SOURCE: “A Woman Away,” in Times Literary Supplement, No. 4772, September 16, 1994, p. 20.

In the following review, Craig offers a negative assessment of The Glass Lake.

At the centre of Maeve Binchy's plot [in The Glass Lake] is a burned letter—a device well established for giving an askew turn to events that might otherwise have proceeded straightforwardly. It is 1952, and we are in a sleepy Irish town called Lough Glass, which really means “the green lake,” though the descriptive word is picturesquely mistranslated as “glass,” giving rise to romantic reflections on the subject of reflections. Kit McMahon is the chemist's daughter in Lough Glass who is leading a secure life, despite recurrent squabbles with her friend Cliona Kelly, until it dawns on her that her mother isn't quite like other people's mothers. Kit's mother has her own bedroom, for a start, and spends a lot of time walking by...