Latest / A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast / Hamster Book Club Top Tens! (featuring Andrew Batty)

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Hamster Book Club Top Tens! (featuring Andrew Batty) · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:01
  Welcome back to the Hamster Book Club.
• 0:03
  My name is Joe Ford and I am so excited today because I'm here
• 0:09
  in person with. Andrew Batty.
• 0:12
  Hello. Andrew, what on earth are you
• 0:14
  doing here on my sofa? I am here today to talk about
• 0:19
  top 10 best and worst Doctor Who books, which is very exciting.
• 0:25
  I've been highly stressed with my choices to make sure that
• 0:28
  I've done the right ones, but I think I've got it down.
• 0:31
  Come to a bit of context first, please, of just now.
• 0:34
  I think I asked you this before, but you gave me a very sort of
• 0:36
  nonspecific, ambiguous answer to this, of sort of how much of the
• 0:41
  Doctor Who Hoover that you've actually read.
• 0:44
  Now I know you own. Oh oh.
• 0:47
  No, I don't own every book, but yeah, I've got, I think I've got
• 0:52
  all the new adventures, all of the eight Doctor adventures now
• 0:54
  recently completed all of the missing adventures and probably
• 0:59
  about half of the past Doctor ones.
• 1:02
  But out of that I'm not sure how what proportion I've actually
• 1:07
  read because I tend to just go towards the ones which I know
• 1:11
  are going to be good and avoid the shit ones.
• 1:13
  So I'm a little bit worried that my list is being only based on
• 1:18
  ones which I've actually read. Might be a little bit unbalanced
• 1:23
  when it comes to the worst ones. Coming to a book club near you,
• 1:28
  the other half of Andrew's collection of Doctor Who books.
• 1:32
  Prepare yourself for some expletives.
• 1:35
  Well, OK, let's now I've sort of asked you all of the questions
• 1:40
  on the the Hansard Book Club normally haven't I like what was
• 1:43
  your favorite Doctor Who author? Who's underrepresented?
• 1:46
  What's your favorite Doctor Who book?
• 1:49
  This is going to be an interesting list because I
• 1:52
  really don't have a clue. I'm sort of getting an
• 1:55
  impression of the ones you like and the ones you don't.
• 1:57
  You're sort of pro Paul Mars, anti, I don't say anti gun, but
• 2:03
  anti sort of that machismo sort of book.
• 2:08
  Is that right? Yeah, I mean, I tend to be drawn
• 2:12
  towards the more sort of playful ones, I think, but you know, the
• 2:16
  sort of serious dark guns and war ones, if they're done well,
• 2:20
  they can be good. So yeah, I, I, I, I think I just
• 2:26
  like things that are good rather than thinking like.
• 2:31
  Just like. Things that are good, just like
• 2:33
  things that are good. Well, let's find out what's good
• 2:35
  and what's not. Go straight to your your first
• 2:40
  choice. So let's do a let's do a good
• 2:43
  one first of all. So of your top ten favourites?
• 2:46
  OK, so my top my my first choice is kind of three books, but I'm
• 2:53
  going to only talk about one in detail.
• 2:55
  So I feel like I'm kind of smashed them together and anyone
• 3:00
  who's listened to the podcast will know how much I love Paul
• 3:03
  Mars, but especially the first three books that he did for the
• 3:09
  BBC Books line. So Scarlet Empress, The Blue
• 3:13
  Angel and Ver Degree. But the one I want to talk about
• 3:18
  is Ver Degree, so that's my first my first choice.
• 3:21
  Can I confess something to you before you even say why you love
• 3:24
  that one, right? I got three people to read Third
• 3:29
  Degree, which is a book I love as well.
• 3:32
  Yeah, and two of them hated it so much I refused to record the
• 3:37
  episode. I said I just will not allow you
• 3:39
  to trash this book. So will you please explain to
• 3:42
  Dylan Rees and Luke Malloy why they are wrong?
• 3:47
  Well, yeah, so it's it's a really interesting take on the
• 3:53
  3rd Doctor era and sort of past Doctor books as a concept
• 3:59
  because you kind of get Iris wild time inserted into this
• 4:02
  point in the Doctor's past. And it very much talks about it
• 4:08
  in that in those terms that, you know, this is kind of an
• 4:10
  interruption of the 3rd Doctor's story and then kind of pulls
• 4:16
  together all of those kind of tropes of the 3rd Doctor era of
• 4:21
  alien invasions and the UNIT family and the Master.
• 4:25
  But then chucks in loads of like surreal stuff and just weird,
• 4:32
  beautiful imagery. Like the one that sticks with me
• 4:34
  is this kind of train in the middle of a beach, like like a
• 4:41
  steam train in the middle of a beach which is full of Victorian
• 4:45
  book characters. Literary characters.
• 4:48
  It's like ladies chatter this letter.
• 4:49
  Yeah, I think it's like an alien race who've read the classics.
• 4:56
  So that's how they think that they should disguise.
• 4:59
  Themselves, isn't it? Yeah, but the way I the way I
• 5:04
  described my click bait description of of Verdigre to
• 5:08
  you and. You've been marketing so much to
• 5:10
  me today as we've been talking. I've got a list of movies to
• 5:13
  watch. So my my click bait sell of
• 5:16
  verdigre to you was this was the book that made me gay.
• 5:20
  So why so? Doctor past Doctor adventure.
• 5:25
  Yeah, so actually, like, personally to me, this book is
• 5:29
  just really important As for a kind of turning point in my
• 5:33
  life, I think, where as a kid there weren't really many any, I
• 5:43
  suppose, gay characters in anything that I read or watched.
• 5:49
  And I think when I read The Scarlet Empress and The Blue
• 5:52
  Angel, there were queer themes and those, and then especially
• 5:58
  in the Blue Angel, there's, there are queer characters.
• 6:01
  But I think I did this thing where I'd sort of read around
• 6:04
  stuff like that and I because I wasn't really ready for it.
• 6:06
  I didn't really register and go in.
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  But then when you get to ver degree, there is Joe, not Joe
• 6:15
  Grant, Iris Wild Time's companion, Tom, who is a gay man
• 6:21
  from the late 90s who is travelling with Iris Wild Time.
• 6:25
  And for me, that was just a bit of a revelation, like a book
• 6:29
  with an actual queer character in it.
• 6:32
  And there's a particular scene in the book which, well, I'll
• 6:37
  get, I'll get to that. But so this book came out in
• 6:40
  2000, I think, when I was about 13.
• 6:43
  And I think I'd recently watched or maybe at the same time as
• 6:46
  this, like Queer as Folk was was repeated.
• 6:50
  And yeah, it was kind of, I was getting to a point in my teenage
• 6:57
  years where it was like, I think everything I've been told was
• 7:00
  when you hit puberty, you're going to start start liking
• 7:02
  girls. And that just hadn't really
• 7:05
  happened. But I was expecting it to and it
• 7:08
  didn't. But then reading this book with
• 7:10
  Tom in it, Iris companion. And there's a scene in it where
• 7:14
  he there's sort of these these characters who are a parody of
• 7:18
  the Tomorrow people. And there's a bit where he's
• 7:20
  sort of. Destiny.
• 7:21
  Yeah, where he's like flirting with one of the one of the the
• 7:26
  Tomorrow people. And reading this as a 13 year
• 7:31
  old, I was like, I want this to happen.
• 7:35
  And that's kind of OK. And it was kind of just like a
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  moment of like realisation of, you know, this, he's a gay
• 7:45
  character. Maybe I'm gay and maybe that's
• 7:48
  OK because Tom's OK. And I think, you know, there's
• 7:52
  sort of like, there's a lot of talk these days of, like, the
• 7:56
  kind of representation matters. And it's kind of one of those
• 8:00
  kind of sort of glib terms which, you know, I think is easy
• 8:04
  for people to kind of ignore. But, you know, for me, this was
• 8:07
  a real example of that, of like, you know, representation does
• 8:11
  matter. And that actually seeing that
• 8:13
  character there helped me to recognise something in myself.
• 8:17
  And yeah, that book was just a complete turning point for me in
• 8:22
  my life, which I don't think many people could say about many
• 8:26
  Doctor Who books or, you know, that's.
• 8:29
  Pretty amazing though. So yeah, like I, I mean the, the
• 8:35
  people probably have that with a lot of like books or films or TV
• 8:37
  series that they just watch a a particular moment which helps
• 8:41
  them realise something. And Verdigree was that for me,
• 8:44
  so. Yeah, mine was Edward Furlong in
• 8:47
  Terminator Two. It hit me at just the right
• 8:49
  time. I was like, I'm feeling
• 8:51
  something for that. Yeah, that.
