SOURCE: Whitworth, John. “He Wouldn't A-Wooing Go.” Spectator 273, no. 8679 (12 November 1994): 40.

In the following review, Whitworth offers a positive assessment of Who Will Run the Frog Hospital?, though notes that Moore's humor and shallow characterization of men may not appeal to some readers.

This is a short novel [Who Will Run the Frog Hospital?], and somewhere round it the word ‘poetic’ beats its bat-like wings. It is Alison Lurie (who ought to know better) who uses it about an earlier book of Lorrie Moore's. When you hear the word ‘poetic’ you reach for your revolver, do you not? But hold your fire: things are nowhere near as bad as that. There isn't too much description of the natural world; there isn't too much shimmering exultation; the protagonist is a young girl rather than a young boy, and that cuts out a good deal of the poetic stuff.

Berie Carr...