Donoghue wrote in The New York Times that he did not care much about what happened to Alice and her comrades . He felt that Lessing present Alice as " an unquestioned rigmarole of reactions and prejudices " , which leave no room for any further interest . Donoghue complained that Lessing have not made up her mind on whether her characters are " the salt of the earth or its scum " . In a review in the Chicago Tribune , Kuehn felt that the work have little impact and is not memorable . He said Lessing 's real interest is character development , but complained that the characters are " trivial or two @-@ dimensional or crippled by self @-@ delusions " .