The Day of the Doctor (Target novelisation) by Steven Moffat: Review

Watching The Day of the Doctor in the cinema (that’s movie theater, transatlantic readers!) with my then six-year-old daughter, complete with sonic screwdriver, definitely ranks among my best Doctor Who-related memories. In fact, it’s pretty high up there among my best anything-related memories. Along with many others we laughed, gasped and sat on the edge of our seats throughout (Doctors! Zygons! Eyebrows! John Hurt!! Tom Baker!!!), and joined in the spontaneous round of applause from the audience at the end. It was quite an experience. I’ve watched it numerous times since, but needless to say nothing will ever match that first time.

So there was no way in the universe that I could possibly resist the Target novelisation, especially when written by – who else? – Steven Moffat himself

In true Moffaty style, this is far from a straight re-telling of the story. From the beginning (The Night of the Doctor) onwards, there’s lots added, some noticeable changes, a lot of timey-wimey-ness ("as an idiot once wrote" – his words, not mine), plenty of similar little writerly asides, an intriguing narrative voice (who’s telling the story?) and a fair bit of Osgood. Or Petronella, as no-one will ever call her. Oh, and a pretty good running joke involving the Silence.

We get plenty of background – how the Doctor’s relationship with Elizabeth came about, for instance. And there are lots of other additions - lines one suspects Steven previously either hadn’t thought of or more likely had to cut for reasons of time. ("Queen Elizabeth the only. She didn’t like being numbered, and I sympathise entirely.")

On that note the author, probably wisely, avoids the whole numbering business, referring to them all as the Doctor (that’s who they are, after all), and deftly navigates the obvious potential pitfalls.

We see a lot here from the Doctor’s point of view and the War Doctor, in particular, gets a lot of time. As is only right

The on-screen scene where all the Doctors team up to save Gallifrey never fails to bring a tear to my eye (don’t judge me). The version here is a bit different – expanded – but equally if not even more emotive. Like various other elements of the story it takes full advantage of the written word’s ability to describe what would be difficult to put on screen. There’s no "Oh for God’s sake – Gallifrey stands!" moment, though.

You can’t improve on perfection… but this book adds a lot to the story and is an utter delight from start (the cover!) to finish (a lovely nod to the future).

On a final note: "Osgood lives – and so long as the fangirls stand guard on the gates of humanity, so will we." Can’t argue with that!

Doctor Who: Myths and Legends by Richard Dinnick - Review

There've been several Doctor Who books in this mould lately - Time Lord Fairy Tales, The Twelve Doctors of Christmas - all beautifully presented and illustrated hardback books which look just gorgeous on the shelf and are equally enjoyable to read. I imagine the physical copy of Myths and Legends will be the same - hence it does lose something in the ebook format, but the stories themselves are equally fun to read.

There are fourteen stories here, subtitled "Epic Tales from Alien Worlds" and written by Richard Dinnick. While they clearly take place within the Doctor Who universe (there's an introduction by Chancellor Drakirid, Historian to the Bureau of Ancient Records on Gallifrey), the Doctor himself pops up only occasionally in different incarnations and is never named as such. There are plenty of familiar friends and enemies, though - including the Doctor's best frenemy in various guises! - and well known figures from Gallifreyan history.

The stories vary in length and tone, and the book is easy to dip in and out of.

Rather like the previous Time Lord Fairy Tales, a number of stories are clearly based on familiar tales - often this is obvious from the titles (e.g. Jorus and the Voganauts, The Vardon Horse). Quite a few also fit neatly into Time Lord history and fill in some gaps in interesting ways - the last one, Pandoric's Box, being particularly notable in this regard, with one particular much-missed face making an appearance.

All in all, despite the main man (soon to be woman!) being mainly absent, this was a fun read, and yes, I will probably buy the hardback....

The Death Pit (Time Trips) - A L Kennedy

What with all that post-anniversary comedown, some new Doctor Who was sorely needed to ease the pain. A brand new Fourth Doctor novella from A.L. Kennedy, you say? That'll do nicely! Especially following on from some brand new Tom in The Day of the Doctor...

Over 2013 I've got used to a new e-book coming out every month, so it's nice to continue this tradition with the new Time Trips series. They're a bit longer (and a bit cheaper) than their predecessors and seem to feature Doctors in random order (presumably as chosen by the authors).

The Death Pit is set at a Scottish hotel in the '70s and concerns dissatisfied 24-year-old Junior Day Receptionist (or, as she points out, Only Day Receptionist) Bryony Mailer, "possibly the most inquisitive human alive on Earth at that time". It's not a very nice hotel, mainly frequented by boring golfers and their bored wives, but it still seems odd that people are disappearing from the golf course never to be seen again. There are other oddities too - the elderly hotel owner is never seen, and there's something a bit unusual about her twin grandchildren. Then a stranger, a particularly strange stranger, turns up...

I detected a distinct Douglas Adams-esque flavour to the writing at times ("He was flailing about in the pit like someone who had just found out a great deal of new and unpleasant information about life..."), which makes it seem very fitting that one of the characters is actually called David Agnew (a pseudonym used at various times in Doctor Who, including famously by Adams and others on "City of Death").The Fourth Doctor is travelling solo post-Deadly Assassin, and seems to be on the lookout for a new companion, at least if his many approving thoughts (we spend quite a lot of time in the Doctor's head here)about Bryony are anything to go by.

I enjoyed this story, although I did get a bit confused towards the end, and was left wondering about certain characters. Possibly that's a failing on my part, though. All in all, a good read which is certainly worth the price tag. I look forward to the rest of the series.