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Hamster Book Club - Dan Pinn Top and Bottom Ten Books · A Hamster With a Blunt Penknife - a Doctor Who Commentary podcast

• 0:00
  Welcome back to the Hamster Book Club.
• 0:03
  My name is Joe Ford and it is my pleasure today and he's going to
• 0:09
  get a bit bashful when I say this to introduce what I think
• 0:13
  is truly one of the most charming men in Doctor Who I've
• 0:18
  been listening to. Well, actually it's a bit
• 0:20
  egotistical. I've been listening back to him
• 0:21
  today for a strictly come hamster that he did recently and
• 0:25
  smiling my head off every time he opened his mouth.
• 0:27
  I'm here with the wonderful Mr. Dan Pin.
• 0:31
  Hello, Dan. Hi Joe, thanks for having me.
• 0:35
  Thanks for such a wonderful introduction.
• 0:38
  Honestly, you're like a pool of sunshine.
• 0:40
  I was like, I was walking around my shop and you know, I'm not
• 0:42
  really supposed to have an earphone in, but it's underneath
• 0:44
  the, you know, the thing I wear. Maybe I'll cut that bit out.
• 0:48
  And I'm smiling like a lunatic. Like, why are you smiling?
• 0:51
  I want you wouldn't understand profound thoughts going on in my
• 0:54
  head, you know. Is it true that you have some
• 0:58
  knowledge of Doctor Who books? Yeah, I think I got my first
• 1:05
  Doctor Who book when I was about 6.
• 1:09
  I got a Target book. It was Planet of the Daleks.
• 1:13
  Planet of the Daleks, what a great start.
• 1:15
  Yeah, yeah, amazing cover as well.
• 1:19
  You know, which I think was the thing that kind of appealed to
• 1:22
  me the most. Reading age at six years old
• 1:25
  then to just pick up a target and read it through.
• 1:29
  No, I, I, I think I, I wasn't, I wasn't a bad reader, but it, it
• 1:36
  was more something that my mum would read to me at bedtime.
• 1:40
  A bit like Cy Hart's experience where initially it was his mum
• 1:45
  reading it to him and then he, he, he obviously learnt to read
• 1:49
  and was reading for himself. And, and I think that was, that
• 1:51
  was kind of, kind of true of, of, of my experience.
• 1:55
  So yeah. So yeah, I've been collecting
• 1:59
  Doctor Who books for the best part of 40 years now, so.
• 2:02
  The evidence is in the room behind me as we speak.
• 2:06
  It's kind of even more special, isn't it, when, when your mum's
• 2:10
  reading it out to you, right? That's a memory that's not just
• 2:13
  having a book. No, I think that that's the
• 2:17
  thing. I think it's sort of like that,
• 2:19
  that emotional connection, that emotional tie to it as well,
• 2:25
  which which I think is, is why as, as you can see from behind
• 2:30
  me, it's become more than a hobby.
• 2:32
  It is an obsessional most. Because at this still very young
• 2:36
  age, you've never stopped. No, no.
• 2:39
  But then I don't think I've ever properly grown up, to be honest
• 2:43
  with you. I look older, but mentally
• 2:46
  young. It's overrated.
• 2:47
  You know, it is. You still look very young to me,
• 2:50
  but I think all of us have come together doing this podcasting.
• 2:53
  We're still sort of forcing in the heart, maybe 10 some of.
• 2:57
  Us. Yeah, yeah, I was nearly 12, I
• 2:59
  think. You know what as well do you
• 3:01
  remember in Planet of the Daleks that in a move that they could
• 3:06
  never afford to do on the budget of TV Doctor Who, the Ice Cano
• 3:10
  explodes all over the jungle? Yep, Yep.
• 3:14
  Amazing. Well my first question was going
• 3:16
  to be to you is what is your Doctor Who book journey?
• 3:19
  So we're starting with Planet of the Daleks, you by your mum, so
• 3:23
  then sort of take me on the journey from there to here and
• 3:27
  how you discovered the ranges and sort of formulated your
• 3:30
  tastes. Yeah, so I think like the, the
• 3:35
  books have always been really, really important to me, not just
• 3:39
  because it was sort of like, you know, my started with my mum and
• 3:42
  what have you, but but also the fact that I, I think I've
• 3:45
  mentioned this on, on, on other podcasts I've been on that my
• 3:48
  dad hated science fiction. So I think for for most of the
• 3:55
  80s until we got to sort of like Sylvester McCoy, I only had like
• 3:59
  little snippets of, of Doctor Who, but it was enough to kind
• 4:03
  of feel the imagination. So I think like, because I grew
• 4:09
  up in a, in a, in a rural area, I, I don't know if it was the
• 4:15
  same for you because obviously you, you grew up in, you know,
• 4:17
  like the suburbs of London or whatever.
• 4:19
  And, but we had a library van that would come every, every
• 4:23
  term and each class would, you know, would then you, you were
• 4:29
  allowed to go in and, and choose one book to bring into the
• 4:33
  school, the school library. And I can remember it must have
• 4:37
  been probably the third year of, of Junior School.
• 4:41
  So what would that have been? I, I, yeah, probably about eight
• 4:46
  maybe. I remember I, I, I there was a
• 4:51
  lovely hardback version of Androids of Tara and I can
• 4:56
  remember, I can remember grabbing that.
• 4:59
  I can also also I can remember one of my friends he he was
• 5:04
  brought was Dutch and he he he but he also picked a Doctor Who
• 5:09
  book. He picked the faceless ones, but
• 5:12
  the reason that he picked it was because he thought the name was
• 5:15
  funny because it had parents Dicks written on it and it.
• 5:22
  Was a child after my own heart. Yeah, yeah.
• 5:24
  Yeah, definitely, yes. He's still collecting Doctor Who
• 5:29
  books for this day. I don't know because because he
• 5:34
  he moved away not long after that.
• 5:37
  So so I I don't know but. This is an appeal to the Dutch
• 5:40
  boy that picked up the baseless ones by terrorist sticks at the
• 5:43
  same time Dan picked up the Andrew Zatara.
• 5:45
  If you are still reading Doctor Who books, get in touch, let us
• 5:48
  know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 5:51
  So, and I can, I can still vividly see that trip to the
• 5:56
  library van. And I can also remember
• 6:00
  basically the way it worked when when you had one of these books,
• 6:05
  you, you were then able to kind of like take it home and read it
• 6:08
  and all that sort of thing. But some of it you had to read
• 6:11
  with the teacher. And I can, I can still vividly
• 6:14
  remember being sat behind the teacher's desk next to Mr.
• 6:19
  Norman with his, his mad hair and beard and yeah, and trying,
• 6:26
  trying to trying to pronounce Ramana's name and, and yeah,
• 6:31
  yeah. But it was sort of like that.
• 6:34
  That was again, that was another kind of like launched launchpad
• 6:38
  from for the books. And I think I was quite, I think
• 6:45
  quite fortunate that the little town that I grew up in, we, we
• 6:48
  had a, an independent bookshop and I would quite often go in
• 6:56
  there and, and sort of look, look through the books that he
• 6:59
  had on the shelf. He had lots of, lots of Target
• 7:03
  books. And I would, I would kind of
• 7:04
  like just just pick the covers that really interested me,
• 7:08
  whether it was, you know, like the Highlanders or the Green
• 7:11
  Death or whatever like that. And over the course of me going
• 7:16
  in there and just buying these books, I, I kind of, I kind of
• 7:20
  befriended the guy that owned the.
• 7:23
  Show. This, this, this lovely old man,
• 7:25
  he used to be funny enough, he was the headmaster at my my
• 7:31
  sister's school. So they're quite a bit older
• 7:36
  than me. So they're now sort of like late
• 7:38
  50s. So he'd retired as being a
• 7:41
  headmaster. I see, I was going to say that's
• 7:43
  a busy life if he's mastering and book shopping.
• 7:46
  Yeah, he, he, he jerked in the, the, the head, you know, being a
• 7:48
  headmaster and, and, and to, you know, running a bookshop.
• 7:52
  And basically he had like this massive stash of Target books in
• 8:01
  his, in his stock room. And he would just, he would just
• 8:05
  go, yeah, just just go through to the stockroom, have a look,
• 8:09
  see what you want. And, you know, fine.
• 8:12
  You know, it's just really weird how basically this stockroom was
• 8:21
  a court was across a courtyard. It was up this rickety pair of
• 8:25
  stairs into a like a an attic and.
• 8:31
  Yeah. I know this store is not ending
• 8:33
  where I think. No, no, it's OK.
• 8:36
  No, no, there's no, there's nothing dodged.
• 8:39
  Yeah, no. I I'm rather pleased because so
• 8:41
  far it's just warm with my heart.
• 8:43
  Yeah. And what what was the brilliant
• 8:45
  thing was I don't know whether he'd got these targets as like a
• 8:51
  a job lot or something like that, but I was he wasn't
• 8:55
  charging me like the full price for them.
• 8:56
  I mean, I know back in the day what they looked like 192 LB or
• 9:00
  whatever I was. I was a lot to a nipper though.
• 9:03
  But I was picking him up for 60 PA time.
• 9:05
  So, so I was, I was able to get quite, quite a sizeable
• 9:09
  collection quite quickly, quite cheaply.
• 9:11
  You know you. Had your dealer?
• 9:13
  Yeah, yeah, pretty much. And then, you know, then, then
• 9:17
  basically he introduced me to the the stock catalogue.
• 9:24
  So basically he goes, any books you want, I can order them for
• 9:28
  you and you know, and all this sort of thing.
• 9:30
  So I, I can remember, I can remember ordering like
• 9:34
  Remembrance of the Daleks. I can remember ordering
• 9:38
  Battlefield books like time frame and, and all this sort of
• 9:44
  thing. And it's just like, and that's
• 9:46
  really where it kind of started and it just kind of grew from
• 9:50
  there. So initially it was, I think for
• 9:55
  me, it, it was, it was the target books and it was sort of
• 9:58
  like those non fiction books, you know, like like the 60's,
• 10:04
  the 70s, you know those ones, those pictures.
• 10:07
  That entice? I think, I think that was the
• 10:10
  thing. It was sort of like the visual
• 10:12
  appeal of it as well. That was the thing.
• 10:14
  These gorgeous photographs behind the scenes and.
• 10:18
  And black and white ones, you know, You know that one of Jamie
• 10:22
  and Victoria and the Dalek in the library.
• 10:24
  Yeah. Pictures like that just fired my
• 10:26
  mind. Yes.
• 10:27
  Of stuff. I was never, ever going to see
• 10:29
  you. Know yeah yeah yeah and and then
• 10:33
  then there were like weird random things that happened like
• 10:37
  every Sunday my mum and dad would go to like a local garden
• 10:41
  centre. Of course, me being a young
• 10:43
  child that I was dragged to love on these things I wasn't that
• 10:46
  happy about it but I picked up a copy of the companions by by
• 10:53
  John Nathan Turner, which I think up to that point only only
• 10:59
  took you up to like like Colin the Colin Baker era then went
• 11:03
  back the next week and it was it was the other book that he did.
• 11:08
  I can't, I can't remember what that one was called, but but it
• 11:11
  had these lovely, I I think it was Alastair Pearson portraits
• 11:18
  of each of the doctors up to Colin Baker.
• 11:20
  And and it was just he, he was picking like he was just sort of
• 11:24
  his favorite moments and the best story from each doctor and
• 11:28
  all this sort of stuff. Most of the garden.
• 11:30
  Centre. Yeah, yeah.
• 11:32
  If I was your mum I'd be like that'll teach you not to want to
• 11:34
  come to the garden. Centre.
• 11:35
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, so so, you know, got
• 11:40
  all these these amazing things because I'm.
• 11:42
  Starting to assemble this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 11:48
  When it when it came to to like, you know, the end of the of the
• 11:53
  target books because because I think Battlefield wasn't quite
• 11:56
  the last one, was it? But it was, it was almost I
• 11:59
  think was it? I think it was.
• 12:01
  I think Remembrance might have been one of the last ones.
• 12:03
  That was 1990 we discussed the other day.
• 12:07
  Yeah, it was one of the later ones anyway.
• 12:10
  You know, and then then obviously we had the the the
• 12:12
  blue spine ones as well and, and.
• 12:15
  Bloody hell, we've got to collect all these things again.
• 12:17
  Well, I, I've got, I, I, I'm, that's one of the things that
• 12:21
  I'm really, really proud of. I've got like a full full thing
• 12:25
  of the blue spine ones because for me.
• 12:29
  The covers on those it's. Divine, aren't they?
• 12:31
  They're just, there's something else because I, I, I, I think
• 12:34
  it's, I can appreciate like Chrysocrit Kilios and all that
• 12:39
  sort of stuff, but I don't understand why, you know, like
• 12:44
  the latest versions of like the Target books are kind of aping
• 12:47
  his style. Because for me, yeah, they, they
• 12:50
  were good. They were OK.
• 12:51
  Oh I hate. All those stupid bloody dots.
• 12:53
  I want to do a Doctor dot. I'll buy a Doctor dot book.
• 12:56
  Exactly. So so, yeah.
• 12:58
  So it's so it was like those, those ones there, you know?
• 13:02
  Beautiful. The other spiders with that
• 13:04
  fabulous crystal in the middle of the electric coming off it
• 13:07
  and Oh my God. Yeah, You know, so, yeah, but I
• 13:12
  was, I think I was reluctant to jump into the the new
• 13:18
  adventures. And I think, you know, there
• 13:23
  were a couple of reasons for that.
• 13:25
  Like I, I think I was probably quite an immature 12 or 13 year
• 13:31
  olds, very innocent. Very Yeah, you know, not not.
• 13:37
  And. And I think I got put off by all
• 13:39
  of those reviews where it's sort of saying, you know, the, the,
• 13:42
  they're, they're quite adult content and there's a lot of
• 13:46
  swearing and all that sort of stuff.
• 13:48
  And so it's a bit and, and then also I think like the, the page
• 13:53
  count as well. Go going from your you know what
• 13:56
  100 and 10120 pages average for a target and then two. 180 or
• 14:01
  something What? Was the average.
• 14:03
  It's quite, quite a jump. Plus, you know, you've got to
• 14:06
  start with time. Worm Genesis.
• 14:09
  Yeah, if that, if any, book's going to put you off.
