‘Reading Connell’s crystalline prose – sharp, light, sensual and correct – one wonders: “why can’t everyone write this well”. Perhaps writing of this quality is rare because it demands spending a lot of time away from the unstoppably babble of words and barely tolerable excess of objects from which most English language writing emerges. Maybe prose like this can only be written against a peacock sky.’ 

‘… acutely observed and full of moments of startling empathy.’