SOURCE: Blades, John. “Blurbists Credited with Discovery of Continent.” Chicago Tribune Books (5 April 1987): 3.

In the following review, Blades offers a positive assessment of Continent.

As any critic will tell you, some of today's most imaginative fiction writing appears not in books but on book jackets. Because these testimonials (aka blurbs) come from the author's friends and fellow writers, who may just happen to share a publisher, agent or accountant, they usually have all the credibility of nutrition ratings on cereal boxes. But some blurbs prove too seductive to ignore.

When a book arrives with endorsements from writers such as John Fowles (“a remarkable first novel”) and John Hawkes (“gifted beyond belief”), you can be sure that a critic (this one, anyway) is going to wake up and take notice. Without all the fanfare, I would probably have missed Jim Crace's Continent, despite its having won three prestigious awards...