"Malcolm Bradbury claimed that with Empire of the Sun ‘Ballard became an important mainstream novelist,’ and went on to compare him to Ian McEwan and Iain Banks – intending that as praise."

"Empire of the Sun was shortlisted for the Booker Prize – making Martin Amis feel ‘as if the street drug-pusher had been made chairman of DuPont pharmaceuticals’"

https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n10/edmund-gordon/his-galactic-centrifuge