Imaginary friend turned enemy
Invisible Fiends: Mr Mumbles Barry Hutchison Published by HarperCollins ISBN 978 0 00 731515 4
Read the title of Barry Hutchinson's new series of novels very carefully. No, there isn't a spelling mistake. These stories for young teens are all about fiends - not friends. Mr Mumbles, the first imaginary fiend, is far from being a pal. He is very nasty, and he terrorises the novel's young hero.
Hutchinson's novel has one goal in mind - to scare the reader. There is a short set-up in the first few chapters, and then the vengeful Mr Mumbles is introduced.
When Kyle was a young boy, he had an imaginary friend who he called Mr Mumbles because he mumbled when he spoke. Yet this Mr Mumbles was funny, pleasant and understood Kyle very well.
But Kyle grew up, and Mr Mumbles stopped playing a part in his life. By the age of eight, Kyle had completely forgotten about his one-time imaginary friend. But Mr Mumbles had not forgotten about him. He is angry at Kyle and wants to return to his life.
On Christmas Day, when Kyle is 12, a very different Mr Mumbles turns up. He has turned into a monster who will stop at nothing to claim his revenge.
Kyle is horrified at the hideous creature that chases him out of his own home into the night. Mr Mumbles has had his lips stitched together to stop him speaking and looks like something from the depths of a nightmare. The schoolboy finds himself running from someone who had once existed only in his imagination.
Mr Mumbles is a horror story for readers who like to feel the hair on the back of their neck stand up. The story contains a good serving of good old-fashioned scares.
