"A richly colorful novel," said the New York Times, but in the author's home town, the bookstore manager kept it under the counter and sold it only to those who dared ask for it. Woodstock was still four years in the future, and American students were more worried about nuclear weapons than the war that was brewing in Vietnam. But already something was blowing in the wind, and the young Daniel Ford was among the first to document it in this, his debut novel. "It is impossible not to keep on watching them," marveled The New Yorker of his quirky heroine and his rebellious anti-heroes, and the Los Angeles Times agreed that the result was "an effervescent eye-opener."