SOURCE: A review of Storm Glass, in The Globe and Mail, Toronto, June 25, 1987, p. D1.

French is a Canadian editor and critic. In the favorable review below, he surveys several of the stories collected in Storm Glass.

Glib generalizations won't do in any discussion of Jane Urquhart's fiction. Just when she seems to be establishing a pattern in this first collection of 17 short stories [entitled Storm Glass], she darts off in another direction and ambushes our expectations.

But it can be said, without fear of contradiction, that she has impressive talent. There's nothing simple and obvious here; concentric circles of meaning ripple out from the stories, and the prose shimmers like reflections in a deep pool. (Her frequent use of water imagery is contagious.) If Urquhart occasionally strives too hard for complexity, that's always a risk for writers who press against the limits of the conventional short story...