• 8:53
  I think he was a bit older than me, actually, the kid in the
• 8:55
  film. And I was, I couldn't figure out
• 8:58
  how I felt. And then I was like, oh wow,
• 9:02
  that's incredible. And it's just a very funny book.
• 9:05
  As well, it's a very funny book and really memorable and full of
• 9:08
  imagery. So yeah, thank you, Paul Bars,
• 9:12
  but I'm all. Right.
• 9:13
  My God, writing to this this one.
• 9:15
  She has to make his day. There's one bit in 3rd degree,
• 9:18
  you know, where Mark Yates is folded up and put into Joe
• 9:23
  Grant's handbag as if Paul Mars is suggesting he's A2
• 9:27
  dimensional character. Yeah.
• 9:30
  And I think that that's a lot of that sort of stuff, I think is
• 9:34
  why a lot of people don't like, like a certain sort of Doctor
• 9:37
  Who fan doesn't like. Yeah, that sort of.
• 9:40
  Yeah. Do you know, talking to Paul
• 9:41
  like he literally the 3rd Doctor here, all that stuff that all
• 9:45
  those very serious Doctor Who fans like that is his favorite
• 9:49
  period of Doctor Who. He's not mocking it so much as
• 9:51
  he's he's inviting you to laugh with it.
• 9:54
  Yeah, rather than at it. Yeah.
• 9:56
  What a great first choice. OK, so that's that's sort of top
• 10:00
  of the pile. What's at the bottom?
• 10:03
  Right, so I'm starting with the one that might be the most
• 10:09
  contentious, so. I've prepared them, so go for.
• 10:14
  It it's Longbarrow, yeah. So I.
• 10:21
  Wow. I can't.
• 10:24
  Well, there's there are good. I think with with all of the
• 10:28
  books that I've that I've chosen, there's there's good
• 10:30
  bits and bad, bad bits. But I really didn't get on with
• 10:34
  the Doctors family storyline in Longbarrow.
• 10:38
  I absolutely hated it. What?
• 10:40
  Too weird. Just, I was just really bored by
• 10:47
  it just like that to think that this monumental event is
• 10:52
  happening, You know, we're going to see the doctor's house and
• 10:55
  the doctor's family. And then there are all these
• 10:57
  people called like badger Badger and like, they're all like
• 11:03
  eating fungus in the. Dark or sounds like a Paul Miles
• 11:08
  book now. And then there's just like all
• 11:10
  this. But I didn't buy the 7th Doctor
• 11:14
  after everything that he'd gone through in the new adventures
• 11:17
  just being presented by this house full of weirdos.
• 11:20
  Would, you know, make him fold in on himself and like, start
• 11:23
  questioning his. I don't, I just didn't buy it.
• 11:25
  And there's just long, interminable scenes in that
• 11:29
  House of mushrooms and looms and.
• 11:36
  Do you prefer the Do you prefer the idea of the looms or that
• 11:40
  the doctor can just have sex? I, I mean, I don't mind, I don't
• 11:45
  actually mind the concept of looms and the others, the other.
• 11:48
  I thought that was quite clever, the way that they did that and
• 11:51
  the way that you kind of, it was a clever way of like how do the
• 11:58
  Time Lords reproduce and all that mythology and just for the
• 12:01
  Doctor asexual. And then the stranger I can tell
• 12:05
  you precisely. At the Time Lord reproduce OK,
• 12:07
  they weren't looming anything. And yeah, I I do quite like the
• 12:12
  bits in the book of Ace and Leela.
• 12:17
  I thought those bits worked really well and those those
• 12:19
  characters together worked really well.
• 12:21
  It was nice to say goodbye to to Ace in that book, and it was
• 12:24
  good to kind of bring her into the the the 7th Doctor's last
• 12:29
  story. It doesn't deal with Chris very
• 12:31
  well. It's Chris's last story.
• 12:33
  He gets like sort of amnesia, my favorite thing in the books, and
• 12:38
  then he's just sort of dumped at the end.
• 12:40
  He does. Turn up later on, don't he?
• 12:42
  In Bernice, Yes, but he's been turned into an ugly man or
• 12:46
  something. It's very weird.
• 12:48
  They basically said he's not, he's not a pretty young blonde
• 12:51
  hunk anymore. Well, what's the point of that?
• 12:55
  We don't want to know. It's all sort of atmosphere,
• 12:58
  isn't it? And there isn't much plot.
• 13:01
  Yeah, yeah. And the, the flat, the 1st
• 13:06
  Doctor flashbacks and all of that.
• 13:07
  I think I was OK with. It's just, it's just the Doctors
• 13:10
  family stuff and the house. I just, I think it's the same
• 13:13
  thing as Ghost Light as well. I don't really like Ghost Light
• 13:15
  either. And it's kind of the same story
• 13:17
  of just here's all these weirdos in a house that you don't really
• 13:22
  want to spend any time with. I'm seeing your type of dog,
• 13:25
  mind you. You could make a link between
• 13:27
  sort of Paul Mars and and Mark Platt in that it is sort of
• 13:31
  quirky, but the tone is totally. Different different types of
• 13:35
  quirk I think. Wow, you started on a high there
• 13:38
  with that bottom tin list. Well, let's go back to, let's go
• 13:42
  back to a good one. Yeah.
• 13:44
  So next one on the list. Also a late new adventure, Happy
• 13:49
  Endings by Paul Cornell, which I feel like, yeah, it's it's like
• 13:54
  the five Doctors of the New adventures.
• 13:56
  It's just such sort of joyous book where you just get to spend
• 14:01
  time with your favorite people. All the best people, aren't
• 14:05
  they? And it's quite, it's quite nice
• 14:09
  that it's quite low stakes. You know, it's this, it's
• 14:14
  Burnish's wedding to Jason, all the kind of past companions from
• 14:19
  the from the 7th Doctor books come back.
• 14:22
  You've got kind of a bit of drama going on with Ace and and
• 14:28
  Jason, but is that really what's happening?
• 14:31
  So yeah, I think it's just a really kind of feel good, fun
• 14:36
  book. Fabulous cover.
• 14:39
  With all the guests on it and Sylvester McCoy is there twice.
• 14:42
  Yeah, Yeah. I just, yeah.
• 14:46
  I mean, there's not really much to say about the plot of the
• 14:47
  book, but it's just being able to indulge in those.
• 14:52
  Yeah. And sort of indulge in that
• 14:54
  continuity best and just. Yeah.
• 14:57
  It's the one time Paul Connell did a wank fest where I was
• 15:00
  like, fine, fair enough. I mean, that probably would have
• 15:03
  been a good ending. Yeah.
• 15:05
  For the New Adventures. And what's weird is, is they
• 15:07
  marry her off. And so it's like, great, this is
• 15:10
  a good way for Bernice to leave, you know, And she's found her
• 15:13
  own hunk to go off with. I think they separate after like
• 15:18
  six months and, you know, they have a terrible time off A happy
• 15:21
  endings, especially to be a happy ending.
• 15:24
  The new eventuals can't quite let anyone be happy for too
• 15:27
  long. There's not as much drama in a
• 15:28
  happy, stable relationship. As that's very true, very true.
• 15:33
  OK, well then slaughter another book for us.
• 15:37
  OK, so my next one, alien bodies.
• 15:42
  No. So yeah, we're going to the
• 15:47
  early BBC books here and it is The Roundheads by Mark Gatiss
• 15:54
  again. In fact, I have never finished
• 15:58
  The Roundheads because I just find it so boring.
• 16:02
  Do you like historicals? Yeah, I, I don't mind a
• 16:06
  historical, it's just I love the 2nd Doctor, Ben and Polly and
• 16:12
  Jamie. I I got this one as a kid
• 16:16
  because I'd loved The Murder Game by Steve Lyons and I was
• 16:19
  like, oh great, there's another Second Doctor one.
• 16:21
  You just made Luke very happy. And yeah, just super bored by
• 16:28
  it. And then I thought, oh, we'll
• 16:30
  come back to it as an adult. Like, you know, I can probably
• 16:33
  appreciate the historical detail.
• 16:35
  All of that got the audio book bored out of my.
• 16:41
  Yeah, I just, I really enjoyed this one.
• 16:44
  No, there was just, yeah, nothing about it grabbed me and
• 16:49
  I probably got about halfway through and I was like, it's
• 16:51
  just going to be more of the same.
• 16:52
  I'm just, I'm not into this. Can I ask you, do you get on
• 16:55
  with Mark Asus TV scripts? No.
