[An] impressive debut novel … Ms Russell has produced a rich and humid world of spirits and dreams, buzzing mosquitoes and prehistoric reptiles, baby-green cocoplums and marsh rabbits, and musty old tomes about heroes and spells. With Ava she has created a goofy and self-conscious girl who is young enough to hope that all darkness has an answering lightness.

This exuberant fantastical romp about alligator wrestlers in the Florida Everglades by acclaimed author Karen Russell is, simply put, fun... The book is funny, energetic and steams along at a fast-pace, filled with oddball characters and a world so intensely unique yet strangely familiar, you’ll be swept along for the ride from the first page.

If this book does not represent one of the first instances in recent literary memory where work of the mainstream Anglo-American tradition reaches to align itself with the richly evocative, distinctly immigrant aesthetic that has characterized many of the most notable books of the last few decades, then it is certainly among the best of those attempts... Russell creates warm, lively characters whose interactions with one another are spontaneous and organic.

Russell's primeval imaginings and gutsy language lurk long in the memory.

Beautifully written and very witty, yet often extremely sad.

Russell’s greatest skill may be at building a world that’s just a few degrees off of our own, a place where everything is just strange enough that the membrane between life and death seems permeable, and a theme park based around the idea of visiting hell seems downright reasonable.

A suspenseful, deeply haunted book.

Magical realism, American style; lush language, larger-than-life surrealism, a vertiginous line on every page between hopes, dreams and reality, a disorienting mirage of a book. What holds it all together is the voice. Russell's writing is clear, rhythmic and dependable, even as her imagination runs wild.

Russell deftly dips into several story lines. And though she trolls some pretty dark waters (abandonment, consumerism, hungry swamp things), there’s magic in discovering how everyone stays afloat.

There’s no doubting the sheer talent of SWAMPLANDIA!’s 29-year-old author. Words and ideas seemingly pour from her inventive mind in a torrent.

Russell's willingness to lend flesh and blood to her fanciful, fantastical creations gives this spry novel a potent punch and announces an enthralling new beginning for a quickly evolving young author.

Ms Russell has produces a rich and humid world of spirits and dreams, buzzing mosquitoes and prehistoric reptiles, baby-green cocoplums and marsh rabbits, and musty old tomes about heroes and spells. With Ava she has created a goofy and self-conscious girl who is young enough to hope that all darkness has an answering lightness. Inevitably she must learn otherwise. Swamplandia! is ultimately about the aching beauties of youth - the way life begins with such dumb sweetness, while the lessons that give it meaning lurk around each bend like terrifying gators in a mossy fragrant swamp.

The tale of the two flyaway sisters proves lyrically powerful as it maps the enchanted but dangerous worlds that young minds can conjure to deal with grief.

It's a wonderfully extravagant, eccentric story by a brilliant young writer with an amazing imagination.