• 14:13
  Yeah, that, yeah. Yes, it's on your top ten list,
• 14:15
  of course. No, I'll let that one out now.
• 14:20
  No, No, it isn't. Yeah.
• 14:23
  And, but like a couple years into the range, Nightshade
• 14:31
  appeared in, in, in the school library and I thought, why not
• 14:38
  give it, give it a go. And I, and I think that was,
• 14:42
  that was probably one of the earlier ones where they, they
• 14:45
  didn't really go down that route of let's put lots of sex in it,
• 14:50
  let's put lots of tits in it and all that sort of stuff.
• 14:54
  Isn't it like what he does is? Really.
• 14:56
  Trag Doctor Who. Yes, yeah, definitely.
• 14:59
  And, and, yeah. And and that kind of kind of won
• 15:05
  me over a little bit, but I was. In transit next.
• 15:09
  Oh, it's one of the next ones. Yeah, I think yeah, it's, it's
• 15:14
  either side of it, isn't? It not far off.
• 15:16
  Yeah, but I, I, I then it still wasn't enough for me to kind of
• 15:25
  dive, dive right into them. So my first, my first new
• 15:31
  adventure that I actually bought was was Blood Heat and and I
• 15:37
  yeah, there was just something about it that kind of appealed
• 15:42
  to me and that that was it. That kind of broke broke into
• 15:47
  into this the the new adventures from there.
• 15:50
  I wouldn't say I wouldn't say I bought everyone, you know, every
• 15:55
  month, but but I was I was kind of I was kind of sort of semi
• 15:59
  regular with with them sort of thing.
• 16:02
  I think it was just like, you know, 1314, you just haven't got
• 16:07
  the the money to to be able to kind of keep up with that.
• 16:11
  And then obviously then then chucked in the the missing
• 16:13
  adventures as well and. Now you wish you bought 10
• 16:17
  copies of each and you could be a very rich man indeed.
• 16:19
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it, it was, it was weird
• 16:24
  that when they brought out the missing adventures, I kind of
• 16:27
  then lost interest in the new adventures a little bit because
• 16:30
  it kind of that sort of more traditional, more classic route
• 16:36
  of Doctor Who was, was more appealing to me.
• 16:39
  So I kind of, I kind of went with those and to the point
• 16:45
  where I probably had more of the missing adventures than I did
• 16:47
  of, of, of the new adventures. But yeah, it was, it was sort
• 16:51
  of, yeah. And I think as time went on, you
• 16:55
  know, I, I got like a little Saturday job.
• 16:58
  So I had a bit more money. And, and, and I think towards
• 17:02
  the end of the of, of, of certainly of the new adventures,
• 17:05
  I was kind of picking them up quite regularly, which which I
• 17:09
  think is a really good thing because now it's that latter end
• 17:12
  that are the ones that are quite expensive to buy.
• 17:16
  So yeah, one recently gifted me The Dying Days for free, and to
• 17:20
  get that as a copy, I mean, I dread to think what I'd have to
• 17:24
  pay. Yeah, yeah, because because and
• 17:28
  I think like like the only one that I I didn't get of those
• 17:31
  really, really expensive ones was was was so violent sin, but
• 17:35
  I, I I bought London Barrow bought dying days What what oh
• 17:42
  happy endings as well. Yeah.
• 17:44
  So I had that one as well. And and you know, so, so, so so
• 17:48
  and, and I think like that latter end of of the range they,
• 17:54
  they, I think they found their stride by that point.
• 17:57
  And, and I I think like this, definitely the stronger third, I
• 18:03
  would say half, but I think it's a stronger third of of the
• 18:06
  range. I would say it's from Sanctuary,
• 18:11
  Human nature, original saying onwards.
• 18:13
  Yes, yeah. Basically after they got rid of
• 18:16
  Ace. Yeah, Britain pretty much.
• 18:20
  And, and that was the thing because I think I, I, I didn't
• 18:24
  really like where, where they took, they took ACE.
• 18:27
  No one did that. No, I.
• 18:30
  Don't know who they were trying to appeal to.
• 18:33
  But but Benny was just brilliant from from the the very beginning
• 18:36
  and and I really love Chris and Roz as well.
• 18:39
  I think I think they're they're really good.
• 18:41
  And, and so, you know, it was, yeah, I, I, I just was, just
• 18:46
  felt like it was, it was more for me than than the earlier bit
• 18:51
  where they were trying really, really hard to be grown up an
• 18:55
  adult. And, and ironically, they were,
• 19:00
  they were, they were doing the opposite, looking very immature.
• 19:03
  Last third feels far more mature for being a bit more restrained.
• 19:08
  Yes, Yeah, definitely. Yeah.
• 19:11
  Because it was, it was almost like they that early part of the
• 19:14
  range, they, they took the Torch route, Torchwood route and they
• 19:19
  where they just went. Oh, being an adult means there's
• 19:22
  got to be lots of sex. There's got to be lots of
• 19:24
  swearing. And, and, and obviously
• 19:27
  Torchwood got better when it realised, no, we don't have to
• 19:30
  do that. We can, Yeah.
• 19:32
  If you don't mention the word fuck and the word come on every
• 19:35
  other page, then they're going to put us in the kiddies
• 19:37
  section. Of the phones, you know,
• 19:40
  whatever. It was called back then.
• 19:44
  Yeah, so, you know, obviously then, you know, I didn't
• 19:51
  persevere with the new adventures beyond dying the
• 19:54
  dying days, you know, with with the Benny's range, you.
• 20:00
  Know I'll have those and I don't remember collecting them at all.
• 20:04
  I've got the whole set and I even know where they came from.
• 20:09
  They're not marks. I don't know where how I got
• 20:12
  them, but I've got all of them. I did decided to buy them all
• 20:15
  when they were coming out so I got older lows.
• 20:19
  I mean, I mean, I've, I've picked up a few, you know, since
• 20:22
  of since, you know, you know, when they were first published.
• 20:26
  I didn't get any but, but I've managed to find a few in charity
• 20:29
  shops and second hand book shops and stuff and, and the ones I've
• 20:33
  read have been very, very good. Some of them are really good.
• 20:37
  But yeah, I, I, I kind of just dropped it, didn't have the
• 20:40
  doctor, so I wasn't interested and.
• 20:43
  I think that was a problem. That's what that range dwindled
• 20:46
  very quickly. Yeah.
• 20:49
  So then obviously BBC Books took over, I think by this point.
• 20:59
  Yeah. Because what was that that was
• 21:01
  about? Was it 98?
• 21:02
  Was it? I think yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 21:05
  It was a few years after the TV movie.
• 21:07
  Yes, yeah. So at this point I had, I had
• 21:12
  finished school, I had finished art college and I'd got my
• 21:18
  first, my first proper paying job.
• 21:21
  So yes. So I was quite keen to kind of
• 21:26
  start where it started and rather than do what I, you know,
• 21:32
  repeat what I did with the, with the new adventures.
• 21:35
  So yeah, I, I, you know, fortunately I was able to buy
• 21:39
  both the, the, the 8 Doctor adventures and the, the past
• 21:44
  Doctor ones as well. But it wasn't wasn't a happy
• 21:50
  journey for me with the 8 Doctor adventures.
• 21:54
  You know, I don't get me wrong, I, I, I, I, I really enjoy the
• 22:00
  8, the 8 doctors. I, I think it's, it is what it
• 22:04
  is. It's it's, but it's an enjoyable
• 22:08
  little, isn't it? And you can, you can blast
• 22:11
  through that book in, in a couple of days, you know, so, so
• 22:17
  it, it wasn't and I, you know, and it was kind of nice to, to
• 22:21
  have that nostalgic bit. I, I don't know if it was
• 22:23
  necessarily the best way to kick off a range of, of books where
• 22:28
  you're trying to get a, a new audience, a new readership into
• 22:31
  it. But but.
• 22:32
  Yeah, what I say to you though, please do not sound apologetic
• 22:37
  when you say now I know you know I love those books, but not I
• 22:41
  know lots of people hate them. So please just say your journey
• 22:45
  is. Yeah, and and but for me, the
• 22:52
  wheels pretty quickly fell off. Exciting characters like Sam
• 23:00
  Jones to hold her hand, you know?
• 23:03
  To be to be honest with you, I didn't understand the hatred of,
• 23:08
  of Sam, to be honest with you that I don't think that was that
• 23:13
  was ever my, my issue with it. I think it it was kind of like
• 23:18
  it. It was almost like they didn't
• 23:22
  quite know what they wanted to do early on.
• 23:26
  And, and you know, I, I guess you could say the same for the
• 23:28
  for the New Avengers and what have you similar.
• 23:32
  Journeys with. The Yeah, so.
• 23:34
  There was a but, but it felt like there were more misses than
• 23:38
  there were hits. So you had like brilliant stuff
• 23:42
  like alien bodies, but then you had things like the two John
• 23:48
  Peel Daleks and I, I, I stuck with the range right, right up
• 23:55
  to legacy of the Daleks, the the second John Peel 1.
• 24:01
  And it was just like, I'm just not enjoying these.
• 24:06
  So I just stopped. I stopped and just and just.
• 24:10
  How you sound regretful? Yes, because.
• 24:14
  I'm defined them all now. Well, no, well that, that's
• 24:17
  that's the thing, because like I got quite lucky and I, I, I
• 24:22
  found like about 20 of of the 8th Doctor books in a charity
• 24:28
  shop, all the like, all like £2.50 each.
• 24:33
  So, so, so basically it means that I've got, I've got all of
• 24:39
  the, I've got, I've probably got about six of them to get now to
• 24:46
  get the get a complete 8th doctor.
• 24:48
  Can I ask, have you sort of read them now or are you redeemed
• 24:53
  them? Yes, so, so I, I think I've
• 24:56
  tried, I've tried a couple of times.
• 24:59
  So I, I thought like I, I, I struggled with those early ones.
• 25:04
  So I, I, I thought, do I, do I jump in at the start and try and
• 25:14
  persevere. And I thought, I don't know.
• 25:19
  I don't know if that's the right thing.
• 25:21
  So what what I did is I, I, I, I kind of, I went in at Autumn
• 25:28
  Mist. OK.
• 25:30
  Did did the two interference books which I think came
• 25:35
  straight after that. Just read those myself.
• 25:38
  Yeah, yeah. Which I I kind of mind.
• 25:41
  Blowing up I. Think it's such a shame that
• 25:45
  that that Lawrence Miles has has kind of just gone or whatever.
• 25:49
  It just feels like he's he's, yeah.
• 25:53
  He's clearly got a fertile imagination, doesn't he?
• 25:56
  Yeah, I mean great prostyle as well.
• 25:58
  Yeah, I mean, I don't. I mean, I don't know if I've
• 26:03
  read his new adventure one. What's what's that?
• 26:05
  Is that Christmas on a Russian? Yeah, Christmas on a Russian.
• 26:09
  A couple of a couple of the Bernese ones as well down and
• 26:13
  yeah, Christine Summerfield in it.
• 26:14
  I can't remember what it's called now.
• 26:16
  Yeah, but but I've, I've read all of his Eighth Doctor ones
• 26:22
  and I don't there isn't a bad book in them.
• 26:24
  They're, they're just, they're just all a really, really high,
• 26:28
  high standard. And, and, and I think his
• 26:31
  version of Gallifrey is probably the most interesting version of
• 26:36
  Gallifrey that there is going, you know.
• 26:39
  Like his Time War is far more interesting than the TV.
• 26:42
  Here is 1. As well.
• 26:43
  Big, big time, big time. It's it's, it's so much more
• 26:46
  interesting, so much more engaging.
• 26:48
  And yeah, you know, it's not this the the the version that we
• 26:54
  got on the TV and and. Now in many a big finished
• 26:57
  boxing. Yeah, yeah.
• 26:59
  You know it's it's. Starlets versus time, Yours Pew.
• 27:01
  Pew, Pew. Yeah.
• 27:03
  It's it's just a bit, it's a bit dry and a bit boring and a bit
• 27:06
  dull, but but his. A bit duck to death.
• 27:09
  Yes, yeah, yeah, definitely. We probably had too much of that
• 27:12
  which which so it's quite good that they've they've blown
• 27:15
  Gallifrey up again, isn't it? You know, so.
• 27:18
  You can't move for Gallifrey's blowing up, can you?
• 27:21
  Yeah. Is it are we on the 3rd of God?
• 27:23
  Knows I've missed. How It's a very unfortunate
• 27:28
  planet. Yeah, yeah.
• 27:30
  But yes, so so yes, so I then then I then took a did another
• 27:39
  jump right up to I think it was the ancestor cell.
• 27:44
  And I then went all the way through to year of the
• 27:51
  intelligent tigers. Cool.
• 27:52
  But I. Mean OK, so I had I I think that
• 27:57
  that. Sort of is it?
• 27:59
  5 or 6 books after, after the ancestor cell where, where the
• 28:05
  doctors lost his memory because of the trauma of, you know,
• 28:09
  destroying Gallifrey. And those those are those are
• 28:13
  awesome. That's, that's a great run of,
• 28:16
  of six books there. You know, some, some are better
• 28:20
  than others. I, I think like the, the, the
• 28:23
  two best ones are the start and the finish.
• 28:25
  You know, the burning and Father's Father's Day.
• 28:29
  I think those, those two, those two for me are the, are the,
• 28:33
  the, you know, the high points. Have.
• 28:36
  You read The Gallifrey Chronicles by Lars Parkin?
• 28:38
  Yes. I've done that I.
• 28:39
  Wasn't going to say because you know it wasn't due to trauma
• 28:42
  because he had all those super compressed matrix memories.
• 28:44
  Yeah, they were all in there. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 28:48
  Because because it isn't bad enough when you just got your
• 28:50
  own thoughts. I know.
• 28:51
  Like, you know, the whole planet. 100,000 memories in my
• 28:55
  head. No, thank you.
• 28:57
  Jesus Christ. Yeah, and and and but but then I
• 29:01
  think from from there. I think I've only, I've only
• 29:05
  read 3/3 of the books after that, I think.
• 29:10
  What is it? Trading Futures by Lance
• 29:13
  Parking, Reckless Engineering by by Nick Walters and yeah,
• 29:21
  Gallifrey chronicles the last. One Dan Penn you've excite me so
• 29:25
  much the thought that through this book club I may expose you
• 29:30
  to some of these fabulous books that you've not read yet.