• 16:59
  OK. So maybe it might be a sort of
• 17:01
  flavour of Doctor Who. I like the Crimson Horror.
• 17:05
  I like How could you? Not they're the wrong hands.
• 17:11
  I like Nightshade, so I'm not like a complete mock Gattis
• 17:15
  hater. What he?
• 17:16
  Did in the middle of the tragedy day, is that right?
• 17:19
  Oh, St. Anthony, Saint Anthony's.
• 17:21
  Player. Oh that was so boring.
• 17:23
  I haven't read that one. No, he don't want to do
• 17:25
  adventures after that. I don't.
• 17:27
  I don't think so. I think he just did those.
• 17:29
  Out of ideas now. So there are Steven Moffitt
• 17:31
  instead. Yeah, so the Round Heads is out.
• 17:34
  Round Heads is out. OK, well let's let's let's be
• 17:38
  kind again. OK so going from a a shit second
• 17:42
  Doctor book to a really good one.
• 17:44
  Oh, I love it. Segway from once to an ugly.
• 17:46
  Come on. The final sanction by Steve
• 17:49
  Lyons, Which? Steve Lyons is that, yes, you're
• 17:54
  right. You're hearing this loop right?
• 17:58
  So again, it was one that I got as a kid and again, kind of
• 18:03
  because I'd really loved the murder game.
• 18:06
  So the murder game is quite a kind of, it's a murder mystery
• 18:09
  plot set on a space station. It's quite fun and light in tone
• 18:14
  and introduce these aliens, the stellations, who are sort of
• 18:21
  armoured shark aliens. And then the final sanction is
• 18:26
  the sequel to the murder game, which kind of goes more into who
• 18:29
  the stellations are and the war that they're having with
• 18:32
  humanity. And it's just a really moving
• 18:36
  story and kind of shows the worst sides of humanity in that
• 18:43
  they were kind of the aggressors in this war that attacked the
• 18:47
  Salacious planet. And that's what changed them
• 18:49
  from these cute dolphin people to arming themselves as sharks.
• 18:55
  Super interesting. Isn't it like saying that that
• 18:57
  they were introduced as such a like a a more almost comic, but
• 19:01
  formidable, like evil force, and then to put that spin on it and
• 19:05
  say, actually, no, there, there's this is a tragic story.
• 19:09
  And there's a very clever chapter that's written from the
• 19:11
  perspective of a dying soldier, which leads you into thinking
• 19:17
  that this is a dying human and the kind of injustice that's
• 19:20
  been forced upon them. And then you come to the end of
• 19:24
  the chapter and you realize that it's one of the selations and it
• 19:26
  kind of flips, flips, flips things on its head.
• 19:31
  So it's a really strong story. It's also a great story for Zoe,
• 19:34
  who gets the bulk of the action and kind of has a bit of a
• 19:38
  Donner in Fires of Pompeii type storyline in that she's trying
• 19:43
  to change history and stop this sort of atrocity happening.
• 19:48
  And maybe I think that storyline, it plays out in a way
• 19:51
  that maybe you wouldn't expect and goes in a direction which
• 19:54
  Doctor Who doesn't often go in when it when it's talking about
• 19:57
  these changing history stories. So yeah, it's a really, really
• 20:03
  strong book and yeah, one that I think doesn't get talked about.
• 20:07
  Totally unlike anything in season six as well, isn't it?
• 20:11
  So? And we've had this discussion
• 20:14
  with Luke about should the, should these books be, you know,
• 20:18
  just doing adventures of the type, what we got then, or
• 20:20
  should we be doing new things? And that is a good argument for
• 20:24
  doing new things. OK well, come on, get the shovel
• 20:29
  out. It's time to bury another book.
• 20:32
  OK, so this one I think won't be that that contentious.
• 20:37
  It's a book which, well, actually it's the first ever
• 20:42
  original Doctor Who fiction, I think.
• 20:45
  The invasion from space. What's that?
• 20:48
  So that was it was so it was a, a first doctor book that was
• 20:54
  published like an annual in the, in the probably about 1965 or
• 20:58
  something. It's very rare and difficult to
• 21:01
  find. Oh.
• 21:01
  I love you, you're so neat. So it's. 65.
• 21:06
  It's one of those ones which was always kind of like printed in
• 21:08
  books as like, you know, this is kind of a Doctor Who rarity.
• 21:11
  It's very difficult to find, but a couple of years ago BBC Audio
• 21:16
  did an audio book reading of it and.
• 21:20
  It's who did it. Do you remember?
• 21:22
  I think it's, I think it's Peter Purvis reads it.
• 21:25
  So you know, it's, it's a great reading.
• 21:27
  It's just kak. So it's, it's kind of like an
• 21:32
  annual story, like one of those bizarre ones.
• 21:35
  It doesn't really feel like Doctor Who.
• 21:39
  So it's about so the TARDIS lands in the Great Fire of
• 21:43
  London. The Doctor kind of like rescues
• 21:46
  this family who are about to burn to death, but he also
• 21:50
  fucking hates them. And they're just really, they're
• 21:54
  really annoying. Oh, just as they are.
• 21:56
  All you people in this in my TARDIS and then they sort of go
• 22:00
  to the future and it's one of these like very sort of Flash
• 22:04
  Gordon sort of story. I can't, I can't, can't even
• 22:09
  remember the story. Like the one where the people
• 22:11
  tell the doctor to get naked. No, I think that's I think
• 22:14
  that's another another one and it's just it's.
• 22:17
  What's going on in those annuals?
• 22:19
  Yeah. So it's kind of like an annual
• 22:20
  story, which would normally be like 20 pages or whatever, but
• 22:24
  now like 60 pages. So it's quite interminable.
• 22:29
  And yeah, I just wouldn't recommend.
• 22:33
  It's probably like one of those ones which lots of people like
• 22:37
  lust off, but because it's such a rare item.
• 22:40
  So when you. Actually get it and like the
• 22:43
  artwork is very pretty and it's got that kind of retroesthetic.
• 22:46
  To it. I just want to see him treating
• 22:47
  this family terribly, you know? Yeah, I think they eventually
• 22:51
  get home in the end. Don't die.
• 22:54
  No, he doesn't. Just like, kick them out into
• 22:55
  the TARDIS, into the vortex. But yeah, I mean, it's probably
• 23:00
  good for comedy value. So pleased you've got something
• 23:03
  from 1965. Or more or less, yeah.
• 23:06
  OK, back to top 10 then. Back to the top ten.
• 23:09
  OK, so it's another it's another Steve Lyons.
• 23:15
  Just to you hearing this book, are you doing this for him?
• 23:18
  No, I mean, I think I I also love Steve Lyons.
• 23:21
  I'm just not as vocal as. Nobody is as vocal as Luke.
• 23:28
  So yeah, the crooked world which we've spoken about, I think, I
• 23:31
  think all of us have recommended.
• 23:33
  My episode on that I. Haven't listened to it.
• 23:35
  I can't bring myself no. They weren't to kick.
• 23:38
  Well, James Lark actually did like it a lot.
• 23:39
  But a lot of criticism. We may have to redo this one.
• 23:44
  So yes, the Crooked World 8th Doctor story about the Doctor,
• 23:48
  Fitz and Angie landing on a planet where it's kind of a
• 23:53
  cartoon world and all the characters are loosely based.
• 23:57
  Well, not loosely, they are exactly.
• 23:59
  They are all of Hannah Barbera and sort of Warner Brothers
• 24:05
  cartoons cartoon characters. And, you know, it's one of those
• 24:10
  concepts which sounds like it could be terrible, but it's
• 24:13
  absolutely brilliant and really moving and yeah, just full of
• 24:20
  memorable moments and using those kind of stock characters
• 24:24
  in really interesting ways, doing interesting things with
• 24:29
  all of the regulars as well. And yeah, it's just, it's one of
• 24:34
  those like 10 out of 10 Doctor Who stories, which I think
• 24:37
  should be at the top of everyone's list.
• 24:39
  I love this custard pie gun. Oh, I can't remember the custard
• 24:42
  pie. It's quite a few years since
• 24:43
  I've read it. And when Fitz in a
• 24:46
  characteristic effort to get into the underpants of or
• 24:49
  underpants and. That would be pit stop and.
• 24:52
  Turns out she's got no bits because she's OK.
• 24:58
  I'll be like, I can do nothing but endorse that choice.
