Critics have praised Lingard's ability to delve into the adolescent mind and reveal truths we recognize from that time in our own lives. We identify with her characters, even though we have not experienced Northern Ireland during the war, because her characters epitomize the adolescent experience. Kate and her friends are restless and bored, insensitive and self-centered, and unaware that their "game" of espionage and intrigue could lead to serious trouble.

The girls get caught up in their own fantasy; they inflate the importance of their mission, and they never stop to think that they might be "persecuting" an innocent woman.

"Sometimes not thinking can be a crime," Kate's mother tells her early in the novel, after the girls get caught roaming the streets after curfew and are picked up by the police. But the girls do not think, not then and not later...