“An astute and subtle interrogation of a young woman’s struggle to forge her own path amidst a bloody conflict and in the shadow of the sometimes wildly profitable business of other people’s suffering. Margaret Sweatman is a writer of deep emotional insight, and in Lilac Welsh she has created a vivid, complex character caught between warring currents of ambition and familial loyalty. There is a cold fire that burns through this novel.”
“I was thrilled by The Gunsmith’s Daughter, by how cinematic and engrossing it is, what big questions it asks.”
“In this beautifully written and tightly plotted novel, Margaret Sweatman gives us a searing look into ourselves. Lilac Welsh is faced with a moral dilemma. She loves her father but is conflicted about the way he makes his living — he makes guns that kill people. Set in the time of the Vietnam War, Lilac’s dilemma is Canada’s: we criticize U.S. foreign policy, even while our economic well-being remains entangled in America’s. The Gunsmith’s Daughter delivers uncomfortable home truths as sharply and poetically as George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and the Man.”
“The Gunsmith’s Daughter, possessing the forward thrust of a whodunit, makes for compulsive reading and is clearly the work of a seasoned writer who knows what she’s doing every step of the way.”
– Atlantic Books Today

“Throughout the novel, dialogue sparkles with authenticity and wit comparable to the novels of Patrick deWitt (The Sisters Bothers, French Exit). Sweatman’s unpredictable but convincing snippets of conversation go a long a long way in revealing the characters and their relationships, particularly the complex relationship between Lilac and her father.”
– Winnipeg Free Press