Mind Catcher

Rating:
Summary: Far-fetched piffle in the hands of a hack
Review: A skilled writer might be able to engage an audience with a premise as far-fetched as transferring human personalities into computers. Unfortunately, John Darnton hasn't done this. The writing is hardly inspiring, and the plot wanders needlessly. This plodding pot-boiler may be accurate in its presentation of brain physiology. I can't say, since I'm not a physician. But I am a photographer, and the section in which one of the protagonists shoots photos on 4x5 roll film raises doubt regarding the technical knowledge of the author and his editors. The point here is that, as far as I know, 4x5 roll film is not available, at least to the casual photographer. When faced with such bloopers, I always wonder why authors feel they should blunder around in areas where they are obviously uninformed, and why editors don't double check this sort of thng.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing...
Review: I didn't enjoy this book. It was very boring, and very predictable, in terms of the plot. Despite the topic matter.

Rating:
Summary: Great Concept - Fast Read - Lacking Substance
Review: I had a hard time putting this down. Other reviews on this site have detailed the story enough already so no point in re-stating.
Good points - Fascinating concept, fast pace.
Bad points - Too predictable. I was anticipating a twist or surprise that never occurred. The character development was somewhat lacking.
Summary - I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book though I can't explain why.

Rating:
Summary: MIND CATCHER
Review: I have just finished the last page of John Darnton's, MIND CATCHER, and can report that it kept me sitting on the edge of my seat from the first page to the last. What an astonishing yet eerily credible concept! This is thinking man's fiction, with complex, heart stopping plot twists. For many years I have toyed with the idea of the existence of "anima", having found a personal version of proof, but not a proof that strayed beyond an article of faith. I have read extensively on this topic, yet never before have I found anything that made the connection between the concept of a soul, or center of life, and our contempory world of cyberspace. The connections between this spiritual precept, that all things, all ideas, all people may exist at all times, and the web, are indeed compelling. Darnton's premise is of course, at once thrilling and frightening. I've read his previous books(being interested in the collision of science, the human condition and ethics), but believe MIND CATCHER to be his best work yet. And even more impressive, through this intricate web of science and medicine, Darnton has drawn deeply sympathetic, believable characters (human, flawed in love and life). MIND CATCHER is not only a great read, but a dramatic and chilling call to all of us, as we embark on this newest century.

Rating:
Summary: A "Mind Meets Machine" Story
Review: I listened to the unadbridged taped version of this book, and though I wavered between giving it a 3 or a 4, I decided on the 4 because it kept my attention, unlike many books on tape I listen to. This is a "mind meets machine" story, and reminded me of the movie "Frequency", in which Dennis Quad hears his long-dead father over the radio, and "Matrix" in which the minds of people are living in cyberspace. In this story, Scott's son Tyler has a terrible head injury, and Tyler lies in a coma, as the doctors attempt a never-before-tried procedure to salvage Tyler's mind with the assistance of a computer which seems to take over Tyler's life force.

Rather than dwelling on the plot, I'll comment that for me, the story was interesting, though rather predictable. What I really missed was the point of view of Tyler, the son. I wanted to know where his mind was throughout the story. To me, that would have been more interesting, to know what he was thinking and "doing" in the netherworld as he watched the adults dealing with his situation; but Tyler remained "silent" throughout the story.

The reader did an acceptable job, and for the most part was easy to listen to, except when trying to give expression and voice to some of the characters. In trying to sound like the women characters, his voice took on a whiny, simpering tone, and some of the doctors and scientists took on an overly "diabolical" or "nerdy" tone. These interpretations were somewhat annoying.

My final comment is that yes, the taped version was entertaining enough to keep me listening, but I'm glad I only listened as I went about my work, and didn't spend precious time dedicated to reading the book.

Rating:
Summary: Artistically crafted, imaginatively conceived
Review: I was also unable to put this book down. I was amazed by the imaginative detail - little things such as the meter that determines whether or not the machines or the brain is keeping Tyler alive, or even the use of a psychiatric ward as the backdrop for the exploration of the mind.

Most important of all, Darnton's novel is a new and fresh perspective on what it means to be human. He has separated out what we rarely discern as separate, and he has suggested definition for the mind beyond what we typically consider.

