Critical Mick

Reviews Free of Rules.

Reviews by the Clown that All Other Critics Want to Strangle with a Black Turtleneck

Mind's Eye
by Philip Henry
Coral Moon Books, 2006

The Monster in the Rye

Critical Mick: Good Evening, and welcome to another late-night edition of The Unruly View- Phantom FM's highly-rated literary chat show. Whether you're listening in your cars or your bedrooms, many thanks for riding along on this little trip of wish fulfilment! I'm your host, Critical Mick, and tonight we're discussing Portstewart-based author Philip Henry's second novel, Mind's Eye.

CM: Set in the 1989-90 school year, Mind's Eye revisits the monsters of high school: chicks, jocks, parents, vodka, frustration, dreams, hopes for the future, public humiliation. It's a trip down memory lane, but this lane is one of those darkened country roads bordered by overgrown hedgerows and tilting cemetery walls. And, by God, that's not just a howling pursuit of drunken yabboes kicking up a closing fog of moonlit dust- Mind's Eye is set in a Portstewart populated by at least one homicidal creature from the deep. That's right, schoolkids are getting picked off by a towering monster ala a good ol' fashioned chiller flick. Can an average Joe- in this case, an eighteen-year-old only child named Steve Norton- not only survive the horrors of Hutchinson High School but a killer critter too?

CM: Our phone lines are already lit up, now it's my turn. The bottle tonight is Billingham Rye Whiskey. Ahh! Fiery stuff. I'll take the first caller. Hello, you're on Phantom FM.

Danbrown: Uh, yeah, hi. This is famous author Langdon R. Danbrown. I'm a Philip Henry fan and I'm just pleased as punch to be on your show, Critical Mick.

CM: Critical Mick: Yes, yes. Danbrown. Welcome back to The Unruly View, Danbrown. So! You've read Mind's Eye? The whole book, this time?

Danbrown: I read the back of the book first and then the words inside.

CM: CM: And what was your favourite part? Danbrown: Definitely the words inside. CM: Next caller! Hi, you're on The Unruly View. Denise: Hello Mick~ this is Denise in Dundrum. CM: Hi Denise, welcome to the show. Mind's Eye. What did you think? Denise: : I enjoyed the novel~ dead chuffed I was to see a strong female lead fighting the monster alongside Steve. Emily Mathews was a girl with spirit. CM: Yeah, and a bit of a hottie too! There's a trio of high school outcasts who have seen the monster and survived its attacks. In secret they've got to find and battle it before any more of their classmates die. Denise: A fine pursuit it was, too, but Mick! But can you not just say that Emily was a brave and resourceful girl? Do ye immediately have to label her based on her physical appearance~ "A hottie"? CM: Ah! Well, she is Steve's love interest. He does start the novel dating another girl, Rachel, but Emily is the star of the romantic subplot. And she is described with "big, vulnerable, brown eyes… looking really sexy" with soft skin beneath a flimsy shirt that her bra is visible through so… yeah! A hottie. Denise: Critical Mick, you are so superficial! Steve, the lad telling the story, does the same. I have my copy of Mind's Eye here~ excuse me while I read a short passage: Denise: Miss Crabtree, the new science teacher, was a true gift from the gods. Fresh out of teacher training college, she was slim, pretty, and for such a small waist, had huge boobs. For the past month the weather had been blinding, and she ha taken to wearing flimsy little summer dresses and no bras…. She stood with her back to the window and you could see every curve of her body through her dress! And 2) the fan was at the front of the room and, if God was smiling, the cold air would hit her dress and reveal the location and shape of her nipples. (page 2-3) Denise: Writing of this nature is pure sexist! CM: Such opinions allow good discussion, Denise, thank you for opening the topic. Style or sexism? Stay tuned to see, listeners- hello! You're the next caller on Phantom FM. Dylan: Dylan Magill here, salutations! A reaction wells within my teenaged breast, right, to what that previous caller lady said. I'm just after matriculating out of secondary school myself, right, and tha' quoted passage exemplifies what thoughts fill my bleedin' loins all day long! The very essence of young manhood, Philip Henry nailed the nature. CM: Eloquently put, Dylan…. I think. Dylan: Breasts, breasts, breasts, fanny boobs breasts. Then periodic beers and movies and sport and wot. Mainly breasts. Breasts big as cakes! In Mind's Eye, Steve's voice, right, is dead authentic School Days. CM: I've got to agree. There were times I laughed. There's no cardboard to Steve's character, he's crazy and obsessed. Absolutely the real deal. Dylan: A bell-brought gush of tight sweaters! Bounties of breasts suddenly swell in the corridor flow, schools of nipples bobbing high like corks on a waving sea… CM: Hey hey! No matriculating while listening to The Unruly View, here on Phantom FM! Line four, hello! Kelly: Um, hi! This is Kelly, listening online in, like, Manitoba! Phantom rocks! CM: It does indeed, Kelly. Have you read Mind's Eye?

