Short Trips, The History of Christmas 18.05: Set in Stone, by Charles Auchterlonie and John Isles

I wasn't able to come to this completely fresh, having read the article on The Doctor Who Reference Guide, and I wondered how that would affect my reading; but really it just puts me in the same position as I am for most of the TV serials I missed first time round. And actually, with this particular story the 400-word summary only really spoiled one mystery: what the Doctor wanted with the Stone of Scone. I suspect foreknowledge would damage A Long Night more.

This story is made up of the good, the bad, and the awkward, and they are somewhat intertwined. Let's start with the basics. The cast sound right; I can easily picture them saying the lines they are given. On the other hand, there is a clumsiness to the prose that means I can't really enjoy it just for the flow of words. To take an example from the first page, the writers say

"It was too dark to make out his face, but [Barbara] could imagine the look of irritation leaving his usually wise, knowledgeable features to be replaced by a manic grin."

Then, in the next paragraph:

"She couldn't make out [Ian's] face in the poor light either, but she could easily picture his clean-cut appearance being ruffled by what the Doctor was proposing."

These are not quite close enough in structure to work as a deliberate repetition, but too close for anything else. And the choice of words is... well, perhaps "inelegant" would be most appropriate.

Still, this wasn't enough to spoil the story for me. Other aspects of the writer's craft are well-handled - take, for instance, the imagery. Auchterlonie and Isles have managed to produce something very visual, with a high concentration of scenes memorable for the pictures they conjured up in my mind. I'm particularly fond of the TARDIS crew driving North from London in a borrowed van, and a scene in the ship at the end which links to Logopolis, 16 years in the series' future. The plot holds no real peril (unless you include the danger of them being "found out" by police who stop to help them change a tyre), but this works - the story is never boring.

Less successful is the way the history is tied in with the characters. Ian is surprised by how cheap things are in 1950, and he and Barbara discuss whether they are really suited to the time, with food rationing still on. Hang on - they were both in their 20s (or at a stretch, very late teens for Barbara) in 1950 the first time around! Their thoughts and discussion should take a different form, such as "do we really want to go through this again?"

Similarly, the Doctor doesn't act like he should at this point. He's too proactive, spending a lot of energy and time on an issue he could, in theory, have ignored. Now, I would say that this is fallout from when he came up against a problem he couldn't leave alone in The Time Travellers, that those events changed him; but really I see no other evidence for such an interpretation. He also whips up an antigravity device for moving the stone that seems more appropriate for later incarnations, leading to a passage highly reminiscent of Remembrance of the Daleks.

And this is a great example of why I say the good, bad and awkward are all jumbled up. We have here strong imagery, but it's the wrong imagery, and it raises questions I don't want to be asking right now. Our heroes' theft of the stone is beautifully handled - but what happened to the students who admitted to the crime? Do they exist in this version of history, and if so were they lying? Are the references to the program's future just nods for the fans, or something more? How does it all fit in with the wider Whoniverse?

And since I've asked that question...

A Confused Chronology, part 6: The Closest We've Ever Been to Our Own Time and Place
As mentioned in a previous post, Iananbarbara discuss staying on - since they are the closest they've ever been to their own time and place. Which is odd; it's quite possible they don't think that Planet of Giants counts because of the size difference, but Kilmartin in 1950 is further away than Bristol in 1954, which they visited while still travelling with Susan, during The Witch Hunters.

Or did they? So far as I can tell this story only references the TV show, and (with the caveat above) the statement here makes sense in a Whoniverse consisting only of TV serials plus Set in Stone. Which isn't quite as crazy as it sounds when you consider that Gary Russell went to some lengths to demonstrate that the audios, novels, and comics existed in different continuities. Still, it's not a particularly satisfying answer to a continuity fetishist like me.

A single timestream with both discussions is never going to work, unless you posit an unpublished story in between during which their memories get wiped or some such, and even then you run into similar difficulties reconciling it with The Revenants (set in 1956). If you place that one last the repeated discussion is at least accurate, but I would still find it odd that it's so similar in the three cases; and the fact that Iananbarbara are calm, contented, and at home in the TARDIS at the end of Set in Stone makes their eagerness to leave when they reach Orkney unlikely. Swap the order and you run into other difficulties. What to do, then? I can see a couple of possibilities:

(a) Don't Worry About It.
This is the simplest solution: ignore the contradictions, or if you can't do that, mentally edit the stories until they fit.