• 25:01
  That's a. Wonderful book and also I I
• 25:05
  bought it for a friend of mine who'd enjoyed like series one of
• 25:09
  Doctor Who. Like the the Christopher
• 25:13
  Eccleston's theories, we were talking about this earlier about
• 25:16
  when when there were piles and piles of Doctor Who books for
• 25:20
  like 99 P in the works. And I got her The Crooked World
• 25:23
  and she absolutely loved it as kind of a very casual fan.
• 25:28
  That's. Amazing.
• 25:29
  Yeah. So trying to get her into the
• 25:31
  deep end of this. Book I want to read more.
• 25:35
  We're going to apologise now if anyone can hear a cat meowing
• 25:38
  outside the window. It's one of the many cats from
• 25:41
  the street that my overall feeds, so apologies for the
• 25:44
  meows. Oh, it's very cute, Yeah.
• 25:47
  It comes in the bloody windows. I'm sorry, I'm back to the
• 25:50
  books. So bottom, but back to the
• 25:54
  bottom, Yes. Do you know what?
• 25:56
  Some out of the bottom, some of our favourites.
• 25:57
  So see which author's going to be crying to themselves to sleep
• 26:01
  tonight. Well, it's another doc, another
• 26:05
  writer that we've spoken about on the podcast before.
• 26:09
  It's not Barry Letts, it's our good friend Simon Messingham and
• 26:15
  the Infinity Race, which I think is at the bottom of a lot of
• 26:19
  people's lists. So this was a book which came in
• 26:25
  the middle of a very well at the beginning of a very exciting
• 26:28
  story arc in the 8th Doctor books off the back of Time 0,
• 26:34
  which kicked off an exciting new story.
• 26:40
  Reality has been shattered. It's off into different parallel
• 26:43
  story, last parallel worlds. What's going to happen next?
• 26:48
  What's going to happen next is a really dull story about a
• 26:51
  regatta in space and just turgid dull.
• 26:57
  I think about it, Yeah. I remember lots of scenes from
• 27:00
  Fitz and Angie's point of view and how Messingham completely
• 27:03
  fails to capture these characters.
• 27:05
  Yeah, but I I don't even remember the race.
• 27:08
  I don't remember who wins. I do remember Sabbath turns up
• 27:11
  and that's it. Yeah, I couldn't even remember
• 27:13
  the Sabbath. Not coming to a book club near
• 27:17
  you? Please God.
• 27:20
  You're happy for that to go to someone else?
• 27:22
  Yeah, yes. OK.
• 27:23
  Yes, very happy for that. OK, so well recommend another
• 27:27
  one. Well, sort of similar era of
• 27:31
  Doctor Who. Doctor Who hates doctor books.
• 27:34
  Anachrophobia by Jonathan Morris Andrew which tik.
• 27:39
  T.O.K. Yeah, which I mean, we were
• 27:41
  talking about sort of the sort of more gun books versus like
• 27:50
  the more kind of like this is a very serious book.
• 27:53
  You know, I like the serious ones too.
• 27:56
  It's. Not going to box you into a cold
• 27:58
  or a high concept camp, all right.
• 28:00
  Yeah. So this is a, well, this is a
• 28:03
  high concept book of of sort of time travel.
• 28:07
  And yeah, again, full of really strong imagery.
• 28:12
  Probably the most memorable monsters in the BBC Books line
• 28:17
  for me, I think pictured on the best book cover of the of the
• 28:21
  BBC Books line in my opinion as well.
• 28:24
  The kind of Rene Magree pastiche of the guy in the top hat with
• 28:28
  the clock face. Have blood on it.
• 28:31
  With the yeah, with a little splash of blood.
• 28:34
  Don't do blood very often on the covers, do they?
• 28:36
  Yeah. And this, yeah, this is a tense,
• 28:39
  scary one. And the, the way that the kind
• 28:43
  of monsters are created is really creepy and really like
• 28:49
  affecting and moving. Because, yeah, the the way that
• 28:55
  the humans are kind of turned into these clock men is that
• 29:01
  they sort of get into your head and make you want to.
• 29:06
  They make you think about your past and something you regret
• 29:08
  from your past and then make you want to change it and go back in
• 29:13
  time to change something that you regret in your past.
• 29:16
  And that is what kind of turns you into one of these clockwork.
• 29:20
  And it, oh, it's just so creepy and is.
• 29:22
  It one bit with the base commander who's a bloke and he
• 29:25
  remembers a soldier that he either he wanted to have an
• 29:29
  affair with or that he had an affair with and that's when he
• 29:33
  turns. It's really great idea.
• 29:36
  And people finding like their insides turning to clockwork
• 29:40
  and. Is there an end of chapter as
• 29:41
  well where the doctor looks up, doesn't he?
• 29:43
  And his face is is a clock. I remember Angie being great in
• 29:47
  that as well, just as she sort of starts figuring out the rules
• 29:51
  of the world. And of course, because she's all
• 29:53
  about numbers on the Stock Exchange.
• 29:55
  So when they go off to clock Weld in the last third, yeah.
• 29:58
  Oh, what a great choice. Yeah.
• 30:04
  So, yeah, from a from another 8th Doctor.
• 30:09
  There's a lot of 8th Doctor on this list, but I think, you
• 30:11
  know, we love for me, don't worry.
• 30:13
  And that's also because that was the period where I was actually
• 30:16
  reading every book as it came out.
• 30:19
  So this is one on the bottom now.
• 30:20
  This is one on the bottom. So yeah, that that was the
• 30:25
  period when I was kind of, yeah, getting the kind of full swathe,
• 30:29
  the kind of quality when it came to Doctor Who books.
• 30:32
  So this is another one which kind of clanged for me, which is
• 30:37
  emotional chemistry. Not a fan of Russian literature?
• 30:42
  No. Well, maybe, but not as written
• 30:46
  by a Doctor Who by a. Test or than a four, Yeah.
• 30:50
  Yeah, so again, it was one which kind of came in the middle of an
• 30:53
  arc and just sort of did its own thing, but not in a particularly
• 30:57
  interesting way. And it's not like I feel like
• 30:59
  every book has to play into an arc to be worthwhile.
• 31:03
  It's just I think when you've got those continuing storylines
• 31:06
  which are meant to kind of capture the reader, and then you
• 31:09
  put a standalone in it, it better be a bloody good
• 31:11
  standalone. Otherwise it's just going to be
• 31:13
  frustrating. Like the crooked world.
• 31:15
  Like the crooked world? Yeah, and this one sort of stood
• 31:19
  apart from from the range. I can't remember it really doing
• 31:22
  much with the regulars. It was just sort of doing its
• 31:25
  own thing, but just being quite a dull.
• 31:28
  Talents of Wenjiang is Magnus Grill in it at.
• 31:31
  Some point knows, God knows. Like yeah I can.
• 31:34
  I can barely remember anything apart from being bored and
• 31:37
  frustrated with it, so it goes in the bin.
• 31:40
  I do remember the pros being quite fruity and interesting,
• 31:44
  but it was so dense and I remember getting off my throat
• 31:48
  and going oh this is like what is this got to do with anything?
• 31:52
  OK, well, back to the recommends.
• 31:54
  Back to the top 10. Back to the top 10.
• 31:57
  So this is one that we've done on the book club, Sands of Time,
• 32:00
  Justin Richards. So yeah, I mean, I think a lot
• 32:05
  I've chosen quite a few that are about sort of time travel timey
• 32:08
  wimey type stuff. But yeah, this is.
• 32:10
  More of a fan of Moffett? So yeah, this kind of does that
• 32:15
  time hopping cause and effect story probably.
• 32:20
  Well, it's one of the best takes on that.
• 32:22
  I think in Doctor Who takes a classic Pyramids of Mars and
• 32:27
  then is a sequel to it, but does something really interesting
• 32:31
  with that sequel and does things differently.
• 32:34
  Kind of moves about in time, but depicts all of those places
• 32:40
  really well. There's a real pace to it.
• 32:43
  It's a proper action adventure. And you know, it's been
• 32:46
  reprinted so anyone can go out and enjoy it.
• 32:49
  You have not. Got a scour eBay for ridiculous.
• 32:52
  Amounts of money exactly 1. Of the ones on BBC as well the
• 32:55
  website. Yes, so it was on a.
• 32:57
  Bit of coverage on it. I think Justin Richards might
• 33:01
  have been making the decisions as to which books.
• 33:04
  And also there's a whole podcast episode about how with us
• 33:08
  talking about in depth. I see.
• 33:09
  I remember some very witty, erudite people being on that
• 33:12
  episode. Stop, stop, stop.
• 33:19
  Yes, so back to the worst. Oh yes.
• 33:24
  So yeah, so that was a must. Have you said any kind of order,
• 33:27
  by the way? No, no.
