Tillie Olsen says that Miner give us the ‘beat’ of urban life, its politics, its interrelationships; best of all, its old women on the edge of survival. On one block of San Francisco’s tenderloin district in the late 1970s, two working-class women strengthen their friendship through working on a local political election threatening the neighbourhood with gentrification. May Sarton says of these women, No fluff about senior citizens here!
Chrissie and Margaret are beautifully drawn characters, full of prickly yearnings and well-practiced defenses against the stacked deck of life. -
Los Angeles Times .