[4] Reviewing the book in the Chicago Tribune, Kathleen Rooney compared Hopper to critics like Pauline Kael and Susan Sontag, saying "Every piece...is powerfully written, wittily observed and unafraid to argue.

Taken individually...and as a whole, they make an airtight case for why the professional critic still matters, and why it is a thrill to spend time in the presence of someone whose job it is to care so much and so intelligently.

"[5] New York Times book critic Dwight Garner described The First Collection as "by turns loose and warm and finicky and outraged, and its best pieces are more observant than 94 percent of the first novels that have come my way this year.

"[6] In 2021, Hopper released a revised version with additional essays and a foreword by Samantha Irby.

A starred review in Publishers Weekly said, “This revised and expanded edition ... hits just as hard.”[7]