"Three Short Story Writers—Peter Cowan, Elizabeth Jolley, Justina Williams," in Westerly, Vol. 25, No. 2, June, 1980, pp. 104-07.

In the following assessment of Mobiles, Williams considers "The Lake" one of Cowan's strongest short stories due to its "abstract, bony prose," "solid-looking realism," and "symbolic suggestion. "

At least three characteristics of mobiles might have suggested his choosing it for a title. No part of a mobile is self-sufficent: it is the surprising balance between them that gives the structure its charm. That balance, again, is always rather precarious, even elusive. And thirdly, it is a form less ambitious than bronze or stone, kept, it may be, for casual decoration rather than planted down as a Work of Art. In the title story, as in several others, I feel that the latent suggestion of triviality in these characteristics is not wholly avoided. But Cowan clearly means his title to refer, as...