SOURCE: “Life behind the Fiberglass Curtains,” in Book World, The Washington Post, Vol. 11, No. 4, October 4, 1981, p. 3.

In the following review, Yardley contends that Trailerpark “is an odd, quirky book that offers satisfactions different from those provided by the conventional, or even unconventional, novel.”

The dust jacket copy of Trailerpark begins with this curious plea: “Read this book as you would a novel—from the beginning straight through to the end.” Inasmuch as Trailerpark is elsewhere described by its publisher as “a novel,” it's difficult to imagine how else to read it—from the middle to the end to the beginning, perhaps? Backwards?

Never mind. The point is to read it, any old way you want. Its publisher's good-hearted protests notwithstanding, Trailerpark is not a novel but a collection of interrelated short stories. Each of them is uncommonly good, and the whole of Trailerpark is greater than the sum...