• 29:33
  I, I, I know that, that that's The thing is the exciting thing
• 29:36
  is that that I, I, I guess again, it feels like it's, it's
• 29:40
  the same with with the 8th Doctor books as it was with the
• 29:45
  there's a good laugh that that last bird seems to be
• 29:49
  particularly. There's.
• 29:50
  Some misses, but maybe there's some hits.
• 29:53
  Yeah. Oh, right.
• 29:56
  I might have to jiggle up our list a bit then.
• 29:58
  OK, yeah. And then, so, so I think, and
• 30:03
  then what I've done when I, I got this, this large batch of
• 30:07
  them from this charity shop where which meant that basically
• 30:11
  I think I've got, I've got the complete run up to year of
• 30:19
  intelligent Tigers. And then there's a few gaps in
• 30:22
  the, the couple towards the end as well.
• 30:24
  So what I've done is I've gone back to the beginning now
• 30:28
  started with the 8 doctors. Oh.
• 30:30
  Dear on that bumpy road again. Yeah, I mean that that's that's
• 30:35
  and so I'm up to Bell Tempest. I think I'm about halfway
• 30:39
  through Bell Tempest. Like sort of planets exploding
• 30:42
  and lots of people dying. Do you?
• 30:44
  No. Well, that's Jim Moore.
• 30:49
  My you know, he wrote Blood Heat when you started.
• 30:52
  What happened? It, yeah, it's, it's been, it's
• 30:56
  been interesting. And I think I, I've, it's
• 31:01
  strange because some books have kind of gone up in my
• 31:04
  estimation, whereas others have kind of gone down.
• 31:07
  So yeah, like I say 8 the 8 Doctors it's an it's it's fun,
• 31:14
  it's enjoyable. It's it's light and fluffy and
• 31:17
  what have you, the body statues. That was all right.
• 31:23
  You know it's. It could be a modern day Big
• 31:25
  Finish, couldn't it? Professor Lightfoot?
• 31:27
  The Zygons? OK.
• 31:29
  Definitely. I love the Victorian setting
• 31:31
  though. I think it, it was really dank
• 31:34
  and, you know, got all the, the, the, the dirt and you know that
• 31:40
  you expect of those. That isn't it.
• 31:42
  He's a horror writer. Yeah.
• 31:44
  Horror, horror writer. Yeah.
• 31:48
  I the the second time of reading it I I didn't enjoy vampire
• 31:54
  science as much as I did first. Time, which is quite.
• 31:57
  Which is quite controversial, I know, because we love.
• 32:00
  Controversy here. Yeah, the.
• 32:04
  Dope, you didn't enjoy War of the Daleks.
• 32:07
  No, no, I, I really. Yeah.
• 32:11
  The if anything it felt worse than the first time when I tried
• 32:16
  when I read them. I think there are some pitiable
• 32:20
  new adventures, but I don't think I'll pity a single new
• 32:23
  adventure more than our picky War of the Daleks.
• 32:25
  No, no, it's it's Oh, yeah, it's it's just just dreadful, isn't
• 32:32
  it? You know, and like I say that
• 32:34
  that was, it was the second one that made me just check the
• 32:37
  towel in first time round. Genocide.
• 32:41
  Yeah. Didn't like that one.
• 32:44
  Alien bodies. It was just like, man alive.
• 32:47
  This is a shining beacon amongst all, all of this mediocrity, you
• 32:53
  know, kind of thing. Yeah.
• 32:55
  And then, and then, and then it was sort of like, I think after,
• 32:58
  after Legacy, you've then got like a succession of like books
• 33:05
  that don't really you, you, you've finished them, but you
• 33:08
  go, I can't remember anything about them.
• 33:11
  Like they're like, you know, I can barely remember the titles,
• 33:14
  you know, sort of like the. Longest day Greenstone moon
• 33:19
  option lock here. And.
• 33:22
  The decade's children have. You had that one yet?
• 33:24
  Yeah, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sponge.
• 33:28
  Yeah. So and I was, I was getting a
• 33:32
  bit despondent with them and then I Dreamstone Moon felt like
• 33:40
  a little step up and then, well, I want to keep my powder dry for
• 33:46
  when we talk about it. But seeing eye, that was like,
• 33:53
  Oh yeah, this is quite good, you know, so so that that helped.
• 33:59
  It was sort of like it was kind of just clinging on to these
• 34:02
  these these two that kind of felt like they were stepping in
• 34:06
  the right direction. And it, and it and it, and I
• 34:08
  think it is sort of like it's, it's worth me persevering
• 34:14
  because I know there are better things to come, you know, but
• 34:18
  but yeah, I think that that, yeah, my, my opinion of of that
• 34:23
  early days of the range hasn't really changed a great deal.
• 34:26
  There's a couple that are amazing.
• 34:28
  There are, there are a couple that are OK and then there's
• 34:32
  quite a lot that are just well. I don't think that's a
• 34:34
  controversial opinion though. I think a lot of people struggle
• 34:37
  with the first or 20 aged Dr. books because I don't think they
• 34:41
  had a clue what they were doing. I think that they were flailing
• 34:44
  about a bit. They were going from editor to
• 34:46
  editor, and by the time they got to see a night, it's almost like
• 34:49
  they went right course correction.
• 34:50
  We need to grow these characters up.
• 34:52
  We need to get them on the same page and then we can start
• 34:55
  telling some good stories with some reasonable characters.
• 34:58
  Yeah, yeah, definitely. So so you're sort of away from
• 35:04
  the books. So I'm assuming the new series
• 35:05
  adventures are a bit of AI mean I can see them on your shelf?
• 35:10
  Yeah, No, I I think, I think this has kind of been said quite
• 35:16
  a few times before. So I'm going to be saying
• 35:19
  nothing new here. They're not aimed for, for the
• 35:23
  likes of us. They, they are for, you know,
• 35:26
  those kids that started watching Doctor Who in in 2005.
• 35:33
  But that's not to say there aren't they are a much better
• 35:39
  quality than what you would expect from ATV tie in or, you
• 35:43
  know, like a a range that's kind of aimed at early teens, you
• 35:49
  know, sort of. And there's some crackers in
• 35:52
  there, you know, touched by an Angel, you know, what's the
• 35:58
  Lance parking one? We've oh, the eyeless.
• 36:01
  Eyeless. Yeah, that's a really good one.
• 36:02
  Noemi Alderman's borrowed time. Yes.
• 36:06
  A cracker I really like Sick Building by Paul Mars.
• 36:11
  I, there's some, I, I really like the free books that we got
• 36:16
  with Peter Capaldi and Bill I can't read.
• 36:20
  Any of. Those, there's one set in
• 36:25
  Edinburgh, it's like a historical win.
• 36:27
  There's the plague and all that sort of thing.
• 36:29
  And it's that one's absolutely. Add 1 to the list.
• 36:32
  Yeah, that's me coming to a book now.
• 36:36
  Yeah. And, and then the three, it's
• 36:38
  such a shame that we only got 3 for, for Jodie, because there,
• 36:44
  there were they, they were very enjoyable as well.
• 36:47
  They were, they were, they were quite good reads.
• 36:49
  So, yeah, you know, there was there, there, there's, you know,
• 36:54
  again, I think it's sort of like, I think the standard's
• 36:57
  pretty high. But when, when you get like a
• 37:00
  really, really good one, they are really, really good, you
• 37:03
  know, But yeah, so, so, yeah. So I, I, I, I, I I got that.
• 37:11
  So, so before we head into your top and bottom 10 list, 7 and
• 37:16
  you can determine where we start with that.
• 37:18
  We can even start with the top or we can start with the bottom.
• 37:20
  If you'll forgive me, I'm getting the sense that you've
• 37:23
  read about 80% of Doctor Who books across all the ranges.
• 37:30
  Yes, yeah. I, I, I I've read all the
• 37:35
  targets. Yeah.
• 37:39
  And I know I've but, but I, I've, I would say that I
• 37:44
  probably haven't read all of any of the other ranges, whether
• 37:48
  that's the new adventures, there's still ones there that I
• 37:51
  haven't, I haven't read. I think, I think it's, it's only
• 37:55
  only a couple, but. There's that's exciting that
• 37:58
  means. We Yeah.
• 37:59
  Yeah, yeah. We've got books to read together
• 38:01
  and talk about that you've never read before.
• 38:03
  Yeah, that's exciting. You know, like, like I say, I,
• 38:06
  I, I, I think when it comes to like the 8th Doctor range, I've
• 38:10
  probably read a third of them. So there, there's a lot.
• 38:13
  Really excited, yeah. Whereas with like the past
• 38:18
  doctors, I I'm pretty. Sure, I've read all of.
• 38:22
  Those because like I say that that was I ditched.
• 38:26
  I ditched the 8th Doctor once because it just didn't feel like
• 38:29
  I was enjoying them at all and and kind of just went with those
• 38:33
  with with the past. Still had your Doctor Who
• 38:35
  fiction, everybody? Yeah.
• 38:37
  Yeah, I mean, you know, I, I think like the the the quality
• 38:41
  of those was quite variable, but but I think it had that kind of
• 38:45
  nostalgic. Yeah.
• 38:48
  Element to it, because it was it was doctors I was familiar with,
• 38:51
  you know, I know. Plenty of people that only ever
• 38:53
  bought Missing and past Doctor adventures.
• 38:55
  I touched the other ones because they were like well no I don't
• 38:58
  want all this sex and swearing. Then they picked up Combat Rock
• 39:02
  by Mick Lewis and went, Oh dear, what's going on here?
• 39:05
  Yeah, Yeah, Yeah. I mean, you know, and I think
• 39:11
  that that is a range that I, I think if you're honest, the, the
• 39:17
  sort of the, the average quality of those wasn't that high, but
• 39:22
  when it, when it, when it hit the, the right length.
• 39:25
  They were very. Very good.
• 39:28
  Become more fond of the past Doctor adventures than most, but
• 39:33
  there are some dogs in some terrible books in that range,
• 39:38
  and not always from the right, as you'd suspect as well.
• 39:42
  No, and I think that that was the, it's, it's strange, but
• 39:46
  when, when you're kind of asked to, to kind of put together a
• 39:50
  top ten list and a bottom 10, it, it's, it's, I think arranged
• 39:58
  like the past doctors ones, it's hard to pick out ones that you
• 40:02
  would really, really champion. And, and I think because,
• 40:06
  because it's like I was kind of I, I kind of what I, what I
• 40:09
  initially did is I made a list of right, what are the virgin
• 40:14
  books that I really, really enjoyed.
• 40:15
  And I've gone back and I've reread, you know, what, what are
• 40:19
  the missing adventure ones and and so on and so on.
• 40:22
  You know, and it, it was sort of, it's quite interesting that.
• 40:26
  You know, I probably could have done a top 20 when it comes to
• 40:31
  the virgin books. I could almost have done a top
• 40:34
  10 of targets like the the 8th doctors there were about 6:00.
• 40:40
  But the past doctors there were only there were only two, two
• 40:44
  books that I I could think, yeah, they're they're pretty,
• 40:48
  pretty good. I already can't wait to hear
• 40:51
  you're listening. Yeah, yeah.
• 40:53
  You will get down. What I will say is listening to
• 40:56
  your journey is it's very exciting, but our journey starts
• 41:02
  here. That's that's really exciting as
• 41:04
  well because now we're now I'm a part of your book journey.
• 41:08
  So is David Gillespie Pratt and oh God, who's in our group?
• 41:12
  I've forgotten already. Gareth.
• 41:14
  Baley, obviously lovely roles. I'm forgetting someone.
• 41:17
  Who am I forgetting? Me.
• 41:19
  Oh. Yeah, yeah, you're right in
• 41:23
  front of me right now. Dan, I've been wanting to ask
• 41:27
  you this for some time now. And you know, since it's just
• 41:30
  two of us alone on this Friday night on this call, what would
• 41:34
  you like to do first? Top or bottom?
• 41:37
  I I think. Oh, you really are straight,
• 41:40
  aren't you? You didn't even smile at that
• 41:42
  joke. If I'm, if I'm honest with you,
• 41:47
  I don't, I don't quite understand.
• 41:49
  Don't worry about it. All right?
• 41:51
  You don't. Even.
• 41:52
  Know all right, it's all about trains and no well, top and 10,
• 41:57
  top ten and bottom 10 books. Yeah.
• 42:01
  Shall shall we start with a bottom first, because that means
• 42:05
  that means that we end we end with a top.
• 42:08
  So we we end on a high. We'll end on a high and the
• 42:11
  bottom 10 lists are always my favourites so.
• 42:14
  Well, I think like I may have mentioned this to you in our
• 42:17
  when we were sort of like messaging each other, but the IT
• 42:21
  was it was easy to kind of go, these are the books that I love
• 42:26
  and quite difficult to go. These are the books that I don't
• 42:30
  love. So so the the the bottom 10 was
• 42:35
  was a harder list. OK.
• 42:38
  But are these in order or just any order?
• 42:40
  Are they? Any order?
• 42:41
  Yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to.
• 42:42
  I'm going to do it like the Top 40, you know?
• 42:45
  12:50 yeah, 10 to 110 to one. All right, So bottom #10 is.
• 42:52
  We've, we've already talked about how bad this is.
• 42:54
  This is War of the Daleks by Yeah.
• 42:57
  Well, I mean, where do you start?
• 43:01
  I, I mean, it's a book that had a lot of potential and a lot of
• 43:08
  promise because you, you probably like, like myself, we,
• 43:13
  you, you probably read those, his novelisations of like those
• 43:18
  60s Dalek stories of Chase, Dalek Masterpan, impressive.
• 43:22
  They, they're really, really good.
• 43:24
  So you think, oh, John Peel and the Daleks, this, this is going
• 43:30
  to be good? Never before have we been lulled
• 43:34
  into more of a false sense of security.
• 43:36
  No and. And, and I think, I think I, I
• 43:40
  think I'll be fair here and say that there, there are elements
• 43:44
  of the first third of the book that I kind of I, I kind of
• 43:50
  like, you know, like I, I think it's because I like, I like, I
• 43:54
  like, I think I'm probably more gun than I am frock, if if you
• 43:58
  know what I mean. So I, I love that that.
• 44:01
  Battle. Yeah.
• 44:03
  You got the Spider Daleks and all these things.
• 44:05
  And I thought, yeah, that's, that's quite, yeah.
