[1][2][3] It depicts Dolores as a sadist and a controller of everyone around her; for instance, she enjoys killing small animals.

[4][5] Most notably, the novel takes the interpretation of Humbert as being unattractive or repulsive: he even loses his teeth at one point.

Entertainment Weekly said it "drags down Nabokov's blackly satiric vision, set in atomic-age suburban America, to the level of a cynical 1990s teen sex comedy".

[9] In 1998, Dmitri Nabokov (Vladimir's son, and executor of his father's literary estate) sued to stop the publication of the book in England, France, and the United States,[10] claiming copyright infringement.

Farrar, Straus and Giroux cancelled their planned publication pending the outcome of the lawsuit;[10] eventually, a settlement was reached whereby Nabokov would contribute a preface to the book[11] and receive half the royalty payments with a $25,000 advance (which he donated to PEN International).