(b) A Quantum Superposition of Stories.
Quantum's always a good word to use in technobabble; there's a sense in popular culture that even the scientists who work with it don't really understand it, and as a result it can do anything. It even has a 'many worlds' interpretation, which sounds like just what we need here.

In brief, the idea behind quantum superposition is that a system which can exist in a number of different states actually does exist partly in all of them simultaneously - until we examine it, when measurement will give us a single, concrete result. We can do something analogous for Doctor Who stories: they all exist, contradictions and all, until we experience one - when that becomes "fact", potentially excluding others. The analogy falls down if we then go and read, watch or listen to one of those excluded stories, but not if we allow crosstime slippage: we are effectively shifting into an overlapping, parallel continuity.

Rubbish? Maybe, but admit it - it's fun, isn't it?

I'm going to do a couple more timeslip entries before leaving Susan behind altogether, and I'll discuss another theory when I tackle The Longest Story in the World. For now, though, this has got far too long and I'm shutting up.

Published:
Date: December 2005
ISBN: 1-84435-149-1

Rating:
4/10.

Next Time:
It probably will be a look at the post-Susan gap period overall. But you never know.

And Now, in a Change to our Published Programme...

I'm very grateful to Ian Potter, author of The Revenants, for lending me a couple of books. This means that I can now review Set in Stone properly, and also do a timeslip on The Mother Road (which sounded interesting from bethhigdon's review) - many thanks, Ian! Of course, it also means my schedule is going to be delayed somewhat. I'm typing the start of this notice on Friday morning with the intention of putting it up later today, and I could just post the announcement and leave it at that; but something happened yesterday which amused and impressed me, and might be of interest to you too.

I do try to keep ahead of myself in gathering material for the marathon, with mixed success. When ordering from the library I'm at the whims of the people who currently have a book checked out, and that delayed my review of The Time Travellers; but they didn't have Byzantium! at all, so I ordered a cheap copy. (Incidentally, other than some short stories that can easily be skipped this means I've got everything I need up to Iananbarbara's departure, other than The Plotters, which I will be bidding on soon.)

It arrived yesterday, in oodles of time. My son opened the package, looked at the cover, and the following exchange ensued (slightly paraphrased since I don't have an eidetic memory):

Isaac: When is this supposed to be? That's not a standard legionary helmet, but they are wearing lorica segmentata, so they're not auxiliaries.

Me (largely ignorant of details): Hm? Well, it's Byzantium, so it's probably the Eastern Empire.

Isaac: They'd stopped using lorica segmentata by then. Anyway, the helmet doesn't look right for that.

Me: Well, I was only guessing - let's check when it's set.

[I head off to get Lance Parkin's Ahistory; sure enough I'm wrong, and it's set in 64 AD.]

Isaac: So they would have lorica. But it wasn't used for as long a period as most people think, you know?

[Isaac heads off to get his copy of Adrian Golsworthy's The Complete Roman Army, and very quickly finds a picture of the helmet.]

Isaac: See? It's a cavalry helmet, and its from completely the wrong time period. And anyway, that doesn't go with lorica segmentata because legionaries weren't cavalry and auxiliaries didn't wear it at the time.

Who knew? I love it when people are enthusiastic about something! He wants to join the Ermine Street Guard when he is old enough.

Action Figure Theatre: Fast Return, by Jim Sangster

There's a cross-pollination in the marathons in The Long Game section of Gallifrey Base. Bethhigdon's Timelines marathon is currently covering the period I've just finished (with Susan, Iananbarbara) and an entry there put me on to Action Figure Theatre - too late to tackle the same story, but there's another that is set in this gap, and it's been created by a published Who author.

This is a short, four-page comic. The visuals for Action Figure Theatre productions mostly come from photographing models in handmade sets, and the sets here are fantastic. There's even a visual joke on the second page, where the gates of the junkyard on Totter's Lane are opened just enough to read "Foeman" - behind two Daleks and some robomen.