• 44:08
  I like to talk about blowing your load though.
• 44:09
  In the 1st 20 pages you went. Bigger.
• 44:12
  Who happens after that? Yeah.
• 44:16
  Yeah. And then I think you then get to
• 44:18
  the bit where where Davros enters the story and then it
• 44:23
  just becomes this hotchpotch of continuity and and then and then
• 44:32
  and it starts really pushing the boundaries of of like
• 44:38
  believability. So, you know, we, we then find
• 44:43
  out that that, you know, as the book progresses, that that
• 44:47
  basically all of those Dalek stories since Destiny of the
• 44:51
  Daleks have been like a massive, a massive con so that the Daleks
• 44:57
  can put themselves on trial. I mean what?
• 45:04
  Wasn't the whole thing like was to fool Davros into thinking the
• 45:09
  Antalis is Scaro in Destiny of the Daleks when he wakes up so
• 45:14
  that when he activates the Hand of Omega in remembrance of the
• 45:18
  Daleks he destroys Antalis instead of Scaro?
• 45:23
  Yeah. I mean, why?
• 45:26
  No, because, because I mean that that's the thing, because
• 45:29
  there's that's some of the stuff that I kind of had written down
• 45:32
  here in my notes was like, like the Mevellan's They they weren't
• 45:37
  the enemy. They were a construct, a Dalek
• 45:40
  construct to, you know, to and then could.
• 45:44
  Someone have a word with that Dalek designer then please?
• 45:48
  Disco yeah, and then and then yeah.
• 45:52
  And like you say, you've got this this kind of the Daleks of
• 45:57
  them pretending that that this other totally different planet
• 46:00
  is Scaro so that the hand of Omega doesn't blow it up and it
• 46:05
  and you're just thinking, yeah. And I know I believe that that
• 46:11
  came about purely because he had had a conversation with Terry
• 46:15
  Nation and he said that he wasn't happy that Scaro had been
• 46:19
  had been destroyed in remembrance.
• 46:22
  And and you kind of so you're basing the whole concept or
• 46:26
  conceit of this book basically because the guy that made the
• 46:30
  Daleks in the 1st place goes yeah, I didn't I didn't like
• 46:33
  them blowing up Scaro. So.
• 46:36
  Yeah, and they must know at this point that the consumers of
• 46:39
  these books are only hardcore Doctor Who fans.
• 46:43
  But if you rewrite great swathes of Doctor Who TV continuity that
• 46:48
  you're doing them a disservice. And when you think like, you
• 46:55
  know, the, the story where Scaro blew up is, is rightly regarded
• 46:59
  by most of fandom as being a one of the, the classics.
• 47:03
  You, you can't, you can't do something like that.
• 47:06
  And and not not feel some sort of backlash because you're,
• 47:10
  you're messing, you're messing with the, the crown jewels in a
• 47:14
  way there, aren't you, you know? It would literally be like, you
• 47:17
  know, having some mad scheme to suggest that William Hartnell
• 47:22
  wasn't the 1st Doctor and that there was all of these doctors
• 47:25
  before him. Wow.
• 47:27
  Who would do that? Precisely.
• 47:29
  Absolutely. It would be like suggesting
• 47:32
  there was a a spare doctor between Paul McGann and
• 47:37
  Christopher Eccleston that we never heard of before.
• 47:39
  Yeah. We don't mention.
• 47:41
  I mean, you know, there's things you just don't do.
• 47:44
  No, you know, and it's sort of yes, it's.
• 47:48
  Very badly written as well. Oh yeah.
• 47:51
  And and I and I think one one thing that I did know about how
• 47:55
  it was written Sam in this. Is.
• 47:58
  Absolutely, appallingly rogue. I think this is the damage this
• 48:03
  book. Is.
• 48:05
  Number one, the damage. But if you if if if you do go
• 48:09
  back and you read it from from the 8 doctors to to where I've
• 48:12
  got to. This is the only book that
• 48:15
  treats Sam in this way, that she's lusting after the doctor
• 48:19
  like some horny dog and that that any woman that walks into a
• 48:25
  room she's then jealous of. Gets your eyes off him.
• 48:29
  Yeah, yeah, you slag. It's.
• 48:32
  Like, oh, man, yeah. And, and if you read it out of
• 48:36
  context and you just have that story, then you think, yes, I
• 48:41
  can understand why people don't like Sam.
• 48:43
  But if you read it in order, you're going.
• 48:46
  Who is this? This is.
• 48:47
  Very different from the Sam we've had in the previous four
• 48:51
  or five books. I was immediately my heckles was
• 48:54
  up when I was reading this down when, because I did it for the
• 48:57
  book club recently, lovely Ken Moss, who does my readings.
• 49:01
  You know, he does fabulous readings for the book, but he
• 49:04
  loved that book. And I thought, how on earth am I
• 49:06
  going to destroy all of his dreams?
• 49:08
  Because I really hated it. And I knew I was onto a bad
• 49:11
  thing when Sam walked into the TARDIS and there's there's an
• 49:15
  opera singer singing in the TARD.
• 49:17
  And she goes, oh, you stupid fat cow, to the to the grab her
• 49:21
  phone. I'm like, why are you doing
• 49:23
  that? Like, it's just very, very, very
• 49:27
  bad. Yeah.
• 49:29
  OK. Well, I don't think anyone's
• 49:30
  going to argue with that particular part of your list.
• 49:34
  Yeah, I think, I think it was a, it was a, it was a safe start.
• 49:38
  To be. Honest.
• 49:39
  Let's be more positive then and skip across to your number 10
• 49:44
  top list. So.
• 49:48
  The. The coming in at #10 I think I
• 49:52
  think of I've got to do the the the usual caveat that you have
• 49:56
  to do with this author that basically I am separating the,
• 50:01
  the art from from the artist because the author is that the
• 50:07
  author is a dreadful human being with reviews that I, I do not
• 50:10
  prescribe to. However, he does have quite a
• 50:13
  few entrants in people's top ten list.
• 50:16
  Yeah, that's the unfortunate thing.
• 50:17
  He, he, you know, so yeah, at #10 is the Plotters by, by
• 50:23
  Gareth Roberts. So admittedly, I don't like his
• 50:30
  new adventure books. I, I, I don't think that that's
• 50:34
  playing to his strengths, but all of his work in, in, in the
• 50:38
  missing adventure range are, are just fantastic, whether it's,
• 50:41
  you know, those, those Tom Baker ones, which I think there's
• 50:44
  three of those, isn't there? And then this, this one, the,
• 50:47
  the plotters. But I just, I just really,
• 50:51
  really enjoy this book so, so much.
• 50:55
  And I came to it quite, quite late because this was, I think
• 50:58
  this was one of the gaps that, that I had in my, my missing
• 51:02
  adventure range. And then I managed, managed to
• 51:06
  find this. There was a, there was a
• 51:08
  bookshop on, I think it's the Isle of Wight.
• 51:10
  Who, who won? I think it's called.
• 51:12
  And yeah, yeah, I, I, I when I found it, I've got, I've got,
• 51:18
  we've got to go to the Isle of Wight because I want to go to
• 51:19
  this book. So I dragged my family on
• 51:22
  holiday there. But he he had like brand new
• 51:28
  editions of a lot of the books that I didn't get and he was
• 51:30
  still selling them, but at recommended retail price.
• 51:34
  Wow. So the plotters was one that I
• 51:37
  picked up probably about seven years ago from, from him, yes.
• 51:42
  So I paid paid £4.99 for it or whatever.
• 51:44
  You should have picked all, all yours up and then on the way out
• 51:46
  the door said to him, mate, you know you're sitting on a gold
• 51:49
  mine here. Yeah, I, well, I, I, I, I
• 51:52
  noticed that as time went, as time's gone on, he's still, but
• 51:57
  he's like cut and done that. I've seen new one prices.
• 52:01
  They're 20. 5. £30 now for some of them so, so yeah, so, so.
• 52:07
  I got, again, I got really lucky, you know, but it just,
• 52:13
  this book just really kind of stands out in that range as, as
• 52:16
  one of one of, well, one of the best, you know, it's full of
• 52:22
  rich, witty dialogue. And, and it's, it's very funny
• 52:27
  in, in a similar vein to say the, the Romans.
• 52:31
  And, and I think, I think that's one of the, the, one of the
• 52:35
  things that you can kind of say about Gareth Robbitt's writing
• 52:38
  for this range is that obviously he only picked 2 eras, but he
• 52:45
  had a knack of being able to capture the, the, the atmosphere
• 52:50
  of that era perfectly. You know, he he nailed the the
• 52:55
  characters of of the Doctor and and the rest of the companions
• 53:00
  and, and you, you know, you can see like their, their
• 53:04
  personality traits and all of their tics littered throughout
• 53:09
  this, this. Book You Know You.
• 53:11
  The doctor, he's very much in that, you know, you can, you can
• 53:14
  just, you can see him there chuckling and going, Mum, you
• 53:17
  know, you know, that sort of thing.
• 53:18
  As the doctor does. Yeah.
• 53:20
  And it's, it's just, I, I just think it's just superbly written
• 53:25
  and it's, it's you, you could imagine this as it is a missing
• 53:31
  event. You could imagine this being ATV
• 53:34
  story where where we've lost, we've lost the tapes and all
• 53:39
  we've got is, is, is is this book of it.
• 53:41
  And, and and I think that that is incredibly, that's incredibly
• 53:47
  clever to be able to just inhabit that era, but also make
• 53:52
  it feel fresh as well. You know, it doesn't feel, you
• 53:56
  know, because sometimes you've got you've got these people that
• 53:58
  kind of these authors, they try quite hard to kind of.
• 54:03
  And by doing that, it feels worse.
• 54:06
  It feels less worse. Cordon.
• 54:09
  Yeah, you know. It might be quite impolitic to
• 54:15
  say this because the central conceit is Vicky disguised as a
• 54:22
  boy, and so Kim John. Thinks that Vicky is.
• 54:25
  A boy and henceforth is lusting after her, him throughout this
• 54:32
  entire book, which obviously, given where Gareth Roberts has
• 54:36
  gone, this is all very dodgy. But funny.
• 54:39
  It's so funny, yeah, because. Because I, I I.
• 54:43
  It's funny because like I say, I probably read this about six or
• 54:48
  seven years ago, but I can still kind of remember the line where
• 54:51
  it's it's something like King James is kind of saying to to
• 54:56
  Vicky as Victor. You know, if you let your king
• 54:59
  have the way, you'll be in for a lovely surprise.
• 55:01
  And like Vicky then turns around and goes not as lovely as the
• 55:04
  surprise you'll get. And it's just it's priceless.
• 55:08
  There's one thing which I'll never forget.
• 55:10
  Where they're trying to get back to the TARDIS, so they're all
• 55:13
  dancing around the TARDIS as witches or something, like
• 55:16
  trying to get to the door. And I was like, I would pay
• 55:19
  money to see William Hart or Jacqueline Hill, William Russell
• 55:24
  dancing. Around the Tardis.
• 55:25
  Like this? Oh, that is a grand choice.
• 55:28
  Yeah. What a great book.
• 55:30
  Yeah, he, he just was a very. And he wrote only human for the
• 55:34
  NSA. He wrote a really funny, really
• 55:36
  good NSA as well. Yeah.
• 55:38
  Irritatingly, Karen Roberts is a very good writer.
• 55:42
  Yeah, we we want to hate. Them.
• 55:44
  But we just can't, you know, why can't you have no talent for
• 55:48
  God's sides? Well come on then, let's bury a
• 55:51
  book. Yeah, so #9.
• 55:54
  Is Warmonger by by Terrence Dicks?
• 56:01
  I recommended this on one of the book club.
• 56:03
  Episodes I did. Yeah.
• 56:05
  The world. No, go on.
• 56:07
  Come on for your. Reasons.
• 56:10
  Yeah, I think considering that Terrence Dicks has been involved
• 56:16
  in Doctor Who in some capacity since since the 60s, it just
• 56:23
  feels. Like when he wrote.
• 56:25
  This. He totally forgot what the show
• 56:29
  was about and and you know, so so basically this is this is a
• 56:34
  sequel to to the brain of Morbius.
• 56:38
  So gave that away the. Evil villain Rhombosy the
• 56:44
  General. Yeah, I mean.
• 56:50
  So so obviously he's gathered together a massive army.
• 56:54
  The the Doctor finds out. He tells the Time Lords they
• 56:58
  don't want to directly get involved, but then command him
• 57:02
  to create an army to combat Morbius's army.
• 57:09
  And you think, do you recall what the Army's made?
• 57:12
  Out of yes, that that was that's yeah.
• 57:14
  Yeah. And then because they're working
• 57:16
  together somehow. And then to make it worse then
• 57:19
  armies. Are made-up of like Draconians,
• 57:22
  Sontarans, Ograns, ice squares and Cybermen.
• 57:25
  That's right. And it's just like, oh come on,
• 57:28
  this is just mad. I mean, you have seen the
• 57:31
  Pandorica. Opens right?
• 57:32
  They can all work together, yeah.
• 57:36
  Yeah. And and then, you know, and then
• 57:38
  to kind of top it all, I think of all the doctors to choose to
• 57:45
  lead. A huge.
• 57:47
  Army into battle, the 5th Doctor would.
• 57:51
  Probably be the last. One I would choose.
• 57:53
  Do you know the origins of this book?
• 57:56
  So it was supposed to. Be a 6th Doctor book.
• 57:58
  It was written as a 6th Doctor book.
• 58:02
  And then at the last minute, Justin Richards says we haven't
• 58:05
  had. We need a 5th Doctor book.
• 58:07
  Oh, I'll tell you what, Let's make Warmonger a 5th Doctor book
• 58:10
  instead. Now, as the 6th Doctor, it's
• 58:12
  still not great, but it does make more sense.
• 58:14
  Yeah. Because.
• 58:15
  Yeah, because. Yeah, that was the thing.
• 58:18
  I was like, well, which ones? I could see John Pertway doing
• 58:23
  it. I could, you know, the 3rd
• 58:26
  Doctor. Sorry.
• 58:27
  Yeah, I could see Colin Baker. So it's just a very unfortunate
• 58:32
  last. Minute rehearsal, that's.
• 58:34
  You know a special slogan about Fetch Me A?
