Kees Kapteyn‘s review of footlights calls it powerful and luminous, and he comments,
Everything literary runs on metaphors, acting as a lubricant for us to move through our lives. Pearl has a sort of sixth sense when it comes to seeing these devices, as if she sees a dimension few people can see. A penny for her thoughts indeed would be an investment with high returns.
As an empath, she carefully considers everything, observing from afar, yet her affection never diminishes with the distance.
Amanda Earl’s review of footlights, also at GoodReads, says in part,
in this book, there is strength, compassion, tenderness and vulnerability. Pearl doesn’t flinch away from illness, discomfort, anger, ageing, blood, or the struggles of the body.
Louise Carson at Poets.ca in a review of footlights called, Straddling the third wall, remarks,
The marvellous line “whatever snaps your shutter, eh.” made me think of Diane Arbus photographing the disabled, the poor, and how we judge people in an instant, take the character shot and file it.