While Doyle had addressed issues in his previous novels that indicated his revisionist and atheist perspective on Irish history before, in A Star Called Henry he tackled these ideas at a far more ambitious scale. Many reviews of the book took issue with his political opinions rather than the novel itself;[2][3] however, aspects of the writing were criticised too. The novel was nominated for a Bad Sex Award in 1999.[4]
Irish reviewers with their own opinions of Irish history tended to be more reserved in their appraisal of the novel than British and American reviewers. Richard Bernstein in The New York Times noted that "Doyle's new novel never lets up. It is an unrelenting tumult of events recounted with tremendous verbal intensity. But it also seems much of the time to be tumult and intensity for its own sake -- a contrived larger-than-lifeness." and that "The prodigal, extravagant quality of Doyle's new book is evident from the beginning ...".[5] The The A.V. Club described it as "extraordinary" and said that "Doyle has fashioned a gratifyingly complex character around which to build his series".[6]
In The Guardian, Roy Foster notes "The novel's greatest triumph is to recreate this world in Doyle's distinctive shorthand, without any creaky historical set pieces, and make it utterly convincing".[7]
In German-speaking countries it provoked mixed reactions. Reviewers with a penchant for Irish literature and history tended to rate it positively, while critics without this specialist knowledge sometimes rejected the novel. Doyle's language in particular is controversial, the content is perceived as too vulgar and unnecessarily brutal, the style is too artificial.[8]