• 58:38
  Gun and a knife or something like, like, you just can't ever
• 58:41
  imagine Peter Davidson saying that.
• 58:44
  Not at all. That's like a gang.
• 58:46
  Of. The bounty hunters that go
• 58:48
  around wanting to rape people all the time are like what is
• 58:51
  going on in this book and then doesn't, doesn't Perry.
• 58:54
  Join like a resistance. Well, and it's even again.
• 58:57
  She's like, she's not what's she called?
• 59:00
  She's got a name. She's like the busty.
• 59:01
  Avenger or something like that. It's just like Terrence, please
• 59:04
  stop, you know, and I so. So I, you know, I was, I just I.
• 59:12
  Can't. Believe that one.
• 59:14
  Terence Dick submitted this idea, and two, Justin Richards
• 59:18
  thought, well, that's a good, that's a good idea, let's
• 59:20
  publish it. But like recently, he's written
• 59:23
  stuff. Like Players, which is a great,
• 59:25
  a really tasty sort of Colin historical.
• 59:28
  He had a good stab at End Game, which is a spy thriller.
• 59:32
  Yeah, I don't know what happened, you know, so, so then.
• 59:36
  You know, the whole book, basically.
• 59:40
  Leads up to. Basically sullen, hot, fitting
• 59:44
  it with, you know, Morbius's brain tucked under his arm.
• 59:48
  We should have seen it coming. Really.
• 59:50
  Well, yeah. Yeah.
• 59:52
  Yeah. So it's.
• 59:54
  It just, it just doesn't feel right in any if to me.
• 59:59
  It doesn't feel right in any shape formal way.
• 1:00:01
  So yeah, epitome of what you said earlier, wasn't it about
• 1:00:04
  these? Writers taking these established
• 1:00:05
  eras and trying to do new things with them.
• 1:00:08
  I need a feeling. Just utterly jarring.
• 1:00:10
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:00:11
  It just. It just doesn't.
• 1:00:12
  Work. So yeah, let's park slagging.
• 1:00:16
  Off Uncle Terry right here, although unless you've got some
• 1:00:19
  more and we'll, we'll head back to a positive book number #9 on
• 1:00:23
  your top ten list, so. Yeah #9 is Bad Therapy by by
• 1:00:30
  Matthew Jones right? Let's have a couple of lists.
• 1:00:34
  Yeah, I. Again, this was another one that
• 1:00:38
  that I I picked up reasonably recently and and I think and and
• 1:00:49
  and it I don't know, it just it just really the emotion of the
• 1:00:55
  book kind of really, really hit home for me.
• 1:00:58
  So, so, you know, basically this is, I suppose, what it was meant
• 1:01:03
  to be the aftermath of so violent in, wasn't it?
• 1:01:06
  So, so basically, you know, you've got Chris and even the
• 1:01:11
  doctor to a point basically coming to or dealing with, with
• 1:01:15
  the grief and the loss of of, of Roz's death.
• 1:01:20
  So, so that, you know, it feels like it, it's very much a book
• 1:01:25
  about grief and dealing with, with grief.
• 1:01:29
  And I think because, because I've read this after, after I'd
• 1:01:32
  lost my my mom, I don't, I think that that really kind of spoke
• 1:01:39
  to me, but. But that's not.
• 1:01:43
  To say that that's all of that this this book is about because
• 1:01:47
  it because it's not, it's not just about that, but but
• 1:01:50
  obviously, you know, you've got, it's obviously set in the 1950s
• 1:01:54
  and it and it deals with those very narrow minded opinions and
• 1:02:00
  attitudes of the time. So you you've got the, the
• 1:02:03
  weighty issues of, of, of of homophobia.
• 1:02:07
  And and racism. In there as well, you know, to
• 1:02:10
  the point where I, I suppose in my mind that the main character
• 1:02:15
  of the book is, is Jack, you know, So, and his stories, and
• 1:02:21
  it was certainly initially is, is absolutely heartbreaking
• 1:02:25
  because he's in love with, with Eddie.
• 1:02:29
  So it's so it's a love that they, they, it has to remain
• 1:02:32
  hidden. He then loses Eddie in the most
• 1:02:37
  horrific murder you can, you know, it's really quite brutal.
• 1:02:41
  And then he's, he's not able to mourn the death of that person
• 1:02:46
  openly, you know, and, and you know, and then on top of that,
• 1:02:50
  he's then being blackmailed by a gangster.
• 1:02:52
  He's threatening to kind of expose his his sexuality.
• 1:02:57
  But but I think what what is really nice with with his story
• 1:03:02
  is that he almost becomes the doctor's companion in this this
• 1:03:05
  book because you've you've kind of got Chris's.
• 1:03:09
  He's almost plot B and it and it's Jack and the doctor of plot
• 1:03:15
  A. You know, Chris, obviously he
• 1:03:18
  he's grieving Roz. He's got that relationship with
• 1:03:22
  a name escapes me now. But but yeah, one of the toys,
• 1:03:29
  yeah. And it's it's just, it's just a
• 1:03:34
  book that's just full of emotion.
• 1:03:36
  It's character driven. Not to say it hasn't got its
• 1:03:41
  moments of action and and drama, but but, but it's it's it's all
• 1:03:45
  about the the character and and yeah, I just, I just wish we'd.
• 1:03:52
  Got more books? From Matthew Jones, really.
• 1:03:54
  Because I I know that he obviously did.
• 1:03:58
  Was it beyond the sun of Benny Lees?
• 1:04:00
  Yeah. And then?
• 1:04:02
  Obviously the impossible planet and which again is great.
• 1:04:05
  Character work, isn't it? But but it would have.
• 1:04:09
  Been lovely to see more Doctor Who books in the 90s from him
• 1:04:14
  but yeah I I just love how gentle the 7th.
• 1:04:17
  Doctor is in that book because I have a real issue with the 7th
• 1:04:20
  Doctor in the New Adventures a lot of the time, and he's so
• 1:04:23
  kind and empathetic and the bit I always point to is so funny.
• 1:04:28
  He's in Jack's bedroom and the housekeeper's coming up the
• 1:04:32
  stairs. He goes quick, get under the
• 1:04:34
  bed. Just the thought.
• 1:04:36
  This master manipulator juggling out all the world's in the
• 1:04:38
  universe is under this gay man's bed, hiding away from the
• 1:04:42
  housekeeper. It's just gorgeous.
• 1:04:44
  Isn't there like a magazine under the?
• 1:04:46
  Bed as well. Well, we're covering that.
• 1:04:52
  On the book. That's one of Rod's.
• 1:04:54
  I was really, I was really happy when Rod.
• 1:04:57
  Recommended that and I was like yeah yeah yeah because like I
• 1:05:01
  say, it's been a few years since since I read it but.
• 1:05:05
  But it's one that kind of really, really stuck with me
• 1:05:09
  because of, I mean, I. Don't know if.
• 1:05:12
  I'd want my my Doctor Who to be as heartbreaking as this every
• 1:05:18
  time, but to do it now and again, you know, and you know,
• 1:05:26
  yeah, I, I think it, it, it just handles a lot of weighty topics
• 1:05:32
  really, really well. It shows we've we've moved on a
• 1:05:34
  lot from. You know the earth shock to time
• 1:05:37
  flight. Oh well, he's dead.
• 1:05:39
  Let's move on. You know, now we can actually
• 1:05:41
  have a whole story where we explore grief in in really touch
• 1:05:46
  your Wiz. I can let you into a little
• 1:05:47
  secret though. That's probably one of two.
• 1:05:51
  Books for rock and stomach. Chris Quedge, it's not one of my
• 1:05:54
  favourites at all, but I think he's brilliantly written in that
• 1:05:58
  book. I think the room, the room, we
• 1:06:01
  know doors as well. He's great in that book too.
• 1:06:03
  But we'll get there. We'll, we'll, we'll explain that
• 1:06:06
  in in some detail. I love Ross.
• 1:06:08
  Forrester though, I will say that, OK.
• 1:06:12
  Come on, Swing. Us back around to to another
• 1:06:15
  author that we're going to send a therapy.
• 1:06:17
  Yeah. The Transit by Benny Ranovich.
• 1:06:23
  Again, the level of which I have mentioned earlier on before you
• 1:06:26
  start, can Ioffer. You some colon offs.
• 1:06:30
  OK, there we go. I might just wipe the taste out
• 1:06:34
  of your mouth, right? Oh yeah.
• 1:06:37
  That's a horrible line. Yeah, So obviously with the,
• 1:06:42
  the, the the the new adventures, their, their tagline was stories
• 1:06:46
  too broad and too deep for the small screen.
• 1:06:52
  Now, in my mind, that should mean stories that couldn't be
• 1:07:00
  told on the TV because Eva, the technology wasn't there to
• 1:07:07
  achieve it or, or the budget that that story just was not you
• 1:07:12
  weren't you, you didn't have the ability to be able to tell it.
• 1:07:17
  Whereas I think like the the early days of this range and
• 1:07:22
  we've kind of mentioned this already that they thought,
• 1:07:24
  right, OK, this just meant loads of nudity, loads of sex, loads
• 1:07:29
  of swearing, loads of, of, of grim death, violence, etcetera,
• 1:07:35
  etcetera. And I think transit feels like
• 1:07:39
  the epitome of that approach. And for me, it, it frequently
• 1:07:46
  oversteps the line of decency and therefore doesn't feel like
• 1:07:54
  it's a Doctor Who book. It just, it just doesn't.
• 1:07:58
  And I don't know whether that's me being prudish or whatever,
• 1:08:03
  but it just it just feels like, you know, they they were trying
• 1:08:07
  so hard to be adult that they come across as anything but.
• 1:08:13
  And you know, it's quite a shame because, you know, Ben Aranovic
• 1:08:19
  is better than that. You know, he wrote remembrance
• 1:08:23
  the also people really a new event to that and then and then
• 1:08:27
  obviously, you know, he's I think that might have been a
• 1:08:29
  reaction to this, though you. Know Rebecca Levine said.
• 1:08:32
  Look, chill out, chill out, all right?
• 1:08:34
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:08:37
  And then, then, you know, obviously I, I mean, I don't
• 1:08:39
  know if you've read any of Rivers of London, but I've, I've
• 1:08:42
  read a couple of the early and, you know, and it, it kind of
• 1:08:45
  proves that that that this, this is a blip.
• 1:08:49
  This this is a. A.
• 1:08:51
  Misjudgement, you know, and here, Winston said when we did
• 1:08:55
  recently, the remembrance. Of the Daleks when he went.
• 1:08:58
  Ben Aronovich is clearly an extremely adept writer who also
• 1:09:02
  wrote Transit. Yeah.
• 1:09:06
  Definitely there was also this thing.
• 1:09:08
  In those early new adventures about.
• 1:09:09
  Doing really impenetrable science fiction stuff like Cats,
• 1:09:14
  Cradle, Times, Crucible, Transit, The Pit, and it was all
• 1:09:18
  heading into like, cyberspace and all this bullshit that was
• 1:09:22
  popular at the time. It's like, just tell a story,
• 1:09:25
  you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 1:09:28
  Nightshade Nightshade is just a story about.
• 1:09:31
  People and the horrors of their past.
• 1:09:34
  That's so. Simple, yeah.
• 1:09:35
  Yeah, yeah, you know, and, and it's all the, it's all.
• 1:09:38
  All the better for it as well. You know, it's it, Yeah, you
• 1:09:42
  know, but but, you know, I think we can be thankful that it it
• 1:09:45
  was it was sort of like a phase that the authors.
• 1:09:51
  And the range. Kind of grew out they matured
• 1:09:53
  and and you know yeah, they got this out of their system with
• 1:09:59
  that first third of the range and and and yeah.
• 1:10:03
  And it was definitely better after they decided that this
• 1:10:06
  this wasn't the approach to take anymore.
• 1:10:08
  You could also be grateful that James Lark, Ian Winston.
• 1:10:10
  And Jason Thompson have already read that one for the book club.
• 1:10:14
  So you don't have to endure it. I like that.
• 1:10:19
  Every cloud has a silver lining. All right then.
• 1:10:22
  Well, let's head back to your top.
• 1:10:23
  Ten list OK, yes, so this is a little.
• 1:10:32
  Bit of a different one to be honest.
• 1:10:34
  This is a book called Time Slides, which is a non fiction
• 1:10:40
  and it it's by Colin Howard, who, who was one of the artists
• 1:10:44
  that mainly did VHS covers, but he did he did books, he did
• 1:10:49
  magazines and all sorts. So this this is a book that was,
• 1:10:55
  was was published by by Candy Jar because they at the same
• 1:10:59
  time they brought out a book about Jeff Cummings as well,
• 1:11:04
  which which again is a is a brilliant book.
• 1:11:08
  Yeah, but this man I, I, I think I picked this one.
• 1:11:13
  And and you know, I was thinking when I was listening sort of
• 1:11:16
  like non fiction books that that I like.
• 1:11:21
  There were quite a few artist ones in there.
• 1:11:22
  So there was Black light by Andrew Skeletor the the Jeff
• 1:11:28
  Cummings one. I even I even thought about like
• 1:11:33
  the the target book by by David J Howard because of the fact
• 1:11:39
  that it's got all of these beautiful artworks from, you
• 1:11:43
  know, from the first targets right up to, you know, where
• 1:11:48
  we're at now. But I think in all honesty,
• 1:11:53
  Colin Howard is probably my favorite of the the Doctor Who
• 1:11:57
  artists and and this book time slides.
• 1:11:59
  It's just full of. Everything that you've done, you
• 1:12:05
  know so that you. Know you've got, you've got like
• 1:12:10
  trying to think some of the, the video covers.
• 1:12:12
  So like the Android invasion, that beautiful orange one with,
• 1:12:17
  with Tom Baker, you know, tied to the, the, the War Memorial
• 1:12:22
  ghost light with, you know, Sylvester and Sophie on it and
• 1:12:27
  the, the house in the background.
• 1:12:28
  And it's all did he do? Did he do some New adventures
• 1:12:32
  covers? Did he do?
• 1:12:33
  Birthright he did. Do I think there's a?
• 1:12:37
  Couple in that. Book because like that's.
