Enthralling. Emotionally gripping . . . ordinary people struggling against a city's beautiful indifference, and clinging on for dear life (Daily Telegraph )
Beautifully crafted, gripping, moving, enlightening. Sure to be one of the best historical novels of the year (Time Out )
Scrupulous, pitch-perfect. With heart-pounding force, Dunmore builds up a double narrative of suspense (Sunday Times )
Magnificent, brave, tender . . . with a unique gift for immersing the reader in the taste, smell and fear of a story (Independent on Sunday )
A masterpiece. An extraordinarily powerful evocation of a time of unimaginable fear. We defy you to read it without a pounding heart and a lump in your throat (Grazia )
A beautifully written and deeply moving story about fear, loss, love and honesty amid the demented lies of Stalin's last days. I literally could not put it down (Antony Beevor )
Dunmore chillingly evokes the atmosphere of Soviet suspicion, where whispered rumours and petty grievances metastasise into lies and denunciation. A gripping read (Daily Mail )
Meticulous, clever, eloquent. An absorbing and thoughtful tale of good people in hard times (Guardian )
A remarkably feeling, nuanced novel that satisfies the head as well as the heart. This does not read like a retelling of history, but like a draught of real life. With her seemingly small canvas, Dunmore has created a universe (Sunday Herald )
Dunmore's genius lies in her ability to convey the strange Soviet atmosphere of these very Soviet stories using the most subtle of clues (Spectator )
Storytelling on a grand scale (The Times)
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