Special Interactive Section! Philip Henry is a bit of a graphic artist as well as an author. To conclude their August 2007 interview, Critical Mick supplied Henry with a series of Dublin nighttime images and the instruction: "Doctor 'em to tell a story, convey a mood or just use them as the jumping off point for whatever you'd like to do. Anything cool & original." Here's what Philip Henry did... click each panel for a full-sized version!

Kelly: Um, no-! I was calling to request that new track by Dingo Fandango, that one with all the ambulance sirens?

CM: No dingoes here! Just rye whiskey and gossip from the world of books, Kelly. Are you into Stephen King, Mark Leslie, guys like that?

Kelly: Um, sure! Gotta support a fellow Canuck like Leslie.

CM: You may wish to also support Philip Henry. Like Mark Leslie, he's a do-it-yourselfer who has brought out his own brand of horror. Mind's Eye is a monster yarn set in a high school in Norn Iron.

Kelly: In where?

CM: That's the way those mad bastards from up North say "Northern Ireland." Norn Iron, Noren Eyeron- well, you know. When I'm still somewhat sober I'm no good at accents.

Kelly: Oh! No, I've seen that already. I don't want any more bombs and argument over churches and stuff.

CM: Ah! You're touching on one of my favourite features of Mind's Eye- it's 100% free of the usual Northern Ireland clichés. No politics, no religion- Philip Henry is telling the story he wants to tell, exploring his own memories and interests rather than rehashing what's already filled so many books and films and tirades from nutters in the pub.

Kelly: Yeah, then, like maybe I will try it out. Just as I seek out cool new bands rather than listen to the hooey the big radio stations try to force on people, I believe I'll, like, take a chance on a new voice in fiction. Can I order that Mind's Eye book online?

CM: Sure can! Details are on philiphenry.com, or just pay Amazon.co.uk a visit. Thanks for ringing Phantom all the way from Canada, Kelly- next caller!

Danbrown: Gosh darn it, Mick! This is Danbrown and I'm mad as hornets that you cut me off earlier! I am a great writer, you know. I'm always ringing in, regular as clockwork, and lending your show credibility.

CM: CM: Yes, Danbrown, you do ring in week after week after week. Hang on while I take a pull of Billingham's. Ah!!! OK, Danbrown, please state your opinion on Philip Henry's novel, Mind's Eye- the words inside, not the cover.

Danbrown: The ugly-as-sin monster which stalks Portstewart is not a ghost. Can I say what it is, loud as thunder, and give the secret away?

CM: CM: Please don't- the nature of their foe is one of the novel's mysteries.

Danbrown: OK, well I'm not letting any cat out of the bag by saying that when Steve first sees something in the shadows of his back yard, he sees a woman who is pretty as a picture! Then when he turns the light on it, bright as day, he sees that it her shapely form was a lie! It's a monster! It reads your mind and, like a master of disguise, bares its fangs and kills you dead!

CM: CM: The goal of a master of disguise is to kill you?

Danbrown: Maybe some of them once they creep up on you. Ninjas. Or something.

CM: CM: Sure, Danbrown. Watch out for that hedge! Might be a deadly, fangy master of disguise. Anyway, that last caller did touch on an interesting point. The monster in Philip Henry's book does not drink blood or suck souls or turn victims into zombies. It feeds on hope. Ah! I found that notion fresh and original.

CM: CM: Well, the texts and emails are rolling on it! We'll be back with more calls right after these important announcements.

