Juster says the book was rescued from the remainders table when Emily Maxwell wrote a strong review of it in "The New Yorker". Maxwell wrote, "As "Pilgrim's Progress" is concerned with the awakening of the sluggardly spirit, "The Phantom Tollbooth" is concerned with the awakening of the lazy mind." Hers was far from the only positive piece; children's author Ann McGovern reviewed it for "The New York Times", writing "Norton Juster's amazing fantasy has something wonderful for anyone old enough to relish the allegorical wisdom of "Alice in Wonderland" and the pointed whimsy of "The Wizard of Oz" ". John Crosby wrote for the "New York Herald Tribune", "In a world which sometimes seems to have gone mad, it is refreshing to pause and consider for a moment a book for children which contains a character called 'Faintly Macabre, the not-so-wicked Which.' The name of the book is "The Phantom Tollbooth" and it was written by a bearded elf named Norton Juster and illustrated by Jules Feiffer, who is the cleverest of the young neurotics". Dissenting was the "Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books", which in March 1962 deemed the book an "intensive and extensive fantasy, heavily burdened with contrivance and whimsy".