‘Yet there is no futility here. His groping, as he calls it, charms and disturbs and conjures up images of extraordinary, if fleeting, power. … It’s a little bit Poe, a little bit the Ian McEwan of Black Dogs, a little bit something else surprising that it entirely Brooks. … And yet he is so clearly a master of his own prose.’ Jane Sullivan, Australian Book Review
‘This latest collection from one of Australia’s finest poets and fiction writers features a fragmentary approach that allows more light in through the cracks to illuminate Brooks’ characters and situations.’ West Australian
‘Napoleon’s Roads is a powerful and accomplished collection, evocative and secretive, and it lingers deliciously long after reading.’ The Weekend Australian
‘Napoleon’s Roads is a quietly, cunningly postmodern book— a little like a panther itself—a suite of work for the new millennium that does not erupt with the flash and crackle that is often glamorised in the mass media as literary innovation, but that will surely outlive it.’ The Lifted Brow
‘the reader … is likely to be engrossed from the start by the bright intelligence and muted sensuality of the latest performance by one of Australia’s most skilled, unusual and versatile writers.’ Sydney Morning Herald, Saturday Age