 
 
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CM: Welcome back- just got an email from first-time listener Judge Fish. I'm glad you approved of Mind's Eye's high production qualities, Judge. Professional layout, attractive print- I only spotted one typo, myself. On a side note: yes, I am the snivelling, stupid waster you and your shotgun chased off your Laraghcon mansion a couple years back. But, I'm mighty brave when at a safe distance, and full of rye whiskey- you wig-wearing toff! Next caller!

Jeremy: Howyis- Jeremy here in Portobello. Great show! I'm mad about breasts meself. The diddies on yer one, Jordan, Jaysus-!

CM: Alright, thanks Jeremy! Let me just remind callers that The Unruly View tonight is about Philip Henry's novel, Mind's Eye- and nothing else! If you've read the book and have something to contribute to the discussion, I'd love to hear from you. Line eight, you're live on Phantom FM!

Nigel: No breasts?

CM: Line two, keep it clean!

HH Bullimore: No discussion of comely young women from me, my friend, and certainly no twaddle.

CM: I know that voice! Winner of about every literary award there is, folks, we've been joined by South Dublin's own HH Bullimore. How the [bleep] are ya, Bully?

HHB: Your flattery aside, this is not such an engaging program tonight, I'm afraid.

CM: Sheesh! Everyone's a critic.

HHB: I must draw exception to tonight's title in question. Though inspired by The Catcher in the Rye, Philip Henry's novel Mind's Eye displays weaknesses in form and content that will prevent it from becoming an equal classic.

CM: How so?

HHB: Let me begin with inconsistencies: Steve begins, in October 1989, not knowing how to hold a beer. The lad discovers the meaning of Dutch courage through the drinking of that, his very first. A brief month later, in the short course of a dramatic teen party, he consumes a bottle and a half of vodka yet remains sober enough to race across town and engage the dread foe-? Come now! This and further inclusions and omissions brought to ground, without soft landing, the suspension of disbelief upon which all speculative fiction depends.

CM: Huh?

HHB: Do try to keep up, Mick, you are not a complete spanner. I am saying that, with all the lapses from realistic expectation, I found it impossible to take the text at face value and thus fall under the spell Mr. Henry wove.

CM: Maybe Mr. Henry was shooting for an unreliable narrator? Hell, with all the rye I've drunk, I'm an unreliable radio host!

HHB: Fair point, teenaged boys do fib uncontrollably. The inconsistencies may be attributed to the narrative voice's authenticity. But in terms of the experience generated for the reader: one of the three main characters, the third leg of the trinity which oppose this unholy beast, is not introduced until page 106 of the novel's 233. Well after the obligator first third of the novel- what habitual television viewers may comprehend as the "First Act"! This violation results in a feeling of disharmony within the story arc.

CM: Ah, Bullimore, you're full of applesauce! You're giving out because a character wasn't introduced in the order your high-fallutin' literary theories demand? Get off of my show, ya raisin! Ha!

CM: Um!

CM: Let's go to commercial while I ask my production team if I have just torpedoed my career. Answers after this!

 
 
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CM: We're back, on the Unruly View. Phantom FM's most drunken cat show! Meow! Line seven.

Imogen Collins: Hello Critical Mick, Art Beat host Imogen Collins here! Great program tonight.

CM: Really?

IC: Oh yes! I was just driving my Mercedes G-Class Cross-Country Vehicle through Dublin, on my way to interview Slash from Guns n' Roses, when I tuned in to your discussion of Mind's Eye. I couldn't resist ringing!

CM: Ah! OK, Imogen!

IC: I just wanted to set the record straight on this novel, seeing as… I'm in it!

CM: Huh?

IC: Yes, the author and I had a brief acquaintanceship back in the 1980's when I was working in local media in Northern Ireland. Obviously he has never forgotten the encounter, and so included me in his story along side references to Bon Jovi and the film Aliens. You know, big cultural identifiers from the 80's?

CM: OK!

IC: In addition to appearing as a minor character in the novel as a glamorous, sexy media celeb, Henry begins each chapter with a quote from one of my programs of the day. For instance, Chapter VI - The St. Valentine's Day Massacre (February 1990) begins, "The main thing to have is hope. Everyone should have hope on St. Valentine's Day. Even if you are unbelievably ugly, someone may take pity on you."

CM: Those were real? I thought that was just trademark Henry humor.

IC: Do you think Philip Henry included all these quotes from Ask Imogen and other sources because he's still obsessed with me, do you? I have a feeling he sometimes took excerpts that made me sound crass, besides. You don't think Philip Henry is enraged at me, like a serial stalker or something?