What's that, you say? Totter's Lane? Daleks? In a story named after a feature of the third serial? Yes, this is nostalgia city - and the plot sets up the events of the Daleks' next starring role, The Chase. It's positively overflowing with continuity, and if I were to take this seriously it would be all too much. Fortunately I don't have to: it is, as the saying goes, just a bit of fun. It contradicts Venusian Lullaby, and requires us to assume that the junkyard looks just the same 200 years after Iananbarbara were first kidnapped, but I don't care. Look at the way the shots are set up! Smile at the shiny "Vworp Vworp" sound effect! Admire the timey-wimey plan of the dastardly Daleks!

Perfect reading for a lovely sunny day at the beginning of the summer hols.

Aaand that's it. I've reviewed all the stories in this gap that I have access to. Before I move on, though, I want to take a brief look at the one or two short stories placed here that I haven't read. I'll deal with them (though not review them) using internet summaries:

Short Trips, Companions 5.17: A Long Night, by Alison Lawson
This gets put in different places by different people: I've seen it in the post-Season One gap, after Planet of Giants, and here. Since it takes place in one night and concerns one of Barbara's dreams (as well as one her mother Joan's) I guess it could go almost anywhere, but because it is set on the first anniversary of Iananbarbara's departure for Joan it should perhaps be placed near there in the schedule. Whatever, it doesn't really affect anything else so far as I can tell.

Short Trips, The History of Christmas 18.05: Set in Stone, by Charles Auchterlonie and John Isles
This is a bigger deal. It takes several months, and is set in the 1950s. Apparently it has another discussion between Iananbarbara over whether they should stay or not, as in The Witch Hunters and The Revenants; and again it uses elements of real history to spice up the tale, like The Nine-Day Queen and The Matter of the Ram's Skull. Without reading it, I'm not quite sure how it fits, so I'll have to make some guesses. But for that, you'll have to wait until next time.

Next Time:
A look at the post-Susan gap period overall.

Give-a-Show Projector Slides

These were never intended as a single story, but the ever-inclusive Andrew Kearley of The Complete Adventures site has combined all the ones that aren't basically versions of televised adventures into a "travelogue-style" story, so I dug out the DVD of The Web Planet and took a peek - only to discover that it only had the Vortis one, which falls into the excluded category. However, the tube that is you allowed me to see the rest as well, though it was too tricky to sort it out so that they appeared in the "right" order.

First impressions are that this is very much in the TV Comic style. The companions are Iananbarbara, but John and Gillian would be more appropriate. I've only seen a couple of the comic strips, but they seem to match up with this - and I know enough to have decided not to pursue that particular thread of the program when the time comes.

Here we have such features as a dinosaur that shrinks as the TARDIS (sometimes called simply 'TARDIS', almost as if we were in Pete's World) moves forward in time - because they became extinct! And you can't take diamonds in the ship because they will disappear! It's a fantasy world of pure magic, where logic and consistency have no place - and perhaps the most fantastic is the Dalek thanking the Doctor and his companions for attacking some annoying insect pests...

It's often been said that the beauty of Doctor Who is that it can do anything, and that's a good thing; but sometimes this means it'll be doing things that I can't really be bothered with. I would class this as parallel universe material - 'Doctor Who Unbound', if you will - and I'm not going to try to fit it into my chronology of the Doctor; or indeed rate it.

Canon
I almost said "my personal canon" in that last sentence, a much-debated phrase. And since this is an extremely short review I might as well make use of the space to lay out my stall.

Let's start with the basics: what does 'canon' actually mean? I don't need to expend any effort on this, since Paul Cornell has explained it all clearly here.

Read it? Good. So you now know how not to use the term (unless you disagree with his argument, of course, which is your right). All that's left is for me to dust down the stage, stack the chairs, and turn out the lights.

Weeeellll.... not quite. Because there's one thing I like to do that Elizabeth Sandifer, in particular, isn't keen on; which is to use terms loosely, if they seem appropriate to me. That makes sense: Dr. Sandifer's critical training means that she can (and should) be precise on her blog, whereas I am a mathematician who reserves his precision for other arenas. I talk about "suspending my disbelief" when that's not really what I'm doing, and similarly I have a "personal canon". Which has nothing to do with canon. Because, for Who, that doesn't exist.

There. glad we got that straight.

Next Time:
A sidestep into the fannish land of Action Figure Theatre...

