[Satan Says is] an emotionally young book; hate and love of parents, woman suddenly out on her own, the frightened wife and mother. Olds's experience can easily be shared: she focuses on simple, everyday occurrences and uses the poem to give them deeper meaning. There are a few first-book problems, such as an overuse of tough sexual words (which after a while seem thrown in for shock value), a self-consciousness about being a writer, too many similes, and a few images which verge on the superficial, but these are all things which can be outgrown easily.

Rochelle Ratner, in a review of "Satan Says," in Library Journal, Vol. 107, No. 6, March 15, 1980, p. 728.