[The] fiction of Colin MacInnes has remained virtually unknown on this side of the Atlantic.

The three novels that make up [The London Novels of Colin MacInnes], and which have taken about a decade to cross the big divide, may change all that. Many an American reader, discovering the humanity and vitality of these explorations of the London scene, will regret having had to wait so long for them. But the delay serves one useful purpose: The passage of time emphasizes the unusual quality of these novels. They read with the immediacy of newspaper reportage, yet they clearly have the added dimension of art, for not a word seems to have dated in the slightest over the years since their first appearance. They speak so vividly to today's concerns—concerns that are as real in New York or Chicago as in London—and with so much more balance...