Happy Birthday to Me!

Well, it was my birthday yesterday; so here's a bit about what's been happening. Don't worry, quite a lot of it's to do with Doctor Who!

But not this first part. All our family love history, and one of the highlights of the year is the English Heritage Festival of History, which always takes place around this time. They have a great market there, so my birthday present was going to be items for my dark age outfit (and my daughter's main present, delayed from April, was going to be material to make hers too). Unfortunately things didn't work out quite like that. My brother-in-law injured himself and couldn't come, then the dog became ill and had to be taken into veterinary hospital, and finally the festival was cancelled at the last minute due to flooding - curse you, climate change! We managed to have a good weekend anyway, including bronze smelting, iron age roundhouse painting and willow work, but it certainly wasn't as planned.

Without a historical market, I decided to use my birthday money for Doctor Who items. I'd already been sent £20 by other relatives, so reckoned with the money from my immediate family I'd get enough - or at least nearly enough - for one story from each Doctor out of the (rather too large) collection of stuff that (a) I've bought when I've seen it cheap, using general household funds; but (b) I'm not allowed to actually use until I've saved up the pocket money. Or, like yesterday, birthday money.

So, what did I go for, and why?

First Doctor: The Guardian of the Solar System
The last of Simon Guerrier's Sara Kingdom trilogy. As you know he's one of my favourite writers, and Jean Marsh performs them so well! How could I not? Well, there was an alternative, with similar recommendations - but The Anachronauts was more expensive, which would have severely limited my other choices. This was the one where I was thinking of my wife, too: she enjoyed Home Truths so much that she bought The Drowned World out of her own pocket money rather than wait for me to save up.

Second Doctor: The Enemy of the World
I almost certainly saw this one on first broadcast, but don't remember anything about it. I'm probably more of an age to appreciate it now - and hey, it's by David Whitaker!

Third Doctor: Planet of the Spiders
I viewed this on a (legal) online site a few years ago, but otherwise haven't seen it since original broadcast; it's the only Pertwee TV story I've got and haven't watched yet. I would have gone for a Caroline John story but I've seen or heard all of hers that have been released. Roll on Ambassadors of Death and The Last Post (two sadly appropriate titles). 8-(

Fourth Doctor: The Masque of Mandragora
It was this or The Leisure Hive, and even though it's the same companion as my last choice I just fancied watching it for the fist time in 35 years.

Fifth Doctor: Ringpullworld
Simply because this was the highest-rated candidate fifth Doctor story on Gallifrey Base last year.

Sixth Doctor: The Holy Terror
Not being a particular fan of the comics I've always been put off by the penguin, but a while back I promised Rob Shearman I'd give this a listen. Time to fulfil that promise.

Seventh Doctor: The Magic Mousetrap
It's the first of a well-received trilogy, so why not?

Eighth Doctor: The Silver Turk
My son just won a trophy for best primary school chess player in a local inter-school competition (he only lost one game, and that was against the secondary school player who won the overall competition). He also likes cybermen (Silver Nemesis is his favourite seventh Doctor story), and history. This one's for you, Isaac.

Ninth Doctor: The Monsters Inside
A simple choice: it's the earliest book I've not read.

Tenth Doctor: The Nightmare of Black Island
Likewise.

Eleventh Doctor: The King's Dragon
Matt Smith is my daughter's favourite Doctor, and she also loves dragons. So this one's for her.

Three books, three TV stories (though one as narrated soundtrack only), three narrated audios (likewise) and three audio dramas. All for a bit over £40. Not a bad present!

But that's not what happened either. Now, I've got no problem with taking money out of savings to get something good for the children - so long as we don't go too far - but I don't do big extravagances for myself. The rest of the family ganged up on me, deciding that I should be profligate for once (which goes against how I was raised) and got me a really big present. When they told me what it was I refused to accept it several times, before they finally wore me down. I weakened when they pointed out this was money that had already gone out of the account, some of it years ago. The result? The most expensive for-fun birthday present of my life. All the Doctor Who stories I've got sat in the cupboard - about a dozen DVDs, a dozen books, and fiftysomething audios (including the whole last season of the Eighth Doctor Adventures). In all, more than £250 worth!!