• 33:28
  This was sort of like as it came to me.
• 33:30
  I wanted Love Barrow to be your number 11 Doctor Who story.
• 33:34
  It's definitely not the my number one worst ever, so yeah.
• 33:39
  From a from a From a missing adventure to another missing
• 33:42
  adventure. From a sequel to ATV classic to
• 33:47
  another sequel of ATV classic. You're an expert.
• 33:52
  Yeah, Shadow of Wen Chai Yang. What a pile of crap.
• 33:57
  David A Mckinty. David A Mckinty So this is
• 34:00
  another one that I gave up on. It was boring, but it also was a
• 34:06
  little bit racist and a little bit sexist and.
• 34:12
  Well, just like talents of Weng Chai Yang then I mean just.
• 34:15
  Just like talents of Weng Chai Yang.
• 34:16
  But yeah, for a book that was published in the 90s, it kind of
• 34:20
  should have known better. And yeah, I got a third of the
• 34:23
  way through it and I was just like, no, I don't is.
• 34:26
  It all tones and. Well, it's set in the 1930s and
• 34:29
  there's just a lot of sort of inscrutable character, like all
• 34:34
  of those kind of yeah, stereotypes about about the
• 34:40
  Chinese actor, Chinese characters in it.
• 34:42
  And I was just, yeah, I think it was, it was playing, playing
• 34:46
  with genre in the same way that the talents of buying Chai and
• 34:49
  did, but in a way that wasn't really like challenging or
• 34:52
  deconstructing any of those stereotypes, just sort of
• 34:56
  presenting them in kind of a pastiche way.
• 34:58
  And yeah, I just really wasn't into it.
• 35:00
  And I gave up on it. I always thought, you know, poor
• 35:02
  old Mary Tam, Ramona won. She has a tough time.
• 35:05
  She has a lot of terrible books, and of the Companion Chronicles
• 35:10
  those were by far the worst as well.
• 35:12
  Yeah, someone needs to write. A good bloody good Romana.
• 35:16
  One story they do Okie dokie so from David A Mckinty 2.
• 35:22
  Back to Jonathan Morris with Touched by an Angel.
• 35:27
  Brilliant. Yeah, so a new series adventure,
• 35:32
  I think. I think I've picked this out as
• 35:34
  one of my recommends before on on the podcast.
• 35:37
  But yeah, another tiny whiny story and probably I think the
• 35:44
  best use of the Weeping Angels outside of Blink.
• 35:48
  A better sequel to Blink, I think, then Time of Angels,
• 35:51
  Flesh and Stone. And again, doing something that
• 35:57
  really character driven and a character who's not one of the
• 36:01
  TARDIS team, which I think is, you know, quite unusual for a
• 36:04
  new series adventure to kind of invest this much in that kind of
• 36:08
  supporting character there. It's sort of the story of a man
• 36:13
  who loses his wife and is then tempted to try and get her back
• 36:20
  by all this time travel mechanism and and the Weeping
• 36:23
  Angels trying to manipulate him. And it's.
• 36:26
  Yeah, it's a really strong story.
• 36:28
  And yeah, again, one which in the kind of in the world we're
• 36:33
  in now where the books maybe don't get as much focus as TV
• 36:36
  episodes, I feel like hasn't really had its its.
• 36:40
  You said this before about the latter day books, about how some
• 36:44
  of them were great and they just haven't had the focus because
• 36:47
  they're not the only Doctor Who we're getting.
• 36:50
  Exactly like you, you don't get books now which have the kind of
• 36:55
  critical reception of something like human nature, which I think
• 36:57
  was always received really well and highly acclaimed.
• 37:02
  So yeah, I think that's probably, I think in later years
• 37:06
  someone will come back to some of these books and they'll kind
• 37:08
  of get more of their appreciation.
• 37:11
  I. Don't think the people would
• 37:13
  expect there to be a book as stunning as Touched by an Angel
• 37:18
  in the NSA as well. So the fact that that's there
• 37:22
  and I don't, I've never heard anyone say a bad word about that
• 37:24
  book. Yeah.
• 37:25
  God, that's a brilliant choice. I'm glad a new series adventures
• 37:28
  in your top 10. And another new series adventure
• 37:31
  is in my In a move that will surprise no one, I have selected
• 37:39
  the Doctor that. Recently read.
• 37:44
  Recently read Recently endured for the podcast.
• 37:51
  Andrew. Oh, God, it was just awful.
• 37:54
  I mean, I think usually when I read a mediocre Doctor Who book,
• 37:58
  there's like, something I can get out of it, but it was just
• 38:01
  such a plod. And yeah, I mean.
• 38:05
  Short as well. You should have raced through
• 38:07
  it. Should have raced through it,
• 38:09
  but yeah. And just seemed like there were
• 38:12
  a lot, there were too many ideas in it, but a lot of good ideas
• 38:16
  and a lot of ideas which you think would have been done in a
• 38:18
  certain way, which were not done in that way, in a way that was
• 38:23
  kind of to the detriment of the book.
• 38:25
  Again, we've got a whole episode.
• 38:27
  I'm talking about how I managed. To go.
• 38:29
  Do you remember when Luke said that did not want to write for
• 38:34
  the 10th Doctor and Donna? Yeah, it shows, doesn't it?
• 38:38
  It really shows. Completely, yeah.
• 38:42
  So let's, let's never, let's never mention it again.
• 38:46
  You brought it up. What are you talking about?
• 38:49
  OK, well then, back to the great books.
• 38:51
  Back to the great ones. So another one.
• 38:54
  Another 8th Doctor one, I'm afraid.
• 38:56
  But I chose this one. It's maybe not the best 8th
• 38:59
  Doctor story ever, but it is the one which kind of hooked me and
• 39:04
  got me into reading them regularly.
• 39:07
  And that's History 101 by Maxwell Holiday, Which?
• 39:12
  Not talked about much. No.
• 39:14
  And I think so. I got into the 8th Doctor books
• 39:17
  because I'd really gotten into the The Big Finish audios.
• 39:22
  And then there was the big gap between Neverland and Zagreas
• 39:28
  where I was like, oh, I just need more of this stuff.
• 39:30
  So I think I went out and I bought History One O 1 and
• 39:32
  Camera Obscura. Oh.
• 39:34
  Boy, I wonder you came back. And yeah, so History 101 is a
• 39:39
  story that's set in the Spanish Civil War, and I always like
• 39:43
  when the books kind of deals with a part of history that the
• 39:47
  show hasn't done, in particular when it's not British history.
• 39:50
  So it was an interesting setting, I think, for a Doctor
• 39:53
  Who book. And then it does interesting
• 39:56
  things with time travel and changing history.
• 39:59
  The characters are really well. Executed in this book,
• 40:03
  particularly Angie and I remember she gets a really great
• 40:06
  joke about her homage to catatonia.
• 40:10
  You know, great, great pun. I mean, we're always here for a
• 40:12
  great pun and kind of mystifies fits with with her late 90s
• 40:17
  references. So yeah, it's just one that I
• 40:20
  have a really strong affection for because it's the one that
• 40:22
  kind of got me into reading that story, that complete series from
• 40:26
  that point in. And then I kind of went back and
• 40:28
  filled in some of the gaps with those characters.
• 40:30
  To fight, doesn't it? In that I remember it's another
• 40:33
  one of those books that really puts fits through the ringer but
• 40:35
  gets you in his head. Yeah, and he has a really close
• 40:38
  relationship with a kind of with one of the characters.
• 40:42
  He would you then kind of find out is is an agent of Sabbath.
• 40:45
  So again, like there's this. Interesting ARC stuff going on
• 40:49
  I. Don't know what?
• 40:50
  Tell me if I'm mad. I've got this picture in my head
• 40:53
  of them going into a room and there's all these images frozen
• 40:57
  in the air in that book. I'll just make that up.
• 40:59
  I. Can't again, I haven't read it
• 41:01
  since it first came out, but. You're often complimentary on my
• 41:04
  record, but that's all I recall. Yeah, I mean the, I think the
• 41:09
  Picasso painting, painting Guernica is really important to
• 41:12
  the plot in some way that I can't really remember now, but.
• 41:15
  Is that on the list? It's not on the list, but it
• 41:17
  could be on the list. You have to write.
• 41:18
  That on the list? I'd love to read that one again.
• 41:21
  Yeah, we've given how much we love the 8th Doctor Avengers, we
• 41:24
  really ain't covered many of them.
• 41:26
  Yeah, OK, right now, no more. Oh no, there are still 8th
• 41:30
  Doctor books. I can't say that.