CM: Erm- I can't believe I drank that bottle this quickly.

IC: Pardon?

CM: Hang on, listening to my producer on the headset… Wait a minute! You're the Imogen Collins the nosy reporter who covers all the deaths in Mind's Eye? When I interviewed Philip Henry, he let me in on some of the real people and events that influenced Mind's Eye, but, you? Megabitch? You're a real person-?

IC: Serial stalking happens to big stars like me too often- I could tell tales…. Wait…. Did you just say-? (silence) [Bleep] you, Critical Mick!

CM: OK, my producer says we need an "ungettable get" if there's any hope of a Unruly View next week. And we may just have got it! Line one. You're on Phantom FM, tell us the best part about Mind's Eye.

Lefty: Three words: High Body Count. High school tasties by the dozen get chopped down.

CM: Sorry?

Lefty: You heard me! I cheer for the monster, and the one in Mind's Eye sure carries the flag for the rest of us. In one night alone, he kills twenty-six snotty, horny punks in the prime of their life! Yes!

CM: Who am I talking to?

Lefty: The Left Hand of Chatsworth. You know Colonel Chatsworth, the renowned demon hunter whose own left hand is possessed? Chatty dropped his cell phone in the wrong pocket again, and by brimstone I'm doing my best to run up his roaming charges.

CM: Do you have one of those sock puppets on you-? I've drunk a bottle of rye whiskey in less than an hour, but how the hell else can a hand talk?

Lefty: Hundreds off little mouths that screamed open along every crease and knuckle! We do our best to wreck Chatty's career and drive him nuts.

CM: Ha! When you're not reading books!

Lefty: If this literary chat show was for humans only, you should have said so in the intro. Too late now! You now have one demonic entity, here to praise the monster in Mind's Eye.

CM: Well, I suppose a story is only as good as its villain. Go on.

Lefty: The misunderstood monster in Mind's Eye is a poor soul trapped in a world far from its proper place and era. All it wanted was to find a few bright youngsters, full of hope and promise. Then kill 'em.

CM: Yikes!

Lefty: It has only one friend in the entire novel, and that friend must hide his or her identity- never letting on to the so-called "heroes" that true allegiance really lies with the creature from the deep!

CM: So the monster has a human ally? A secret human ally?

Lefty: You'll never guess who it is.

CM: Anything else to add, Lefty?

Lefty: That Bullimore guy's a tight-arsed turd! Mind's Eye is a hell of a lot of fun, from the monster's point of view or the humans'. So long, you long-winded, fat arsed twit!

CM: Well! Rooting for the monsters! And saying turd. The Unruly Review has hit a new low, and is out of whiskey. Tune in next week for our discussion of Declan Burke's Eightball Boogie… no? Next week Phantom FM is giving this slot to the Neo Knitting News? "Grungy shit to listen to while knitting?"

CM: Shit, I said "shit" on the air. Oh well. Folks, it's been fun! Visit philiphenry.com for more info on Mind's Eye! To all the boob-callers and abusive texters and emailers, let me just close by quoting the words of a Philip Henry vampire: BITE ME. I'm off to the pub! Thanks and best regards!

Please don't get mad or sue

Yo! This review and all content on the DFA Guide site are copyright 2007 Mick Halpin. All links to other sites and documents are copyright to whatever source wrote something cool enough for Mick to give it a referral. Try to claim them as your own work and bad karma will catch up with you, baby. Believe it.

Irate, huh? Managed to piss off another one? Direct your hatemail to mick @ mickhalpin dot com.

This Page Was Last Updated On 26 October, 2007.

Ride needed to Belfast- call Van

01

Time flies

(A million years old and drunk at the moment)

02

03

Hi Phil

Sorry for the delay

06

07

08

09

10

11

Gravel Road

Been to the North Sea

Woman with 2 Heads

The music stopped

Great

Turn it on

Monster from the bay

Sophisticated Theme

Bought a trunk with his diary

Havoc Theme

Heaven

Rita Coulter is a legend

Bye now wish me luck

And now.... Strange Sounds from the Basement

Ribbon Cutting Time

I don't know why

Basically Gravel Road again

barber?

Strange Sounds from the Basement