[In "Take Me Where the Good Times Are"] an oldster named Tommy Bartin has a brief but violent furlough from the Monument City Infirmary, so called because "nobody is supposed to say 'poorhouse' anymore."… Mr. Cormier depicts his inevitably disastrous odyssey with an admirable lack of hokum, bypassing the easy sentimentality that this drab El Dorado invites…. It is a pleasure to add that the sum total of [Bartin's] failures to recapture his identity in Mr. Cormier's refreshing little history inspires respect rather than pity. (p. 43)

Martin Levin, in The New York Times Book Review (© 1965 by The New Times Company; reprinted by permission), April 25, 1965.