• 41:33
  Which end though? Back to the worst.
• 41:37
  So I feel a bit mean picking this one out, but it just, it's
• 41:41
  one that I remember not enjoying.
• 41:44
  It's The novelisation of The Rescue by Ian Marta.
• 41:50
  Is it not very short? It's only two ever.
• 41:52
  Well, I think that's kind of the problem with it.
• 41:55
  It's one of those ones which kind of needs fleshing out so
• 41:58
  that he kind of extends the plot quite a lot.
• 42:01
  And there's all this stuff where they're having to like climb
• 42:04
  through ravines and you explore more of the planet.
• 42:06
  And I think lots of people will enjoy that kind of getting
• 42:10
  deeper into the story, exploring more of the planet that they're
• 42:14
  that they're trapped on. I just found it a bit a bit
• 42:17
  boring and a bit of a slog. And there's also these kind of
• 42:20
  extended scenes with the on the spaceship, with the with the
• 42:25
  crew before they crash on the planet.
• 42:28
  And yeah, I think it was one of those ones which kind of got had
• 42:33
  it out to fill the length, but in a way that didn't really
• 42:36
  captivate me. Do you?
• 42:37
  Remember that pre titles they did to Planet of Fire?
• 42:41
  Yes. They should have learnt from the
• 42:43
  rescue not to do this sort of thing again.
• 42:45
  Yeah. Can I ask you a quick question?
• 42:47
  Sorry, I meant to ask you in the last book, but you said there
• 42:50
  was a long gap between Neverland and Zagreas.
• 42:53
  Yeah. Were you satisfied with the
• 42:55
  result when it came out? Absolutely not.
• 43:00
  Yeah, the biggest disappointment.
• 43:03
  Will you tell him upstairs please?
• 43:06
  Yeah, yeah. Anyway, enough about bad books.
• 43:11
  A good one, A good one is it? An Eighth Doctor.
• 43:13
  Book. It's an Eighth Doctor book
• 43:16
  again. It's one that kind of captivated
• 43:18
  me when I was young. The ancestor cell which?
• 43:23
  Wow, I never would have thought you'd say that one come.
• 43:25
  On again, so that, that one I, yeah, I wasn't reading them
• 43:31
  regularly. I had read the Blue Angel, so I
• 43:35
  knew the Doctor fits some compassion.
• 43:38
  And I think when it came out there was maybe like a more,
• 43:43
  more of a slice on it than usual in, in Doctor Who magazine.
• 43:47
  And I think it said it was a Gallifrey story and it was going
• 43:49
  to be big sort of earth shattering events.
• 43:52
  So yeah, I took that as one of my kind of holiday books.
• 43:55
  I think on that that summer holiday and yeah, it was just a
• 43:59
  kind of barnstorming action adventure.
• 44:03
  I think it was probably the first book that I read with
• 44:05
  Faction Paradox in it. So I think probably a lot of
• 44:09
  people didn't like it because they didn't like the way that
• 44:11
  story arc was resolved and kind of a right writers who weren't
• 44:17
  the kind of creators of those of those characters kind of
• 44:20
  wrapping. It up who you could pass on.
• 44:22
  Talking about. But yeah, again, I just had
• 44:25
  really, really warm memories of of reading that book and all the
• 44:30
  stuff that kind of happens to compassion in that book and the
• 44:33
  the flower above Gallifrey and it being revealed that it's
• 44:37
  really the TARDIS like just. Full of ideas, full of.
• 44:41
  Ideas and images and do you? Know and like the last third I
• 44:45
  just thought the pace was furious, yeah.
• 44:47
  And and that was a sort of time war I was expecting in day of
• 44:51
  the doctor of our morning, Yeah, where really weird stuff was
• 44:54
  going down. Yeah, and you know, spoilers,
• 44:58
  this is the one where the 8th Doctor blows up Gallifrey.
• 45:01
  So, you know, this, this reading this kind of in isolation, like
• 45:07
  where I hadn't been reading the whole series to get to that
• 45:09
  ending was just like, Oh my God. I did what now?
• 45:15
  And, you know, I didn't have anyone to talk to about it.
• 45:17
  Like, oh. If only we.
• 45:20
  Yeah, I remember. I remember just being like, like
• 45:23
  who do I talk to about this earth shattering event that has
• 45:25
  just happened? What?
• 45:28
  Year would this have been when you read it 2.
• 45:29
  Thousand, I think. Oh, OK, so the out of the.
• 45:32
  Lot 99, I don't know, Yeah. So yeah, another good one I.
• 45:38
  Remember reading these books, you know, and having no one to
• 45:40
  talk about them? I went on to Gallivre Brace,
• 45:42
  said I like them and then was hounded off, so I figured no one
• 45:46
  else did. Yeah.
• 45:47
  I just sort of used to lurk on those on Gallivre bases, yeah.
• 45:54
  OK. Well, great choice and I'd
• 45:57
  expect it as well. Yeah.
• 46:00
  And OK, so another bad one. Yeah.
• 46:04
  So another novelisation as well, another First Doctor
• 46:07
  novelisation, but Daleks Master Plan, book one.
• 46:13
  So book one specifically. So the reason I don't like this
• 46:18
  one is that so my first ever Doctor Who videotape was Daleks
• 46:25
  The Early Years, which has the surviving episodes of the Daleks
• 46:29
  Master Plan on it. So I know those episodes
• 46:32
  absolutely inside out. And then to have.
• 46:38
  So yeah, when did I? I think I did the audio book of
• 46:42
  this 10. Maureen O'Brien, wasn't it?
• 46:45
  I think it's a piece of purpose. Oh of the episodes.
• 46:49
  Or of the OR the book of the book.
• 46:52
  So I did the audio book of it. So yeah, Master Plan, one of my
• 46:57
  favourites audio book when it came out because the book was
• 47:01
  actually quite hard to find. And the thing that really
• 47:04
  irritated me about it, because they were episodes I knew so
• 47:06
  well, was all the dialogue was different, but it wasn't
• 47:10
  necessarily better. So.
• 47:15
  So I, I think I've since read that it was maybe based on like
• 47:18
  the draft scripts or like Terry Nation's work rather than Dennis
• 47:22
  Spooner's work or something like that, or John Peel just thought
• 47:25
  that he could write the dialogue better.
• 47:27
  I can believe that because a lot of the war and the Daleks stuff
• 47:31
  John Peel did was to appease Terry Nation because he weren't
• 47:34
  happy about the end of remembrance.
• 47:36
  So maybe Terry Nation went and we'll use my draft.
• 47:38
  It's a lot better. Yeah, so I mean, I'm not like a
• 47:41
  purist where I think like, oh, it has to be exactly as it was
• 47:43
  on screen. But the thing that really
• 47:45
  frustrated me was like, it's still like cliched space person
• 47:50
  dialogue. It's just different space person
• 47:52
  dialogue that doesn't necessarily make the story
• 47:54
  better or flow better or the characters any better.
• 47:57
  So yeah, I just found it quite frustrating and I didn't.
• 48:00
  Angry reading that. I was getting angry reading that
• 48:03
  and I didn't do the second volume, so yeah.
• 48:07
  It's master plan. Your list is a revelation to me.
• 48:10
  Do you know? Is it just bonkers?
• 48:12
  It's crazy. But I love it.
• 48:13
  I love that unexpected. It's better than predictable.
• 48:18
  OK so my final one on the best of list is Cold Fusion Lance.
• 48:25
  Parking. So pleased you got 1 Lance
• 48:26
  parking on there. Yeah.
• 48:28
  So this is one that I found in a bookshop, a second hand book
• 48:35
  when I was like 14 maybe when it was really difficult to find,
• 48:40
  like all of those later virgin books were.
• 48:42
  So there was the thrill of like, actually having a physical,
• 48:45
  physical copy of this book. And then, yeah, like, like most
• 48:50
  of the others on this list, it's just full of this incredible
• 48:53
  imagery and all tied into sort of Gallifrey and Law and the
• 48:59
  Doctors passed in a way that's really new and interesting and
• 49:03
  different. Is there 5th doctor book with
• 49:08
  the 7th doctor in it? Yes, and Chris and Rose and
• 49:12
  Adric Nessa, etcetera. I mean, it's a pairing that you
• 49:15
  would absolutely fit to put together.
• 49:17
  Yeah, and like very nerdy confession, like, so this was
• 49:23
  one of my favourites of that of that series.
• 49:28
  And I don't know why I did this, but I think it must have been
• 49:35
  around season four, season three, season four of the
• 49:39
  revival. I think I was trying to, I think
• 49:42
  it was maybe after Human Nature had come out, I was thinking
• 49:45
  like, oh, what other books could they adapt?
