Thirty years divide Tobacco Road from Annette: Mr Caldwell's obsession with stunted sexuality remains. The sharecropping paupers of Georgia might seem a far cry from middle-class life in the suburban South, but the differences between Tobacco Road and Flower Street, Zephyrifield, are superficial. The clash continues between baffled male brutality and traumatized female innocence….

[Annette's] glibly appropriate fate reflects on Mr Caldwell's glum view that all girls are innately concupiscent and get their just deserts.

Sylvia Millar, "Deflower Street," in The Times Literary Supplement (© Times Newspapers Ltd. (London) 1974; reproduced from The Times Literary Supplement by permission), No. 3793, November 15, 1974, p. 1277.