One of the bleakest dystopias I've read in a book. It says a lot about the importance of reading and of intimacy between people, set in a world where those things are outlawed. Some of the characters' frequent ruminations about sex I found to be a bit cringey, but they made sense in the context of the story. It's very easy to follow with only having three characters and I enjoyed the setting of an abandoned New York. I especially enjoyed the early parts where the two main characters are teaching each other to read. I got very few of the characters' references to certain actors and films that they'd read about, I'm not sure if that's to do with the time this book was written or whether they were deliberately meant by Tevis to be outdated. Either way, a very good and interesting dystopian story which I didn't absolutely love but I would definitely recommend.