• 1:12:39
  That is one of my other half's all time favorite Doctor Who
• 1:12:41
  books as well. And it's big pictures of them as
• 1:12:44
  well, isn't it? They're sort of blown up
• 1:12:46
  versions, you know, and, and. And I think like, you know,
• 1:12:51
  because, because that's the, you know, those sort of visuals
• 1:12:54
  really appeal to me, you know, and it's, it's something I wish
• 1:12:58
  I was talented enough to have, have, have pursued, you know,
• 1:13:01
  but, but yeah, no, nowhere near this, this sort of of level.
• 1:13:05
  But what I really love about it is like, it's not just the, the
• 1:13:10
  finished artwork in it. It's got like the, the pencil
• 1:13:14
  sketches. It's kind of got the, the, the,
• 1:13:16
  the scamps, the drafts that, that he'd done of, of
• 1:13:19
  compositions. It's got loads of notes in
• 1:13:23
  there. It's about about like his
• 1:13:24
  inspiration and why he did this composition this way and all
• 1:13:28
  that sort of thing. And I think what, what's really
• 1:13:31
  lovely is that you've also got pothers in there that he, he was
• 1:13:37
  commissioned to do, but didn't actually get used on the, on the
• 1:13:42
  releases. So you've got like there's like
• 1:13:47
  one of revelation of the Daleks that he did for the VHS cover,
• 1:13:51
  But they at that point they decided to go with the, you
• 1:13:55
  know, the the Photoshop kind of ones, which never, never as as
• 1:14:01
  as engaging or as good as these. And and also like that the
• 1:14:04
  happiness Patrol, which they did actually use his painting of of
• 1:14:09
  the Candyman to use on the the the photos.
• 1:14:12
  Oh, is it when they were doing those swirly?
• 1:14:14
  Couple. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:14:14
  Yeah, yeah, just yeah. Yeah.
• 1:14:19
  But it but. I think, you know, it, it, it,
• 1:14:21
  it's a book really that kind of just showcases how fortunate we
• 1:14:28
  are as Doctor Who fans that so many talented people have worked
• 1:14:34
  on those, whether it's the book covers, whether it's the VHS
• 1:14:38
  covers, even though, you know, you've got like Lee binding
• 1:14:41
  doing the, the, the, the rate steps, you know, we just and,
• 1:14:47
  and, and this is a book that that's celebrating that you
• 1:14:51
  know, and it's yeah, it's just, it's just gorgeous.
• 1:14:53
  And I think if if people haven't seen it or haven't read it.
• 1:14:57
  Then. Do so because it's it's just
• 1:15:00
  it's just it's just brilliant getting to know you and what you
• 1:15:04
  do I'm. Really pleased there's a a book
• 1:15:07
  of images on your list. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:15:11
  But yeah, it was, it was, it was like I say, it was initially it
• 1:15:17
  was a hard pick because there's so many books that I've got
• 1:15:22
  along those lines. But then when I thought, well,
• 1:15:25
  who is my favorite? And I go, well, it's Colin
• 1:15:26
  Howard, so it's got to be time slides.
• 1:15:28
  So and it and it went yeah, well, unfortunately.
• 1:15:33
  After being so positive. It's time to bring on the
• 1:15:37
  negative SO. #7 is Scream of the Shelter by by the novel.
• 1:15:48
  Yeah, yeah, the novel. Yeah.
• 1:15:50
  Yeah, I mean. I mean you could have chosen the
• 1:15:54
  the. Production, yeah.
• 1:15:57
  I think that's. That's the thing, I think it's
• 1:16:01
  not a particularly bad written book, but I don't think it's a
• 1:16:07
  good story. I, I, I, I mean, you know, it's,
• 1:16:13
  it is what it is. It's it's, you know, it's an
• 1:16:17
  animation, you know, that was kind of done as a bit of an
• 1:16:21
  experiment to see whether it had legs that got canned because the
• 1:16:25
  the new series started and, you know, set.
• 1:16:28
  But but yeah, I, I it's not, it's not not a great story, But
• 1:16:34
  what I would say is that I find the book easier to consume then
• 1:16:41
  then the animation because it or the the screaming and noise and
• 1:16:44
  stuff. Oh bloody hell I did.
• 1:16:47
  AI did a. Six part commentary on that for
• 1:16:50
  dinner was too hot for TV. And I mean, they were trying to
• 1:16:54
  be positive. I I struggled to find the
• 1:16:56
  positives probably. So as a book, yeah, it it does
• 1:17:00
  have sort of an expansive story because it's world spanning
• 1:17:04
  eventually with sort of action and things like this.
• 1:17:08
  And Cornell can write a long book, he can write a 300 pager.
• 1:17:12
  It's only like 2/3 of the book and then there's a making of it
• 1:17:15
  again. So it's like it's as small as a
• 1:17:18
  target novel that that is my biggest issue with.
• 1:17:21
  It is that it it's quite a small book anyhow, I think it's it's
• 1:17:25
  just about two 250, which is fine.
• 1:17:30
  You know, we grew up on the target, so we, we're used to,
• 1:17:33
  to, to that, but the last 50 pages or so are a making of
• 1:17:39
  documentary. And that's not what I've signed
• 1:17:42
  up for. I've signed up for a, a fiction,
• 1:17:45
  a fiction novels. I've not signed up for, for, for
• 1:17:48
  that. And, and I think, I think this
• 1:17:52
  probably is my issue with it is that I'm not Paul Cornell's
• 1:17:58
  biggest, biggest fan. I, I don't quite understand the,
• 1:18:04
  the hype. I, I think he's, he's a very
• 1:18:06
  good, he's a very good author. He's wrote some very good books.
• 1:18:11
  But but like, I don't know why he's held in this sort of God
• 1:18:16
  like status of, of authors that have have done, you know, virgin
• 1:18:21
  new adventures and and what have you.
• 1:18:23
  Finally, I found my man. We are in complete.
• 1:18:25
  Agreement. Yeah, I, I, I don't.
• 1:18:28
  I think he can write a. Sentence, but I just don't
• 1:18:30
  think. The accolades thrown at him,
• 1:18:32
  yeah, are yeah, it feels they should be.
• 1:18:36
  It feels very warranted. But.
• 1:18:40
  And I don't know what it. Whether it is because he was, I
• 1:18:43
  suppose he was when you think of that, that first lot of of
• 1:18:48
  Virgin New Adventures. I guess he was the first person
• 1:18:53
  that wrote one that hadn't had any involvement with with the
• 1:18:57
  show in it or or the the past ranges of books.
• 1:19:01
  You know, he definitely was pointing the way forwards, yes.
• 1:19:05
  Yes, and and and, but I think it's.
• 1:19:07
  Almost like, yeah, because he was the first people think he
• 1:19:12
  was the greatest. And it's.
• 1:19:14
  I really hate Revelation. Or maybe in a very small minor I
• 1:19:18
  say I don't really dislike Revelation.
• 1:19:21
  Yeah, I, I. Well, I think I'd I'd rather.
• 1:19:24
  I would rather read Genesis Exodus.
• 1:19:28
  I'd go for. Exodus in those days?
• 1:19:30
  Well, yeah, no, Exodus is probably the best.
• 1:19:32
  Of those four, the the time worn ones.
• 1:19:34
  But but yeah, yeah, the other weird thing about screaming the
• 1:19:38
  shower? Is like, for something that is
• 1:19:40
  supposed to be pointing forward, like Revelation was it, it's
• 1:19:44
  very trad and it's looking back to the past quite a lot.
• 1:19:48
  You know, it's like, oh, we'll we'll throw in this sort of
• 1:19:52
  grumpy doctor and this robot master played by Jared Jacoby,
• 1:19:55
  and that'll be your new things. But then it's doing like an
• 1:19:59
  Earth invasion story with the military and it's kind of unish.
• 1:20:03
  Yeah, as as. A pilot it.
• 1:20:06
  Doesn't feel like a yeah, it doesn't feel like a renewed
• 1:20:09
  series, not in the way that Rosen like End of the World did.
• 1:20:13
  Yeah, yeah, and and even. When I mean.
• 1:20:18
  I I know it's it again, it's it's not held in high regard.
• 1:20:22
  And I can kind of understand why.
• 1:20:25
  But like, things like death comes to time, Yes, it has many,
• 1:20:28
  many failings, but one of them is it didn't play safe.
• 1:20:33
  It's ambitious. Yeah.
• 1:20:34
  Yeah, exactly. Whereas whereas this feels.
• 1:20:36
  Very contained. Very.
• 1:20:38
  Let's let you know. Let's go safe.
• 1:20:41
  Yeah, you know, but. But yeah, like I say, you know,
• 1:20:45
  I don't really want 50 pages of Paul Connell blowing his own
• 1:20:50
  trumpet. You know, basically it does not
• 1:20:52
  very well you. Know OK well at the.
• 1:20:56
  Risk of him coming after me now. Let's praise another book.
• 1:21:01
  Okie dokie, right? So number.
• 1:21:04
  Seven in the top. Is Blood Heat by By Jim Morton
• 1:21:11
  Yeah. So like I was saying earlier
• 1:21:13
  this this was my my first new adventure that I, that I bought.
• 1:21:18
  It wasn't the first one I read that wasn't that was Nightshade.
• 1:21:22
  But I I, yeah I, I like I say, I kind of been really reluctant to
• 1:21:27
  kind of dive into the new adventures because of the things
• 1:21:33
  that I'd heard and and and and the page count and what have
• 1:21:37
  you. But then this came along, so
• 1:21:40
  it's like a an alternative timeline where the Silurians and
• 1:21:45
  the Sea Devils rue the Earth again.
• 1:21:47
  And I it's just something about it that hooked me in and I
• 1:21:52
  couldn't even resist. The covers were great.
• 1:21:54
  Is that? Siluru riding a.
• 1:21:56
  Dinosaur. That's Jeff Cummings.
• 1:21:58
  That one, the front cover. Land yeah, it's it's amazing,
• 1:22:02
  but I, I think again, it's something that I love those sort
• 1:22:07
  of alternative history type books anyhow, So, you know, I
• 1:22:12
  like like, you know, s s Great Britain by Len Dayton, you know,
• 1:22:17
  the the Man in the High Castle by Philip K Dick.
• 1:22:21
  I, I, you know, so, so that it feels like it was kind of in my,
• 1:22:24
  my sweet spot that, you know, so, you know, it's got that kind
• 1:22:28
  of what if kind of approach, you know, and, and the what if is,
• 1:22:31
  is here is what if the doctor had been killed by the
• 1:22:35
  Cerullians, hadn't, hadn't actually gone about creating the
• 1:22:41
  vaccine to, to, to cure the, the plague that they had released.
• 1:22:46
  And let's see where that, how that pans out.
• 1:22:49
  And again, I, I think, you know, like, like with bad therapy, I
• 1:22:57
  think like this, this is a little bit different to bad
• 1:23:01
  therapy because it's, it's grim and it's gritty, but it's
• 1:23:06
  exciting and it really, it really grips you.
• 1:23:09
  And, and I, I think again, I wouldn't want my Doctor Who to
• 1:23:13
  be like this all the time, but as a one off, it's bloody
• 1:23:19
  brilliant, you know, and, and, and I really, really love this
• 1:23:22
  book and something you can say a lot with the original.
• 1:23:26
  Books, I wouldn't want it to be like this all the time, but
• 1:23:28
  bloody hell, this is great. Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know,
• 1:23:32
  because. Because because you know, what
• 1:23:33
  are we about 20 or 30 years on from, from the events of the
• 1:23:37
  Silerians and, you know, most of mankind's been been wiped out.
• 1:23:42
  The, the earth has kind of returned to that prehistoric
• 1:23:46
  state. So you've only got like a,
• 1:23:49
  you've got like the remnant of, of unit.
• 1:23:52
  They're kind of working as almost like AI suppose like a
• 1:23:54
  resistance group, but they're barely, barely surviving.
• 1:23:58
  And and this version of the the Brigadier is so different to to,
• 1:24:04
  to the one we know and love. You know, he's he's a broken
• 1:24:09
  man. He's, you know, he's he's a very
• 1:24:14
  bitter and lacks compassion and lacks any of the humor and the
• 1:24:18
  warmth of of the one that we had on the telly.
• 1:24:21
  And it's just, you know, and events have made him that way.
• 1:24:25
  It's not, it's not, you know, it's it's the the things that
• 1:24:28
  he's had to experience. And then, you know, you've got
• 1:24:31
  you, you throw Liz, Liz Shaw into that as well.
• 1:24:34
  And they're constantly clashing, but not in the the good humoured
• 1:24:40
  kind of way that we saw in season 7.
• 1:24:43
  It's almost there's almost AI want to say hatred there between
• 1:24:47
  the two of them. They just don't.
• 1:24:49
  They don't agree on how the other is coming at the.
• 1:24:53
  Situation you know and and. You know, and then you've got
• 1:24:57
  poor Joe. I mean, she, she's basically
• 1:25:01
  been driven mad. And it's like a like, like a
• 1:25:05
  wild animal, isn't she? Why can't anyone be happy in the
• 1:25:08
  new adventures? I mean, I thank.
• 1:25:12
  God, things don't stay this way, you know, No.
• 1:25:14
  No, no, because we catch up with Joe in genocide and she's still
• 1:25:16
  fucking miserable. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:25:20
  But. But yeah, you know, like, like I
• 1:25:22
  say, you know, it is really grim and and I wouldn't want this
• 1:25:26
  every week, but there's just something, there's just
• 1:25:31
  something about this book. As a one off.
• 1:25:34
  That kind of makes me go, yeah, this is, this is, this is, this
• 1:25:38
  is, this is good. This is this is the the too
• 1:25:42
  broad and the too deep that I want not not the the shagging
• 1:25:47
  left, right and centre. Jim Mortimer suffers.
• 1:25:52
  From his own success, though, because this was so well
• 1:25:55
  received. And so then they kept asking Jim
• 1:25:58
  Mortimer to write more books. And with every subsequent book,
• 1:26:02
  with one or two exceptions, he just got darker.
• 1:26:07
  And what? And he just murdered more
• 1:26:09
  people. It was a very odd approach,
• 1:26:13
  yeah. You know, like I say.
• 1:26:15
  I've I've got up to bell Tempest, which, which is Jim
• 1:26:18
  Mortimer, and admittedly I've been I I've things have have
• 1:26:24
  diverted me like putting this list together and and the book
• 1:26:27
  that we're reading for for the book club.
• 1:26:30
  But I'm, I'm probably about halfway through and it's taken
• 1:26:34
  me weeks to get there because it's, yeah, just don't want to
• 1:26:39
  pick it up. So nihilistic, and it's so.