• 49:46
  What would be really good? And I decided, oh, Cold Fusion
• 49:49
  would be a great one to do. So I wrote an entire synopsis of
• 49:54
  Cold Fusion, but with Donna and Martha as the companions.
• 49:59
  Oh wow. And I think I, I wrote it so
• 50:02
  that instead of patients, the doctor's wife in it, it was, it
• 50:07
  was Romana. And it was kind of like a way of
• 50:11
  like bringing back Gallifrey and all of that stuff.
• 50:14
  I think I might have posted it on Gallifrey based.
• 50:16
  Does this exist still? I, I don't know, I might, I
• 50:19
  mean, it might still be up on. Your your hard copy.
• 50:23
  I don't know. I mean, it was just a synopsis.
• 50:26
  It wasn't like. It wasn't I want us.
• 50:29
  To read it, yeah. Donna, Martha, Romana.
• 50:33
  Yeah, and bringing back Gallifrey, cold fusion style.
• 50:36
  Yeah, yeah. So crash all of this stuff.
• 50:41
  So yeah, like, and then just very arrogantly, like posted it
• 50:44
  on Gallifrey base of like, look what I've done people.
• 50:46
  What? What was the response?
• 50:48
  I think it was just a kind of like, oh, interesting.
• 50:50
  I, I think I might be misremembering this, but I think
• 50:53
  Lance Parkin might have replied to it and just been like, oh,
• 50:56
  lovely. I would like just like about
• 50:58
  like a one line thing that might have been like who the hell do
• 51:01
  you think you are? Better version than Viber.
• 51:03
  OK, that's wonderful. Yeah, so.
• 51:06
  You did some great things when you was a Oh, I think it's
• 51:11
  great. Can I ask you, did you listen to
• 51:13
  the Big Finish version of Coldfusion?
• 51:15
  I have listened to about half. Of that's not a good sign,
• 51:18
  Andrew, that you. I don't, I mean, I don't think
• 51:22
  there's anything particularly wrong with it.
• 51:23
  I think it's just very, very long.
• 51:26
  And when with audio of that length, I prefer like an audio
• 51:31
  book to like an audio drama. I just think audio drama is when
• 51:34
  they're getting into like 3 hours plus long.
• 51:38
  It's a bit much for me. Any of them that are more than
• 51:41
  three hours and I struggle. Is it a faithful adaptation?
• 51:45
  Do you remember? I don't think it is.
• 51:46
  They give McCoy more of a role, I think.
• 51:48
  Yeah, I think so. But then I haven't finished it,
• 51:50
  so I don't. I couldn't, couldn't tell you.
• 51:52
  And I also haven't read the book for years.
• 51:54
  The opinion is pending on the audio.
• 51:56
  It's pending. It's.
• 51:56
  OK, if we ever do do the book, maybe we'll do a double barrel
• 52:02
  with the audio and see which is better.
• 52:05
  OK, so your last. My last bad book.
• 52:09
  Your last dud. Yes.
• 52:10
  So yeah, Gooden a Baden. Well, this this one, I think
• 52:17
  kind of we were talking earlier, I think about how I tend to
• 52:21
  prefer the kind of lighter books, which sometimes is true
• 52:25
  and sometimes it's not. But this kind of I think
• 52:29
  epitomises the bleak, miserable side of 90s Doctor Who books.
• 52:34
  It is Eternity Weeps by Jim Mortimer, which I'm.
• 52:39
  Poorly. Sure.
• 52:41
  It's just so miserable and you know, it comes towards the end
• 52:46
  of that line. Ros.
• 52:48
  Is Ros dead by that? I think Ros is dead by that
• 52:50
  point. And I think they're mourning.
• 52:53
  I might be just I think. This, I think this is the book
• 52:56
  where Benny breaks up with Jason Misery.
• 53:01
  Misery the The storyline itself is really depressing.
• 53:04
  And like entire continents are affected by this horrible
• 53:09
  disease that kills people in a really awful way.
• 53:12
  And then on top of that, they kill off Liz Shaw in like a
• 53:15
  really flippant way that, you know, her death doesn't mean
• 53:21
  anything. It's just really brutal and
• 53:23
  horrible. And there was a whole kind of
• 53:26
  trend of doing that in the 90s with Doctor Who companions of
• 53:29
  bringing them back and then killing them in a really
• 53:31
  horrible way or revealing that they've had a depressing life
• 53:34
  since they left the Doctor. And I think it was that kind of,
• 53:38
  oh, maturity that the books sometimes had where they it was
• 53:42
  like, oh, to do proper adult drama, you just need to make
• 53:45
  everything fucking miserable and everyone needs to die horribly.
• 53:49
  And I feel like for me, this book is just kind of like
• 53:51
  emblematic of that period do. You think the 8th Doctor books
• 53:57
  when they took over, pushed away from that or just indulged in
• 54:00
  more of that? I think the there's I think
• 54:04
  there's less. Is there less angst in the 8th
• 54:06
  Doctor books? I don't know if there is I.
• 54:09
  Think the lighter books I just really like like the Scarlet
• 54:12
  Empress, you know? Yeah, I mean, there's still,
• 54:15
  there was a still the whole storyline in the in the BBC
• 54:18
  books where they were killing off companions, although at
• 54:21
  least that kind of then had a resolution and kind of got
• 54:24
  undone. It was.
• 54:25
  For a reason. It was for a reason.
• 54:27
  I don't know if it was necessarily planned that way.
• 54:30
  It's kind. Of like Bell Tempest he takes it
• 54:32
  up another level in the 8th doctor books and his whole
• 54:35
  planets is wiping out and he goes on to those planets and
• 54:38
  shows the chaos and of everyone being murdered.
• 54:41
  I'm like, why am I reading this book?
• 54:44
  Yeah, and I think, you know, lots of people love Blood Heat.
• 54:50
  And again, that one was a bit too bleak for me.
• 54:53
  And what it does to some of the written, what it does to Joe
• 54:55
  Grant in that book is just horrible.
• 54:59
  So yeah, I feel like some of some of those writers just
• 55:01
  needed to lighten up a bit and just find the joy in the
• 55:04
  characters rather than just torturing.
• 55:06
  Them you read Transit. I have not read Transit.
• 55:10
  That's one book where I need to really fucking chill out.
• 55:12
  I'll tell you what, what a great.
• 55:16
  That was a great list, I think. Yeah.
• 55:18
  And you sort of covered all the ranges.
• 55:21
  Well, I set myself some rules. So I was trying to be as as kind
• 55:24
  of all-encompassing as possible. And again, caveat, these are
• 55:28
  gist of the books that I've read.
• 55:30
  So I'm sure there are much worse Doctor Who books out there.
• 55:33
  I just haven't haven't read them.
• 55:35
  Oh boy, but you will. Can I ask you to do one last
• 55:39
  thing before you go? I'm so intrigued, and I wish I'd
• 55:42
  asked Michael Mills to do it on his.
• 55:43
  But will you rank OK, rank the ranges from your favorite to
• 55:52
  your least favorite. So let me, I'll just go quickly
• 55:55
  go through it's the Virgin Michigan adventures, the missing
• 55:59
  adventures, the 8th Doctor books, the past Doctor books,
• 56:03
  the new series adventures and targets.
• 56:06
  OK. Just those.
• 56:08
  OK. So I would probably put do you
• 56:11
  want me to go from top to bottom or bottom to top?
• 56:14
  Whatever is your reference, let's go top to bomb.
• 56:17
  Top to possum. OK, I'm I'm just trying to avoid
• 56:21
  making the obvious let's move faster.
• 56:26
  OK, so top I think no question. For me it's the 8th Doctor
• 56:30
  books. As flawed as they.
• 56:32
  Are as flawed as they are and you I think I was just the right
• 56:37
  age for them and it's never going to that's never going to
• 56:40
  change so I. Think this Sona binds you and me
• 56:43
  was that they both captures and they both captures at the same
• 56:46
  period, which was that sort of mid to latter part of the 8th
• 56:50
  Doctor books. Yeah, no one wants to talk about
• 56:53
  except House. Yeah.
• 56:55
  And again, I think, I think they're kind of ripe for
• 56:57
  rediscovery. And hopefully at some point more
• 57:00
  of this stuff will come back into print and they'll get more
• 57:02
  of an appreciation. Actually, what's nice is
• 57:05
  actually like. Like with Your Fear Itself And
• 57:08
  we did Scarlet Empress and both Nick Wallace and Paul Marsh have
• 57:12
  got in touch to say how lovely that those books are being
• 57:16
  appreciated because frankly, no one to talk about at the time.
