Doctor Who: Dark Horizons
by J. T. Colgan (BBC, 2012)
While writing in a style evoking the tv show’s snapshot paciness, Colgan nevertheless crafts a solid historical setting — a Scottish island under both Viking and alien incursion — and adds depth to the mercurial flitting about of Matt Smith’s otherworldly (yet unworldly) Doctor.
Doctor Who: The Ring of Steel
by Stephen Cole (BBC Audio, 2010)
#DoctorWho meets War of the Worlds (or the Tripods; take your pick) in an adventure that does little to exonerate the programme from claims it repeatedly sledgehammers the law of conservation of energy (while outdoing Wells for off-handedness in thwarting alien invasions).
Doctor Who, Series 9
BBC, 2015
Bookended by Steven Moffat’s tulipomaniacal stake-raising and overblown (if ingenious) retrofitting of Doctor Who’s mythology, the other writers of Series 9 have crafted a straight flush of dark, self-contained science fantasy; gothic disturbances in which Peter Capaldi adds depth to his characterisation.
Doctor Who: The Nemonite Invasion
by David Roden (BBC Audio, 2009)
Donna is afforded some romance but this WWII base under siege story is otherwise unremarkable; worse, its narrative throws off sparks of cliché and relies on the Doctor having wilfully unleashed an already contained menace (which he then — brainwave — seeks to re-contain).
Doctor Who: The Jade Pyramid
by Martin Day (BBC Audio, 2010)
More a straightforward short story than novel, and with a production crackle marring Matt Smith’s suitably Doctor-esque flittering consciousness narration, this audiobook nevertheless stands out for its atypical Who setting (mediaeval Japan) and the uncommon, almost poetic refinement of Martin Day’s prose.
Doctor Who: Pest Control
by Peter Anghelides (BBC Audio, 2008)
Although read by David Tennant and featuring the Tenth Doctor and Donna, Pest Control harks back thematically to the Jon Pertwee era (and not just by namechecking ‘chitinous’). As such, the parasitic hatch-outs seem overly sanitised and the Doctor’s moralism somewhat underplayed.
Doctor Who: The Runaway Train
by Oli Smith (BBC Audio, 2010)
This pointless paradox in the Wild West plays cavalier with time (oh lord), the dunghill moment being when the runaway train, while outrunning a spaceship, is caught up to by horses that already have galloped for thirty minutes in the opposite direction.
Doctor Who: Dead Air
by James Goss (BBC Audio, 2010)
Doctor Who meets The Boat That Rocked: a creepy tale somewhat at odds with the drollness of its recounting – an extended Tenth Doctor monologue in which David Tennant (sublime and Scottish in other readings) sounds like Bill Nighy crossed with Arnold Rimmer.
Doctor Who: The Day of the Troll
by Simon Messingham (BBC Audio, 2009)
David Tennant narrates in his Scottish accent and plays the Doctor very much as per tv, bringing authenticity and complementary zest to this typically grim, typically compelling Simon Messingham novel, available (atypically) only in audio format. Something is lurking under the bridge…
Unflinching Beyond Midnight
(The Derelict Space Sheep Review of Doctor Who Series 8)
Never one to shy away from the sort of perilous escapade made famous by Danger Mouse and Penfold, Arthur Graeme Smith has ventured into Fish Fingers & Custard to review Peter Capaldi’s first season of Doctor Who.
Arthur’s review appears in FF&C #16, which is available in print or as a (free) .pdf download.
Crumbs, you might well say. Ooh, ‘eck!