SOURCE: Wilson-Smith, Anthony. “The Seeds of Terror.” Maclean's 112, no. 43 (25 October 1999): 93-4.

In the following review, Wilson-Smith evaluates the strengths of A Star Called Henry and praises Doyle's creation of such an empathetic protagonist.

Henry Smart is a hard boy, an IRA terrorist and an amoral assassin. He is also a surprisingly sympathetic figure whose motives for violence are not hard to understand. From the moment he is born in 1901, the hero of Roddy Doyle's breathtaking new novel, A Star Called Henry, enjoys only one week of uninterrupted grace and affection—the first seven days of his life. Then his father, a one-legged bouncer and hit man also named Henry, makes the mistake of insisting to his reluctant wife that the baby be called by the same name—although it had previously been given to their firstborn, now-dead son. The pain of that decision drives a wedge between them...