The book was well regarded by critics. Alanna Nash wrote in "The New York Times" that "the author's ability to capture the paralyzing bleakness of despair, and her uncanny ear for dialogue, make this first novel a work of terrible beauty." In "The Austin Chronicle", Stephen MacMillan Moser wrote a review in the form of a letter to Barry, saying "You blew me away. Sometimes I wasn't sure if something was supposed to be funny or not, but I laughed a lot. But I also feel like I got run over by a bus." In 2013, English professor Ellen E. Berry, published a paper focused on the novel titled "Becoming‐Girl/Becoming‐Fly/Becoming‐Imperceptible: Gothic Posthumanism in Lynda Barry's "Cruddy: An Illustrated Novel."" Berry wrote in her summary of the paper that the book is "a vivid example of what I call 'gothic posthumanism' in which gothic themes and tropes serve to advance an extensive critique of anthropo‐ and other centrisms, all forms of domination, the values of liberal humanism and affirmative conformist culture." Berry analyzes Cruddy using a theory of posthuman ethics articulated by Rosi Braidotti, writing that she used Braidotti's theory "to analyze Roberta's survival strategies and her radically posthuman identification with animals centering on their shared vulnerability and thus their shared goal: to disappear and to survive."