• 1:26:42
  Depressing. I mean.
• 1:26:44
  Like, you know, I. Know you've lauded to sort of
• 1:26:46
  the latter end of the Nas, but Eternity Weeps is one of the
• 1:26:50
  most thoroughly miserable books I've ever read in my life.
• 1:26:54
  You want to hear about bad things happening to Liz Shaw?
• 1:26:57
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. It wasn't enough for him.
• 1:26:59
  To do it in an alternative universe.
• 1:27:01
  So he thought, Right, I'll head back to Oz and do it again.
• 1:27:05
  Yeah. I, I don't.
• 1:27:06
  I just wonder if maybe you should have been a one and out,
• 1:27:08
  you know, and just had that Rep with a an amazing book.
• 1:27:12
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 1:27:14
  You know, because. Yeah.
• 1:27:15
  Because because there's there's been quite a few authors that
• 1:27:19
  have done that. Haven't they?
• 1:27:20
  They've you. Know they've come in done 1 and
• 1:27:23
  it's been brilliant and then you we've never heard from them
• 1:27:25
  again, you know it's or they've come in done one, it's been.
• 1:27:29
  Absolutely up the pitch. And all that and Neil, thank God
• 1:27:32
  we. Never heard from them again, you
• 1:27:34
  know. All those.
• 1:27:36
  Ones that came in and did tons. And we're like, will you stop
• 1:27:40
  writing Doctoroo books, please? Yes.
• 1:27:43
  Yeah. Yeah, there is a couple of
• 1:27:45
  those. And you think why?
• 1:27:46
  Why do they keep? Why do they keep?
• 1:27:48
  They can hit a deadline, Yeah. Yeah, I guess it's the same.
• 1:27:53
  As, like, you know, Terence Dix was saying, wasn't it?
• 1:27:56
  As long as they, as long as they can plug that gap, it doesn't
• 1:28:00
  matter. Are we bringing something out
• 1:28:02
  this month? Yeah.
• 1:28:03
  Good. All right.
• 1:28:04
  Is it good? Who cares?
• 1:28:06
  It's coming out. We've got something on the shelf
• 1:28:08
  that is a sound. Choice and no.
• 1:28:11
  One's mentioned that one yet, actually, but I don't know.
• 1:28:14
  It's a popular book. Yeah, yeah, and and.
• 1:28:18
  To be honest, I think that that sort of run of alternative
• 1:28:22
  history ones where, where it's, it's building up to, oh, can't
• 1:28:29
  remember it now. It's the Benny's is on the.
• 1:28:31
  Front cover singing isn't it? But basically that's the one you
• 1:28:36
  know, and you've it's the meddling monk that's behind it.
• 1:28:39
  Yeah, it was, it was quite a good, it was quite a good, good
• 1:28:41
  run of stories. There's some good ones in there.
• 1:28:44
  The 8th Doctor's adventures were looking over their shoulders,
• 1:28:46
  going. And OK, with Alternative Earths,
• 1:28:50
  we'll have a bit of that. And then they did it towards the
• 1:28:53
  end of the run with perhaps slightly less success.
• 1:28:56
  But I mean, we'll get there. Yes, yes we will.
• 1:29:01
  Right now, let's talk about another lesson.
• 1:29:04
  Successful book, Yeah, yes. So number six on the bottom.
• 1:29:09
  List is The King's Demons by Terence Dudley.
• 1:29:13
  OK, Joe, I've got to tell you this.
• 1:29:16
  I mean, I know you've listened to.
• 1:29:17
  Some of these, but Sigh Heart put a Terence Dudley on his
• 1:29:21
  bottom 10 list. That was Canine and Company.
• 1:29:24
  Stephen B, who are the door, put a Terence Dudley on his top
• 1:29:29
  list, and that was Black Orchid. So here we are again.
• 1:29:33
  Yeah. So I, I, I think, I think I, I
• 1:29:37
  need to start off by, by, by saying that I really don't like
• 1:29:44
  the story that that we saw on, on the TV.
• 1:29:47
  That's because you are a man of taste, that yeah.
• 1:29:50
  Well, it it's will is. Not.
• 1:29:52
  Weak. No, no.
• 1:29:55
  Yeah, it it. It just feels like.
• 1:29:59
  Twitter Twitter 2. 225 minute episodes wasted.
• 1:30:03
  But and yes, so I, so I don't like the televised story, but
• 1:30:09
  the novelisation of it, Oh my God, it's dull.
• 1:30:13
  Oh freaking hell. You you kind of lose, lose the
• 1:30:17
  will a little bit. And and I'm not sure how he
• 1:30:20
  managed to stretch those 225 minute episodes out to fill 153
• 1:30:28
  pages. So it's one of the bigger time.
• 1:30:30
  Wow. It's it's not.
• 1:30:32
  It's not. It's not slight.
• 1:30:34
  By any any means. And that's just that's just
• 1:30:37
  beyond me that he was able to do that.
• 1:30:40
  And you know, to be honest with you, I think I would have been
• 1:30:43
  happy with like a 20 page pamphlet really works.
• 1:30:46
  But he didn't, you know, fill. Out.
• 1:30:49
  Riveting. Back stories for Sajils Estram
• 1:30:53
  ET al. No, it's.
• 1:30:55
  It's and and. I.
• 1:30:57
  Think that's the thing? It doesn't even have the benefit
• 1:30:59
  of Anthony Haley's French accent.
• 1:31:04
  But yeah, you know the. The Yeah, it's, I think that's
• 1:31:12
  the greatest crime. That Doctor Who can be is dull
• 1:31:17
  and uninteresting. I, I, you know, I, I, you know,
• 1:31:21
  there are stories that aim high and they fall well short of it,
• 1:31:25
  but they aimed high, you know, and, and, and you, you applaud
• 1:31:29
  them for it. But there's stories.
• 1:31:32
  Like this. It's Dulles dish water and yeah,
• 1:31:37
  it it just does nothing for boring.
• 1:31:42
  OK, I can't wait to hear how many times more.
• 1:31:44
  Times. It's terrorist, studly.
• 1:31:45
  It's going to turn up on people's lists, you know,
• 1:31:48
  clearly a very divisive. Character.
• 1:31:50
  No. Well.
• 1:31:52
  OK, let's. Let's go back and be.
• 1:31:53
  Nice. About somebody again.
• 1:31:55
  OK, so a book that you opened up, read and thought That was my
• 1:32:00
  sixth favorite Doctor Who book of all time.
• 1:32:05
  Yeah, this might be considered a little bit left field, but I
• 1:32:10
  love this book. It's not the one you're
• 1:32:14
  thinking. It's not the one you're
• 1:32:15
  thinking. This is Shakedown by Terrence
• 1:32:19
  Dicks. Yeah, I am recording my book
• 1:32:23
  club on. Shakedown tomorrow?
• 1:32:26
  Oh wow, I've just read it. I.
• 1:32:31
  Yeah, I bet like people probably listen to this and thinking what
• 1:32:36
  madness is this? He would.
• 1:32:37
  Put this in their top 10. It's so fun.
• 1:32:41
  Oh yeah. In the.
• 1:32:43
  And I think that that's one thing I noted down was that it's
• 1:32:47
  it's so fun. It's it's an easy and enjoyable
• 1:32:53
  read in in the same fashion as what the the 8 Doctors is it.
• 1:32:56
  Yeah. It, it won't, it won't win any
• 1:32:59
  literary prizes or anything, but it's just, it's just a good
• 1:33:04
  read. It's just fun.
• 1:33:05
  It's, you know, Yeah, You know, I, yeah, it's not a particularly
• 1:33:13
  sophisticated book. But then I guess you don't want
• 1:33:16
  sophisticated though, do you? No.
• 1:33:18
  But you want. A good read you don't expect.
• 1:33:20
  That from Terrence. Dicks, no.
• 1:33:22
  That's not his, you know, but, but it is, it's sort of like
• 1:33:25
  that. It's like A, you know, kind of
• 1:33:27
  like A that's B movie. Space Opera.
• 1:33:32
  Type, type kind of kind of thing.
• 1:33:37
  Yeah, and, and, and I think he he's quite clever in this
• 1:33:42
  because rather than doing a straight retell of, of the, the
• 1:33:49
  spin off shakedown and just crowbarring the, the the doctor
• 1:33:55
  into it, he uses what is shakedown that that you know, as
• 1:34:02
  like almost like the middle, the middle section.
• 1:34:05
  And he like sandwiches it between, you know, an expansion
• 1:34:14
  on that story, you know, and and he does that classic, classic
• 1:34:19
  Terran sticks scenario, splits the Doctor up from the
• 1:34:24
  companions. They they go off this way.
• 1:34:26
  He goes off this. That's classic New adventures as
• 1:34:28
  well, though. Yeah, yeah.
• 1:34:30
  You know so. And you know, you got that
• 1:34:33
  brilliant prologue at the beginning where the Doctor first
• 1:34:37
  meets Kurt, who is a smuggler who will become one of the crew
• 1:34:43
  of the Tiger Moth simply sexually pair bonded to.
• 1:34:48
  Lisa Duran. Who knows?
• 1:34:50
  We find out, though, and shake down the novel.
• 1:34:53
  Yes. Yeah.
• 1:34:56
  And and. Obviously it brings.
• 1:34:57
  It brings the the Sontarans in it because they're the ones that
• 1:35:02
  have kind of invaded this planet and the doctor ends up defeating
• 1:35:06
  them and they leg it with the tail between their legs.
• 1:35:09
  You then got you've got Roz and Chris doing what police officers
• 1:35:16
  do best. They're on the trail of this
• 1:35:19
  route on spy who's who's who's injured, but he's got this
• 1:35:24
  information about the Sontarans that could do that on that on
• 1:35:30
  pass between the Rutons and the sun sirens and and they they I I
• 1:35:39
  love the character that they meet the Gar shack.
• 1:35:43
  Yeah, the the, the mentally. Augmented.
• 1:35:46
  Ogron, he's like, he's so great, he gets his.
• 1:35:49
  Own book in the. Bernice New Adventures Mean
• 1:35:51
  Streets. Oh, does he?
• 1:35:53
  Yeah. Wow.
• 1:35:54
  It's a great read as well, but he he's.
• 1:35:58
  Awesome. Because yes, he's there to
• 1:36:01
  uphold the law, but he'll only uphold the law if you've paid
• 1:36:05
  him enough. It's just, it's just, it's just
• 1:36:08
  really good. I just love that.
• 1:36:10
  And then you've got Benny. She's she's been tasked with
• 1:36:14
  kind of researching the, the war between the Ruth Thorns and the
• 1:36:20
  Sontarans on, on plentiful Crystal University.
• 1:36:25
  Yeah. You know, and then she.
• 1:36:28
  Gets in a whole heap of trouble because she stumbles upon this
• 1:36:31
  cult and this temple and like you do.
• 1:36:34
  Oh, like you do, you know. And it's sort of.
• 1:36:37
  But it because you skip from one set of.
• 1:36:41
  Regulars to another from chat. You just can't get bored of it.
• 1:36:45
  It just the pace of this book, it flies by.
• 1:36:49
  Yeah. And then like and then like you
• 1:36:51
  say, then cut. To this middle section, which is
• 1:36:54
  what we we know as as shakedown that we we saw as the spin off
• 1:36:57
  video back back in the 90s. You say middle section, Dad, do
• 1:37:01
  you know how long that section? Is is it quite?
• 1:37:03
  It's like 35 pages. Oh, is.
• 1:37:05
  That right, it's 2. 150 page book.
• 1:37:08
  Originally it was. Asked to novelize.
• 1:37:09
  Just shakedown, right? Is this in the in the interview?
• 1:37:13
  He did and he goes. I wrote that and realised I
• 1:37:16
  wasn't quite long enough for this book, so I wrote this story
• 1:37:21
  around it. Yeah, that was a pamphlet.
• 1:37:23
  Yeah, yeah. No but but.
• 1:37:26
  But but I love the way that it all connects so beautifully.
• 1:37:30
  And then it's wrapped up in this final part of the book where
• 1:37:35
  because in in Shakedown, all, pretty much all of the crew have
• 1:37:40
  been killed, Barker. And so the Aldridge's been
• 1:37:44
  killed. Lovely.
• 1:37:45
  Yeah. Caroline Ford, OH.
• 1:37:48
  Wonderful, yeah. Yeah, so so.
• 1:37:53
  Yeah, the Doctor and and his companions.
• 1:37:57
  End up. Being the rest of the crew when
• 1:38:00
  they they and it's so great that last scene and.
• 1:38:05
  You can see them doing it because you've watched it all in
• 1:38:07
  the video, You know, Where are those VR goggles?
• 1:38:13
  Yeah, but. It's the thing, you know, like I
• 1:38:15
  say, you know, it's it's just so much fun and it's Terrence Dicks
• 1:38:23
  doing what he does does best, you know, very, very simple,
• 1:38:27
  very uncomplicated, but tremendous, enjoyable, fun to
• 1:38:33
  eat. I.
• 1:38:36
  Whenever I go back to the new adventures, I.
• 1:38:38
  Get myself in a. Mindset of like, right, I'm
• 1:38:41
  going to read a cynical, pretentious read that's either
• 1:38:45
  going to be really good or really bad because generally
• 1:38:47
  speaking, they are quite dark and a bit miserable.
• 1:38:50
  And I read this book and I was like, that is the most
• 1:38:53
  unpretentious, optimistic, adventurous new adventure I've
• 1:38:56
  ever read. Yeah, I think that that was one
• 1:39:00
  thing. I was thinking as I was putting
• 1:39:02
  this list together. This feels like my palate
• 1:39:07
  cleanser, if you if so, you've had the the grim and grittiness
• 1:39:13
  of blood heat. You've had that emotional kick
• 1:39:18
  in the stomach that was that was bad therapy.
• 1:39:22
  But this here, this is sort of like, yeah, yeah.
• 1:39:26
  Worry. Don't worry about your troubles.
• 1:39:28
  Just just get, you know, read me and and you'll forget about it
• 1:39:32
  all. And it's just it's just witty as
• 1:39:34
  well. And the way that Terrance.
• 1:39:36
  Is the action is really fun oh it was just great way to talk
• 1:39:40
  about this one tomorrow. Do you know?
