Paul McAuley continues his expedition into the world of techno-thrillers with Mind’s Eye, a London-based story centred around ‘glyphs’ – graphic images that lodge in the viewer’s consciousness and can induce fits or (with appropriate drug preparations) render the viewer vulnerable to all manner of suggestions, from “buy this product” to “jump from this high place”. The protagonist, Alfie Flowers, was neurologically damaged in childhood by accidental exposure to such a glyph, discovered by his grandfather in an archaeological expedition to Iraq in the 1930s: but now he has suddenly seen graffiti in London that incorporate the very glyphs that affected him, and he wants to know just how this has happened (and whether the artist can provide a cure). But he attracts the wrong sort of attention – others have seen the glyphs and see their potential. Alfie Flowers ends up in a life-threatening chase that takes him back to Iraq and encounters with his past.
The story moves at a great pace and the London setting is convincing. The graffiti art, obviously inspired by Banksy, also convinces. Alfie Flowers and the other characters are all well-drawn, to the extent that when some of them die, there is something of a sense of shock. The plot is, in equal parts, a mix of le Carré, Indiana Jones and The Long Good Friday; written in 2005, it is set contemporaneously and so the technology hasn’t dated.
My one concern is that the device of the glyphs inevitably recalls David Langford’s Basilisk stories about mind-altering graphics, especially BLIT and the 2001 Hugo-winner Different Kinds of Darkness. It is highly unlikely that McAuley was unaware of these stories – the British science fiction community is a pretty small one – but Dave Langford himself is too nice a person to mention this.
And when did the CIA stop referring to itself internally as “the Company”? Some operatives, both serving and former, make an appearance, and keep talking about “the Agency”. Is this officially a thing now?
That apart, this is a compulsive page-turner with an unusual premise and appealing characters.
Deep Waters Reading 