Gale Research
Peter Parley of Spectator offers "all praise" for Venus with Pistol, Lyall's fifth novel, and recommends it "for those with a thirst for the find in the attic and a bottle of scotch in the third drawer down." Maurice Prior of Books comments that while the theme is "not . . . outrageously original," Lyall possesses a "nice lucid smooth style." Prior further notes that "any thinness in story- content" is offset by "effortless and studious" narration and concludes that Venus with Pistol, with Lyall's "inimitable stamp," is "cogent, neatly devised, with nicely- contrived denouement."