I do not, ironically, agree with the other reviews that Darnton has somehow probed a potentially terrifying future based on biomedical science. This book is more comparable to Shelley's "Frankenstein" than it is to Crichton's "Andromeda Strain", in that it is about the issue of hubris and humanity. Yes, there could come a time when the mind is somehow mapped out by computers and stored away, much as there has already come the time when the human parts of deceased people are used to extend life for the living - but the horrors portrayed by Darnton are not neccessarily any more likely to come about than the monster of Shelley's imagination.

The issue is the *character* of the surgeon Saramaggio (what a great name, by the way - shades of "Dimaggio" mixed up with Saramaggio's portrayed greatness), the *character* of Cleaver (another interesting name, in contrast to the innocence of "the Beav"), and the transformed innocence of the father and the assistant surgeon, Scott and Kate. It is those first two characters' obsessions with success at the cost of humanity that drives this story, and their respective fates by the end of the book are fascinating in their contrast.

A great book! Very well done, John Darnton!

Rating:
Summary: Definetly Not Robin Cook or Michael Palmer or even Clement
Review: John Darnton starts off well, pulls you in as a man who has already lost his beloved wife now is very close to losing his only child. The father takes his son, who fell off a cliff and has a piece of climbing equipment embedded in his forehead, to the best neurosurgeon for care. This neurosurgeon has a "God Complex", imagine that in a neurosurgeon, and he also has a co- conspirator who is both mad scientist and computer genuis/geek who is conducting experiments on how the mind travels outside the body into another existence. From there "Mind Catcher" becomes a mad-scientist science fiction nonthriller with a blunted ending that is less than satisfing. My recommendation: Skip this one and look for something by Robin Cook, Michael Palmer or Peter Clement that you haven't read yet.

Rating:
Summary: Brain candy a la mode.
Review: John Darnton, Mindcatcher (Onyx, 2002)

Darnton's latest novel has all sorts of nifty stuff going for it, not least a punchy, adrenaline-rousing plot. Tyler, a thirteen-year-old boy, has been injured in a rock climbing accident. Two scientists, brain surgeon Leopoldo Saramaggio and artificial intelligence guru Warren Cleaver, see Tyler as the gateway to performing a revolutionary new experiment that could further the medical field by orders of magnitude. At the other end of the spectrum are Tyler's father Scott and Kate Willett, one of Saramaggio's team, who find themselves confused by the ethical ramifications of what the two doctors are up to. Add to this a mutual animosity underlying the necessity of collaboration between Saramaggio and Cleaver, and you have all the makings for a decent medical thriller.

And decent it is, if overly wrapped in cliché and a little predictable at times. Darnton draws his characters well and invests them with real emotion, when they're not spouting phrases that were old when Shakespeare was writing soap operas. The pace rarely leaves breakneck level, and usually gets back up to speed within a few pages. The book goes quickly, especially once the operation begins about ninety pages in. It's good brain candy, gripping but eminently forgettable. An excellent beach read, as we head for another summer. *** ½

Rating:
Summary: Yawn
Review: This book just rambles and rambles and doesn't even get interesting until the last 100 pages or so.

It's a great premise, but pooly done.

Darnton also seems to like to talk about male genitals -- 3 times (and it always is "off to one side") man, how does this apply to the story?

Big yawn, move on.

Rating:
Summary: Biomedical Thriller Chiller
Review: Tyler Jessup, thirteen years old, is on an outing in the mountains when he is struck down in a freak accident--a heavy piece of climbing equipment buried deep in his brain. Fortunately the best neurosurgeon in the country is available and agrees to take the case; unknown to Tyler's desperate father, Dr. Saramaggio is also involved in some--shall we say--questionable research.

The book starts with this premise, tells us a lot about the brain and about the frontiers of research, the possibility of rebuilding the brain with neural stem cells, but then veers off into metaphysics. Can the mind be somehow separated from the brain, extracted by a computer, exist somewhere outside of space and time? And would the world's greatest neurosurgeon do anything--anything--no matter how unethical, to pursue his unorthodox research and the glory that might go with it?

This should be a great book, and at moments it is. It almost works. Unfortunately the writing is uneven, the characters inconsistent, and the events are foreshadowed to such a degree that they lose a lot of their punch by the time they actually happen. At times the narrative drags. There are too many literary cliches--the "mad scientist" mentioned by other reviewers, the grieving father drinking himself into oblivion, the decaying "asylum" from another century with no evidence of modern hospital practice. The unlikely romance...

Then the contrived ending left me with more questions than answers. Well, it was a good book and you will probably enjoy it, but it could have been better. Reviewed by Louis N. Gruber