As you can probably guess, I'm one happy bunny now; though I'm not sure how much writing I'm going to be doing. Have a great week!

Susan's Tale, Part 3

We fell as one, rolling and sliding in a shower of rock and dust. Or rather, what I thought was rock; but it didn't hurt as much as it should have, and I later realised the debris was made up of chunks of the papery substance that we'd been examining above. Still, the angle was steep and the landing knocked the wind out of us both. I felt a twinge in my ankle - the one I'd hurt recently - and realised it hadn't fully recovered yet. I was going to have to be careful for a while, or I might end up with a painful sprain.

It's strange, thinking back on it now. When you're young you assume on some level that everything will be all right in the end. I'd seen enough death to know on an intellectual level that it wasn't so, but still there was that underlying confidence, that hopefulness. It never occurred to me that my ankle might still be troubling me all these years later.

Anyway, I had more pressing concerns at the time. As my eyes adjusted to the extremely dim light I could see that Grandfather was just lying there. I rolled over and grabbed his shoulders, shouting at him. He turned his head and waved a hand vaguely. "Do stop fussing, child, I'm perfectly fine. But I might not be if you keep shaking me like that!"

I hugged him. "Oh, Grandfather, you're okay," I said. Since he started coughing as soon as he finished speaking I was well aware that he was putting a brave face on things, but it was also obvious that now was no time to contradict him. I helped him sit up, and took stock of our surroundings. We appeared to have landed in another tunnel, running almost exactly 30 degrees clockwise of the one we'd been in when the quake hit, and sloping downwards with a camber of about 8 degrees. It's funny how details like that remain so clear; but then my sense of direction and timing has always been near-perfect, when I'm given a chance to focus.

The light flickered, interrupted by a shape moving at the top of the hole; and we heard Barbara's voice, faint and worried. I yelled back, at full volume. "Barbara! We're fine! We can't climb back up, though!"

There was a pause. "Hold on, Susan," she said, "Ian's gone back to fetch some rope." But even as she finished speaking I felt another tremor starting. "Grandfather, I think we'd better move further down the tunnel, just to be on the safe side."

"Yes, yes, just a moment." He was struggling to rise; I gave him my arm, and he didn't even complain. As he finally got to his feet the vibrations grew worse and he almost fell again, but I held on tightly and together we stumbled away from the hole.

Just in time. The entire roof caved in behind us, a huge cloud of dust billowed past, and we were in complete darkness.

Once the air had cleared a little and we could breathe again Grandfather struck one of his everlasting matches. He was hunched over, and held it up as he put his other hand on his knee to support himself. "As I thought. It's completely blocked. We'll have to find some other way out."

I knew he was right, really, but I wasn't able to leave it at that without pushing, just a little. "Couldn't we try to dig through? I'm sure Ian and Barbara will work at it from the other side."

He shook his head. "Hopeless! But this is a tunnel, is it not? One built by some intelligent being? So logically it must lead somewhere. And since we can't go that way" - he indicated the wall of debris - "we must go this way."

He straightened up, the sense of being in charge restoring some of his vigour. I kept hold of his arm and we set off down the tunnel.

It was hard going. The match didn't cast much light so we had to be careful not to trip, and breathing was difficult to begin with. That eased when we reached a junction about twenty minutes later; a faint breeze in the crossing tunnel helped to clear the air.

"Which way do you think we should go, Grandfather?"

"Hm? I don't know, I don't know." He paused and examined the tunnels, but they all looked identical. There wasn't much damage; one or two cracks, but the floor was clear of debris. He sighed, irritably. "Down here, one might as well toss a coin!"

He paused, raising a finger to his bottom lip. "No. Let's think this through, shall we? There's no point in going back the way we came, and the opposite direction simply leads further down; so we should go left or right, yes? And do you feel the way the air is blowing?"

"Yes, it's carrying the dust away to the right. So-"

"So we should go left, towards the source of the breeze."

"Because that must lead us back to the surface! That's wonderful!"

"Yes, well, we haven't got out quite yet, child. We don't know how far we might have to walk."

"But we know we're going the right way, now. It's just a matter of time."

He snorted. "We'd best be going, then. Don't dawdle, Susan!" And with that we set off. I was happy; he sounded much more his old self again.

