SOURCE: Bailey, Paul. “‘Stuff’ and Nonsense.” London Magazine 9, no. 14 (May 1969): 108–12.

In the following review, Bailey faults the stories collected in The Spark for containing poor dialogue and characterization, as well as lack of variety.

The Spark and Other Stories is very much a bloom from the literary hot-house. Mrs Davie is a gifted writer—she can ‘place’ a landscape, an eerie house, a seaside hotel with enviable accuracy.

It's her people—particularly the way they speak—that worry me. When they open their unidentified mouths, it's usually to utter dialogue of the kind that is only heard in experimental plays when performed in draughty drill-halls: Meaningful Conversations, in short. It really is impossible, from one story to the next, to differentiate between the characters: the very young, the old, the middle-aged are all given the same way of speaking. Otherwise clever effects are ruined because of this lack...