A warm, big-hearted tale with a hero you can't help but cheer for

An unpretentious, accessible comedy... a fine example of the things that happen when one dares to think outside the box

A triumphant tale of life, loss, hope and family

An excellent, incisive modern satire that manages to be simultaneously touching, funny and thought-provoking

One of the very few writers who can remember precisely what childhood was really like, how crazy and intense it really was. Utterly unpretentious, totally engaging and very funny

CK Stead, New Zealand's most distinguished man of letters - scholar, critic and poet, as well as novelist - has written a fiction that is remarkable, intelligent and moving

Brilliantly imagined...Among Stead's many achievements is a convincing social, political and physical backdrop...his creation of a coherent, rival story - clever, moving and sometimes witty, with fully human characters - is nothing short of a revelation

A pleasingly unpredictable mix of traditional and radical... It's clever, thought-provoking

Pynchon can be totally maddening, but he has a great sense of mischief

Clever and inventive in a mad professor kind of way...Intermittently warmed by paragraph-long sunbeams of iridescent prose-poetry

A fast elasticism running from slangy to stately, a voice full of echoes, littered with jokes and songs, and often reaching into a curious tenderness, a tone of laid back elegy.... this amazing writer continues to be amazing, and in much the same way he always was

‘[Toni Morrison’s] irreverence was godly’

A beautiful book and it's beautifully written

My favourite book of all time

Morrison's stunning trilogy is an evocation of black life over the past four centuries. It defies summary. Completed almost 25 years ago, these novels top anything produced by any American writer including Hemingway, Updike and DeLillo

[A] beautiful, haunting novel

More than one of Morrison's books could be classed as masterpieces, but this one is famous for a reason: everyone should read it

A magnificent achievement...an American masterpiece

A triumph

She melds horror and beauty in a story that will disturb the mind forever

Toni Morrison is not just an important contemporary novelist but a major figure in our national literature

A work of genuine force. . .Beautifully written

There is something great in Beloved: a play of human voices, consciously exalted, perversely stressed, yet holding true. It gets you

Superb. . .A profound and shattering story that carries the weight of history. . .Exquisitely told

This is a wonderful novel about slavery, freedom, parental loss and revenants