The tunnel seemed to go on forever, curving gently to the left. I was paying close attention to the journey, just in case we needed to retrace our steps; but the breeze led us onwards, past numerous side tunnels. My mind drifted to Ian and Barbara, and I hoped they weren't too frantic with worry.

It was slow going, and boring too. We had to walk carefully because every so often we would come across fallen debris or a crack in the floor that could trip us up, and we had to be alert to spot the obstructions in the dim light of the match; but this didn't happen regularly enough to present much of a challenge.

Then the match went out.

"Drat the thing! These are supposed to be everlasting, not go out after five minutes. That's false advertising, that is - highly irregular."

"But grandfather, didn't you-" I caught his expression as he lit another match and decided not to finish the sentence - or point out that we'd been walking for almost an hour, which was impressive for one match. There was something else that worried me, though.

"I think this tunnel's leading us in a circle," I said. "We've gone about a third of the way round already."

"You could be right. If so, there must be some machinery keeping the air circulating. Keep those ears open."

We set off again. It was so quiet I didn't need to listen hard, but there was nothing to hear for another twenty minutes. Then I could make out a faint scritching sound, just on the edge of hearing. I stopped; grandfather did too, sitting down for a rest. I was nervous, and the noise was definitely getting louder. "That doesn't sound like a pump to me," I said.

He shook his head. "No. No, it doesn't. I think I might have miscalculated."

It was obvious by now that it was coming from behind the wall against which grandfather was leaning. We both backed away from it.

And then I screamed, as a monstrous head pushed its way through, mouth gaping wide.

Next Time:
Probably some meandering thoughts; but who can tell?

Short Trips, Zodiac 4.01: The True and Indisputable Facts in the Matter of the Ram's Skull, by Mark Michalowski

This is an interesting one to review. I've always said that I give a rating based purely on how much I enjoy the story I'm reviewing, ignoring such factors as importance to the history of the show, production difficulties, received fan wisdom, and indeed quality - except in so far as they affect my enjoyment, of course. When I can explain why I enjoy something - whether it be because it's really well done or just that it tickled my fancy - I do so, and likewise I will point out the problems I perceive even if they don't affect my enjoyment.

Anyway, I enjoyed Mark Michalowski's story - incidentally the very first Big Finish Short Trip - and therefore I rate it pretty highly (as you'll see in just a few paragraphs' time). So let me begin by gushing a little and say some of the things I enjoyed. There's one (minor) spoiler.

First is the tiny framing sequence, reminiscent of a device used in stories of a century or so ago in which the author claims that he is merely passing on a tale which has come into his possession in some way. These are often quite elaborate - Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote some fairly extensive ones, introducing the younger me to the technique, and Michael Moorcock did the same in pastiche many years later - but here it comprises a single sentence at the beginning and a short piece at the end. Combined with the lengthy poetic title, this helped prepare me for a reading experience set very firmly in the past. I notice that this has also subconsciously affected the way I have been writing this review, with somewhat longer, more complicated sentences than usual - even for me!

The prose perfectly emulates the style of the period in which is supposedly written (including names elided as R-, for instance), and this sets the mood well. It's very definitely a horror story, and if I saw it on TV I would have hated it (I saw Dragonfire for the first time last week, and thought what happened to Kane was far too gruesome); but in prose I can cope. The atmosphere is tense, the resolution satisfying.

Returning to the framing, there's a trick at the end that is highly reminiscent of The Nine-Day Queen; and this is where the spoiler comes along, because even though I won't mention his name the supposed author of the story - the Ersatz Author, if you like, or E- for short - is a real man, and if you know a bit more about him than I did you will be able to work it out. E- died shortly after the events of the story, and in his last days called out a name that matches one of the unidentified characters. A mysterious figure then visited the graveside, leaving roses and cognac. What is not mentioned is that this later became a ritual, repeated annually from sometime in the 1930s to 2009 - something clearly possible for the Doctor in his later lives. It's neat.

I've not read much by E-. I've read his most famous poem and one short story and seen a number of movie and stage adaptations, but wouldn't call myself an expert. Nevertheless, this story seems in keeping with his works (though happily not quite so archaic in style) and was a most enjoyable pastiche.

