Causing mirth and sneering

Philip Womack in the Literary Review holds forth on TM:

It isn't often that one reads a children's book that begins with a dwarf losing his virginity to a witch; still less that it should continue to include incest and rape [etc. etc. mirthful plot summary of the 'Her father dies (phew!)' kind:] Underneath all this is an involving, if protracted, fable about the loss of innocence and the need to face up to the horrors of everyday life. Go deeper still, and you'll find Hardy, Eliot and...