• 57:19
  Well, thanks for writing them guys, we love them.
• 57:22
  Me too, OK. So number two, number two, I
• 57:26
  think, would be the new adventures.
• 57:29
  Again, for all its flaws, they were doing something new and
• 57:32
  exciting and stretching Doctor Who and doing it in different
• 57:35
  ways. Are you doing this on purpose
• 57:38
  now? Now we've started saying top and
• 57:40
  bottom, you're stretching, doing.
• 57:42
  Things in new. Ways go on.
• 57:44
  Please keep going, Doctor Who's sexually experimented.
• 57:47
  But new adventures were new. Adventures, yeah.
• 57:51
  So I think I was just, I was too young for them when they were
• 57:56
  first coming out. So all of them are kind of in
• 57:59
  retrospect for me. So I never kind of got that
• 58:01
  series, that sense of them as a continuing series.
• 58:06
  So yeah, for me they didn't have as much impact as as the 8th
• 58:11
  Doctor books. They were always kind of a
• 58:13
  something in the past that was kind of a previous generations.
• 58:16
  The highs are just so high, aren't they?
• 58:18
  And the lows, well, yeah, we'll get there.
• 58:23
  Next, I think I would probably say that the past Doctor
• 58:27
  adventures are a bit more consistent than the missing
• 58:30
  adventures. There's more of.
• 58:32
  Them as well. There's more of them and I think
• 58:35
  on a kind of, although there's a lot of sort of middling and
• 58:38
  mediocre ones. I think the lows of the missing
• 58:41
  adventures were maybe lower than the past Doctor adventures.
• 58:45
  So I put the past Doctor adventures, then the missing
• 58:48
  adventures. This is coming from the person
• 58:51
  that was trying to twist mine and Luke's arm to read the
• 58:54
  ghosts of it. Well.
• 58:56
  Famously. You said.
• 58:58
  You was Doctor Who book of all. Time you said you wanted to do a
• 59:01
  bad book, so you think that's bad?
• 59:04
  I haven't read it. Oh, you've heard the.
• 59:06
  Plays. Yeah, I listened to the plays
• 59:08
  when I was a kid, so I do have like a warm affection for
• 59:12
  something that probably isn't very good.
• 59:14
  But I've never read the book of it, so it's.
• 59:16
  Going to be a great episode. OK, So what we left with the
• 59:19
  targets and the new series adventures.
• 59:21
  Yeah, I mean. Your face.
• 59:25
  I haven't read many of the new series adventures.
• 59:29
  The ones I've made you read. I mean, I maybe I would probably
• 59:32
  put the new series adventures above the targets and.
• 59:35
  Possibly the most controversial statement you've made, Yeah.
• 59:38
  Well, just because I've never really had that much of an
• 59:42
  emotional investment in the targets like I know a lot, a lot
• 59:45
  of other people have. And when I was younger, I'd only
• 59:49
  really read a target if I definitely couldn't get the
• 59:52
  video. Like the videos were what I was
• 59:55
  spending my pocket money on the that's the Doctor Who I wanted.
• 59:59
  And you know, the videos were quite patchy.
• 1:00:01
  So sometimes you had to fill a gap in your Doctor Who knowledge
• 1:00:03
  by. Reading the book.
• 1:00:05
  So the books were always kind of my second choice.
• 1:00:09
  I mean, obviously they're amazing and you know, like
• 1:00:11
  Terrence Dicks has had a huge influence on childhood literacy,
• 1:00:15
  etcetera. But for me, they're probably the
• 1:00:18
  ones I'd reached for last out of this list.
• 1:00:20
  If you're reading books like History 101 and then you go back
• 1:00:25
  to read The Last Master Plan, I can see why you might be
• 1:00:30
  thinking. I mean, what is the reading
• 1:00:31
  level for this book? Yeah.
• 1:00:32
  And I think, I think the thing as well was if I was reading a
• 1:00:35
  book, I kind of wanted to read an original story.
• 1:00:38
  I didn't necessarily want to read the book of something I'd
• 1:00:41
  seen. Yeah, I'd rather be told a
• 1:00:43
  completely new story. So yeah, for me that that, yeah,
• 1:00:49
  that's what I'm going to a Doctor Who book for.
• 1:00:50
  Usually it's to be told a new story and something that's going
• 1:00:53
  to grab me, not something that I can get in another form.
• 1:00:57
  OK, last question. I'll promise you, you know, I
• 1:01:00
  mean, we've got a good hour now, you know, we'll get money out of
• 1:01:04
  these top ten lists. Do you Have you read many of the
• 1:01:08
  new series Target Adventures? I've read.
• 1:01:14
  I've mainly read the ones which are written by the person who
• 1:01:16
  wrote the TV version. OK, so I've.
• 1:01:19
  So you haven't done twice upon a time.
• 1:01:21
  I haven't done. Christmas Invasion.
• 1:01:22
  No, but I have done which one? So I, well, I, I read The Witch
• 1:01:28
  Finders last week as just a small because I'm reading so
• 1:01:30
  many bloody Doctor Who books for the book, I thought I'm just
• 1:01:33
  going to read a Doctor Who book and not take any funny notes on
• 1:01:36
  it. And I read The Witch Finders and
• 1:01:37
  it was great. It was, it really gave a new
• 1:01:40
  spin on that, that TV story. I think that's where the targets
• 1:01:44
  are strongest, where it's a very 45 minute episode and there's no
• 1:01:48
  time for characters, half the time for them actually, to flesh
• 1:01:51
  them out. A bit more Daleks in there as
• 1:01:54
  well. Yeah.
• 1:01:58
  I've done Rose, Dave, the Doctor, Dalek.
• 1:02:02
  Maybe those are the oh, Crimson Horror.
• 1:02:05
  Oh, was that any good? Yeah, it's quite.
• 1:02:07
  Intrigued to read that one. It's I, I was expecting it to
• 1:02:10
  flesh out the story a lot more, but it actually just kind of
• 1:02:12
  adds a massive prologue onto it and then sort of does the story
• 1:02:15
  as it was on TV. But yeah, it's a good, it's a
• 1:02:17
  good read. So you've heard it here first,
• 1:02:20
  folks. Lungbarrow is one of the worst
• 1:02:22
  Doctor Who books of all time. The Targets is the worst Doctor
• 1:02:25
  Who range of the lot. What do you have to say to
• 1:02:29
  yourself at the end of this episode?
• 1:02:32
  Sorry, I mean, I wasn't, I don't think I set out to be like
• 1:02:37
  deliberately contrary in this episode.
• 1:02:41
  But I guess, you know, it's based on what I've read and what
• 1:02:43
  I've enjoyed. So yeah, I'm, I'm not trying to
• 1:02:46
  shit on people's favourites. When, when Michael Mills
• 1:02:49
  suggested that Storm Harvest was I could hear you listening to
• 1:02:53
  that episode going excuse me, hold my beer.
• 1:02:56
  I'm barely. Starved.
• 1:02:58
  And just because I always ask this question at the end of
• 1:03:01
  every single episode, where are we heading next?
• 1:03:04
  Now we're to record 10 little aliens.
• 1:03:08
  And then after that. After that, we're going to be
• 1:03:11
  doing Ruby Red, one of the new new series adventures.
• 1:03:15
  So the first time that I think any of us will be reading
• 1:03:18
  Shooty's Doctor in print. So that's quite exciting.
• 1:03:20
  I sort of peripherally know Georgia Cook, so I'm going into
• 1:03:24
  this tentatively because I don't want to say terrible things
• 1:03:27
  about somebody I like a lot, but I am enjoying it so far.
• 1:03:31
  And then, I mean, I took a look on your phone earlier and no,
• 1:03:35
  for Doctor Who, I might add. And we've got a hell of a list
• 1:03:39
  coming up, yeah. I think.
• 1:03:41
  Is growing list is. Entirely unmanageable and would
• 1:03:46
  maybe be about 5 years worth of recording, but yeah, lots of
• 1:03:50
  exciting stuff coming up. You confessed to me earlier
• 1:03:52
  today why I used to read all these sort of other books.
• 1:03:55
  Now all I do is read bloody Doctor Who books.
• 1:03:59
  But just to say thank you very much for your continued
• 1:04:01
  association with this book club, it feels a little bit strange
• 1:04:05
  not to have Luke here with us. We miss you, Luke.
• 1:04:10
  But yeah, thank you very much. And until next time.
• 1:04:14
  Bye. Way.