But. (You knew there was going to be a 'but', didn't you, from the way I opened this review? That's foreshadowing, that is.) Is this really a Doctor Who story? Why are the Doctor, Iananbarbara there? The few hints we get seem more like the actions of a later incarnation. also, their behaviour is close to their TV portrayals, but not quite spot on somehow. Normally this would be damaging for the story, but everything is seen through E-'s eyes and our heroes are kept at such a distance that it feels more like an unreliable narrator than dodgy characterisation. The nearest thing on TV I can think of is actually Love and Monsters, where everything is told from Elton's (heh, another E-'s) perspective; but that was focused very much on the Doctor, whereas this is another story that he has wandered into.

But then, that's what he does, much of the time. It's just that normally we are seeing it from his (or his companions') point of view. So I guess it is a Doctor Who story, after all.

Published:
Date: December 2002
ISBN: 1-84435-006-1

Rating:
7/10.

Next Time:
Either the (much-delayed) next part of Susan's Tale, or an off-topic discussion.

Virgin Decalog 2.06: The Nine-Day Queen, by Matthew Jones

I really don't like writing negative reviews, which is why I've put off this one for a while. Well, okay, there's also been the matter of real life positively barging in and taking the doors off the hinges as it did so. Some of it's been good (such as the two concerts my children have been in, including Tuesday night drumming at The Crucible) and some of it bad (mainly being in considerable pain for much of the time and the loss of concentration that comes with that). Still, it's been over a week and I'm feeling like it's not going to get any easier to write this, so I'm just going to put together something short.

My first Whoniversal encounter with Lady Jane Gray was the Sarah Jane Adventures story, Lost in Time (previously mentioned in connection with Mister Benn, of all things). There, the sequences with Rani meeting the Nine Day Queen were my favourite sections of the story; they had an emotional warmth that came across very well. The same is not true here. For one thing, Matthew Jones seems to think that the alien is the most interesting thing about the story, even though it really isn't. Or at least, shouldn't be; but the world of 1553 is so sketchily rendered that it might be by default. The guest cast (with one exception) come across as far too stagey, talking in clichés. Sometimes this can work, but here it is at cross-purposes with a dark plot that seems to call for more naturalistic performances.

The regulars don't sound much like themselves, either. The Doctor, in particular, is far too generic. If anything, I'd say he sounds more like a particularly grumpy McCoy than Hartnell, with a few "hmm"s, "my dear"s and "my boy"s thrown in for verisimilitude. It's not at all easy for an author to catch the cadences and mannerisms of a televisual character in print, as I have been finding out for myself lately; but for me as a reader it is vitally important.

What of the plot? The story starts well, with what I thought was going to be part of a framing sequence: an extract from an exam question set by Barbara. However, this is just something put in at the beginning with virtually no connection to the plot and no matching endpiece, unless you count the way the tone changes to that of a history textbook for the last several paragraphs. We then have a historical backdrop to an alien hunt, with the threat of changed history thrown in for good measure. It's inoffensive stuff, but there's not that much to it.

Once again the TARDIS crew spend some considerable time hanging around during the story - months in this case - and then it is implied that the Doctor is there at Jane's execution, nine months after their arrival. This isn't a complaint, really, since it creates space for the best aspect of the story, which is how it ties into the real history of the time. This is masterfully done, even down to the little details like the bruises on Jane's wrists and her choice of reading matter. When I was younger I used to love the jigsaw-puzzle cleverness of stories by authors like Isaac Asimov, and this one has that in spades. I'm sure if I wanted I could do more research than just reading the Lady Jane Grey Wikipedia page and I would find that Jones' knowledge runs deep. These days, this isn't enough for me, though. I want characters that live and breathe; and these are almost entirely lacking.

I say almost, because Lady Jane Grey is actually rather good. She almost rescues the first part of the story, and it is a real loss when she is sidelined later on in favour of the alien hunt.

Well, once I started I had more to say than I thought. There's actually quite a bit to admire in the story, but its flaws run afoul of my particular bugbears; so I can't rate it highly.

Published:
Date: 1995
ISBN: 0-426-20448-4

Rating:
2/10.

Next Time:
Perhaps Susan's Tale will continue; or perhaps I will be able to uncover The True and Indisputable Facts in the Matter of the Ram's Skull...