SOURCE: Dirda, Michael. “Worlds Within Worlds.” Washington Post Book World (5 September 1993): 5, 14.

In the following review of Little Kingdoms, Dirda addresses Millhauser's reputation as a writer of meticulous tales.

“Reviews,” finally concludes Steven Millhauser, “did not know which to praise more, the meticulous artistry or the haunting fantasy.” Though Millhauser is talking about the animated feature “Dime Store Days,” the creation of the 1920s hero of his novella The Little Kingdom of J. Franklin Payne, the same words might also sum up the enthusiastic reception of his own best work. For no one alive, except perhaps James Salter or John Crowley, can write more beautiful prose. And no one since Borges and Calvino has composed such spell-binding literary fantasies. “The Barnum Museum,” “Cathay,” August Eschenburg, “Eisenheim the Illusionist”—each is a little world made as cunningly, and as exquisitely, as a Faberge egg.

And therein lies the common reservation...