As a novel by a still relatively unknown writer, "The Bookshop" appeared to mostly condescending initial reviews. "The Times" called it "a harmless, conventional little anecdote, well-tailored but uninvolving"; "The Guardian" a "disquieting" novel about "really nasty people living in a really nice little coastal town"; and "The Times Literary Supplement", while calling it "marvellously piercing", pigeonholed it as an example of "the Beryl Bainbridge school of anguished women's fiction". Auberon Waugh in the "Evening Standard" publicly advised her to write longer books. But a few critics did understand her immediately: Richard Mayne on BBC Radio 3's Critics Forum praised the "wonderful precision, economy and certainty" of the writer".