• 1:39:41
  Yes, yo, I'm I'm looking forward.
• 1:39:43
  I think I'm going to be the most.
• 1:39:44
  Positive of the three, but really?
• 1:39:46
  Yeah, well, it's not for my podcast.
• 1:39:48
  Either. Too hot for TV.
• 1:39:51
  Oh, right. OK.
• 1:39:52
  Yeah. Well, we'll see.
• 1:39:54
  We'll see. Well, obviously we're having.
• 1:39:57
  Far too much. Fun here.
• 1:39:59
  So now we need to head back to your bottom 10 list.
• 1:40:03
  I think we're in your top five now.
• 1:40:05
  So things are getting pretty bad.
• 1:40:07
  Yeah, yeah. A War of the Dice was 10.
• 1:40:11
  So I dread to think what? One is yeah #5.
• 1:40:16
  Is a past doctor adventure OK? Yeah.
• 1:40:22
  By a gentleman. Called Nick Lewis, it's.
• 1:40:26
  It's rags I love. Rags, I know you.
• 1:40:30
  Do. I know you.
• 1:40:31
  Do I've heard you? Say that, but I understand why
• 1:40:34
  people don't. I do.
• 1:40:35
  Yeah, I it's. Quite horrible, yes.
• 1:40:40
  I I think that that. That's my.
• 1:40:41
  Issue. With it.
• 1:40:42
  So I've, I, I've read this book once and I have absolutely no
• 1:40:49
  desire to do so again because of yeah, it, it, it's, I mean,
• 1:40:56
  right, right from right from the start.
• 1:40:58
  It's very, it's very, you know, so, you know, there's, you know,
• 1:41:04
  murders and. Rapings and.
• 1:41:06
  And all this sort of stuff, you know, and you've got this this
• 1:41:11
  cattle truck with this undead punk rock band going around the
• 1:41:16
  country. Kind of.
• 1:41:21
  It doesn't. It doesn't feel.
• 1:41:23
  Like, I mean, this, this is the the weird predicament, isn't it?
• 1:41:27
  You, you don't want with with the past Doctor adventures, you
• 1:41:31
  want them to feel like the era that they came from, but you
• 1:41:37
  don't want them to just do a straight retelling of the Thai
• 1:41:42
  monkster or Day of the Daleks or or whatever.
• 1:41:45
  You want them to do something slightly progressive with it.
• 1:41:50
  It's a question I've. Asked a lot of people is sort of
• 1:41:52
  where's your. Line.
• 1:41:54
  Authenticities have to be. I think mine is.
• 1:41:56
  I want the regulars to feel like the regulars.
• 1:41:59
  But you can tell any story, so I don't mind this one.
• 1:42:02
  I know it would never be told in that time as long as the
• 1:42:05
  regulars feel like the regulars. Yeah, but but yeah, I just.
• 1:42:11
  Struggle to to place this in the The Fur Doctor's era.
• 1:42:17
  I, I, I, I just do and, and it's a bit where someone spat in John
• 1:42:21
  Perry. 'S face or where Casey Manning
• 1:42:24
  spewed up a load of maggots yeah that that's not great and and
• 1:42:28
  and I think. Also, it's sort of like I, this
• 1:42:33
  will be something that's probably a reoccurring theme in
• 1:42:36
  the next 4 in my bottom list. But I feel I've got a good
• 1:42:43
  imagination to be able to read something and I can picture it
• 1:42:48
  in my mind. But then I think there's books
• 1:42:52
  like this where I'm really struggling because there's,
• 1:42:57
  there's the inside of the cattle trucks almost like a portal to,
• 1:43:01
  to another and, and I'm, I don't know, I'm, I'm struggling to
• 1:43:05
  kind of see that and I don't know why.
• 1:43:09
  I don't know what, what there is about it, but it it's I just
• 1:43:14
  really, really struggle with this book and, and like I say,
• 1:43:20
  done it once and I don't want to do it again.
• 1:43:24
  I'd probably say like in terms of like a Doctor Who.
• 1:43:27
  Horror. Yeah.
• 1:43:28
  This is the most horrific thing ever produced out of the entire
• 1:43:34
  Doctor Who franchise. Yeah, it is horrible.
• 1:43:38
  So in terms of a horror, it's extremely effective.
• 1:43:42
  It's also deeply unpleasant. I think in my.
• 1:43:44
  Review, I said. It's like somebody grabbing your
• 1:43:48
  hair and shoving your face in shit from the first page to the
• 1:43:52
  last. And if you're not really down
• 1:43:55
  for that, then you probably won't really enjoy this book too
• 1:43:57
  much, you know? No, no, no, it's not for me.
• 1:44:01
  But. OK, well and.
• 1:44:03
  I I don't think that's a controversial choice.
• 1:44:05
  I think that is a very, you're either going to be on board or
• 1:44:09
  you're not. Yeah, Yeah, I think it probably
• 1:44:11
  is a. Marmite, kind of.
• 1:44:12
  But there's no middle ground. There's no sitting on the fence
• 1:44:16
  with it. It's either you either like it
• 1:44:19
  or or or you don't. And, and although now you've
• 1:44:21
  said that you definitely don't want to read it again, we shall.
• 1:44:23
  Not add onto the list. Don't put it on that list
• 1:44:26
  please. All right.
• 1:44:29
  Welcome. On in back to.
• 1:44:30
  Your top, so top. Five now, yeah.
• 1:44:34
  So this this is. I think it's probably the only
• 1:44:39
  8th Doctor adventure that gets onto to the list, I think.
• 1:44:43
  And this is Reckless Engineering by by Nick Waters.
• 1:44:48
  Oh wow, yeah. I That is a surprise.
• 1:44:52
  All right, OK. I think this is a really
• 1:44:58
  wonderful 8th Doctor story and like, like we said, this is one
• 1:45:06
  I've kind of read in isolation, but I know the books around it
• 1:45:12
  are very good and it's really whetted my appetite to kind of
• 1:45:17
  read those ones around it. You know, that's what I think,
• 1:45:20
  that's what's keeping me going through Better Tempest and
• 1:45:24
  Option Lock is to know. There's books like.
• 1:45:26
  This in on the horizon the only sort of.
• 1:45:34
  Persuasion, I would say to you is is when you hit the burning,
• 1:45:39
  you know, those six books set on Earth from that point on to the
• 1:45:42
  end, there are far more hits than this is.
• 1:45:45
  That's what I'll say. Yeah.
• 1:45:47
  Yeah. But.
• 1:45:50
  For me, I, I, I just love this. I think because it's set in
• 1:45:54
  Bristol, it's a, it's a place I know really well, so it's really
• 1:46:00
  good to see it in a Doctor Who book.
• 1:46:02
  And I go, Oh yeah, I know where that is.
• 1:46:03
  I know what that looks like. Even though this is like a, a
• 1:46:08
  dystopian kind of, you know, everything's gone, gone belly
• 1:46:14
  up. But I, I, I love the the fact
• 1:46:20
  that it's, it's got that kind of we're mucking around with time.
• 1:46:27
  Here and. There's paradoxes and and I know
• 1:46:31
  that's obviously a big thing of the 8th doctor range, because
• 1:46:34
  obviously we have faction paradox and now we've got, you
• 1:46:37
  know, this alternative reality sort of section of it, you know,
• 1:46:45
  but but I I just I just think it's, it's a it's amazing idea
• 1:46:50
  that the the machine that was it.
• 1:46:58
  Is it Mala? Day is it?
• 1:47:00
  The the the guy that that makes the Utopia machine.
• 1:47:04
  Oh, I just spent a long time so I've read as well.
• 1:47:08
  He. Yeah, it it, it messes with the
• 1:47:14
  metabolism of time. So in, in the matter of of a
• 1:47:21
  blink of an eye when, when when he first throws the switch on
• 1:47:25
  basically people age 40 years. So you get you've got anyone
• 1:47:33
  above puberty and basically they die.
• 1:47:37
  Those that are in puberty basically end up being 40 year
• 1:47:42
  olds and then you've got like babies and toddlers become.
• 1:47:46
  These. The Wildron, I do remember them.
• 1:47:51
  Yeah, horrible. Wild.
• 1:47:53
  Cannibalistic. Yeah, monsters and that.
• 1:47:56
  And it's just like, oh wow, this is this.
• 1:47:58
  Is quite. It feels like a, you know,
• 1:48:02
  because there's like, like we say, there's plenty of of people
• 1:48:06
  mucking around with time in Doctor Who, There's plenty of of
• 1:48:09
  eternity of realities and universes and all this sort of
• 1:48:12
  thing. But but to, you know, this is
• 1:48:15
  this is messing around with, with metabolisms, not the
• 1:48:21
  actual, you know, moving time forward, but but they're moving
• 1:48:27
  the metabolism of those people. So like, even to the point where
• 1:48:31
  there are no animals, there are no birds because they their
• 1:48:35
  lifespan just meant that they they went.
• 1:48:40
  So you've got these little townlets where basically people
• 1:48:45
  are malnourished because they're just living off of what,
• 1:48:50
  whatever they they can grow. Yeah.
• 1:48:55
  And then, then you have this, one of the village, one of the
• 1:49:00
  villages was sent to, to, to the, to the guy in the big house
• 1:49:04
  that, that had started all of this.
• 1:49:08
  And she then comes back because her father's dying and
• 1:49:13
  everyone's aged like 10 or 20 years and she hasn't, she's
• 1:49:19
  still the same when she left. And it's, it's just, you know,
• 1:49:22
  so there's all these different like almost like time zones, you
• 1:49:27
  know, sort of thing coming out from the epicenter of of, of
• 1:49:30
  where this utopia machine was, was, was and it and, you know,
• 1:49:34
  and then initially the doctors, he he attempts to put it right
• 1:49:42
  by by going back and trying to change things and it then ends
• 1:49:48
  up ends up kind of making it worse and all this.
• 1:49:52
  And I just, I just think it's, it's, it's just AII just think
• 1:49:56
  it's absolutely fantastic. And talking about visuals, for
• 1:50:02
  me this is the best cover from the rubies.
• 1:50:10
  It's such a simple. Idea of taking that picture of
• 1:50:15
  Brunel in front of those massive chains and then just replacing
• 1:50:18
  his face with with a with a skull.
• 1:50:21
  It's just like, oh, man, that that is so good.
• 1:50:24
  You know, as a designer, you would be really, really proud of
• 1:50:28
  that. And, and, and it's yeah.
• 1:50:31
  And, and I think that really tells that the story of the book
• 1:50:34
  as well, because obviously Brunel comes into it.
• 1:50:38
  He's out there at the start then, you know, and then
• 1:50:43
  basically when the Doctor goes back to try and change time, he
• 1:50:46
  ends up in the TARDIS and on this adventure with the Doctor.
• 1:50:50
  And yeah, no, it's it's just Nick Walters met Paul McGann in
• 1:50:56
  a. Pulp and told him about the book
• 1:50:59
  he was currently writing and explained like the plot and and
• 1:51:03
  the details and Paul McGann went, Oh, I would love to do
• 1:51:06
  something like that. You know, like he was really
• 1:51:09
  thrilled and they're so linked those books at that point
• 1:51:14
  there's there's a run of about 6 books and I can't remember.
• 1:51:18
  I remember the doctor has to make a big choice at the end of
• 1:51:20
  reckless engineering and it's a hard choice.
• 1:51:24
  And the result of it is that time is fractured even more.
• 1:51:29
  The multiverse is fractured even more so in the next book, the
• 1:51:32
  last resort. Fuck me from scene to scene.
• 1:51:36
  You are in a different version of the earth.
• 1:51:39
  And from the beginning of the book, I was coming.
• 1:51:42
  He's he's forgotten. Yeah, man.
• 1:51:44
  A man, it's a mind. Fuck and a half, but it's it in
• 1:51:47
  terms of like huge scientific ideas, it's it's pretty
• 1:51:51
  incredible. I know.
• 1:51:53
  I think that that that's the. That's another really good thing
• 1:51:57
  of the book as well, because the Doctor, Fitz and Angie have have
• 1:52:06
  been in this this reality for a while, like the, the TARDIS
• 1:52:12
  begins to to normalize that this is the, the actual reality that
• 1:52:17
  should have happened. Fitz, Fitz is the same and, you
• 1:52:21
  know, he's and has a real problem with the Doctor trying
• 1:52:25
  to change it because he knows that that means that that all of
• 1:52:29
  the people that they've befriended or met and befriended
• 1:52:32
  in this will cease to exist or that version of them will cease
• 1:52:36
  to exist. So it's also got that kind of
• 1:52:39
  emotional thing, you know, like the Doctor is then obviously
• 1:52:42
  he's looking at the the bigger picture of trying to save time,
• 1:52:48
  put time back on track. But but Fitz is then.
• 1:52:54
  Yeah. But these are people.
• 1:52:55
  They will die. They, they won't be, you know,
• 1:52:58
  and it's just great for that being the voice of of.
• 1:53:02
  Of the people, yeah, yeah. And what an.
• 1:53:06
  Interesting. Choice.
• 1:53:07
  Yeah. And then I can't.
• 1:53:08
  Imagine anyone else on a brick. It's Engineer.
• 1:53:13
  Yeah, no, but I, I. I I it it you'd like to say, you
• 1:53:18
  know, it's one of, of about three that I've read in that,
• 1:53:21
  that final third of the range. And I and I I've, I read it a
• 1:53:28
  long time ago as well. And and it and it's just stuck
• 1:53:31
  with me and it and it's a book that I'll regularly go back to
• 1:53:36
  to reread. Just you wait to like give.
• 1:53:40
  You, the crooked world. And.
• 1:53:41
  Camera obscure and the City of the Dead to Reed.
• 1:53:44
  Blimey. Oh, I can't wait.
• 1:53:49
  Well. Let's skip back to your.
• 1:53:51
  Bottom 10 list, then this is number four, Yeah.
• 1:53:56
  So this is time. Crucible by Mark Pass Fucking
• 1:54:02
  Henetrable. Isn't it?
• 1:54:05
  I should love this book because. I I love Ghost Light.
• 1:54:12
  I love his target of battlefields.
• 1:54:15
  I I find I I again. I think it's a.
• 1:54:19
  Marmite book. But I really love Longbarrow.
• 1:54:22
  I, I, I really, I, I again, it feels like a, a Gallifrey that,
• 1:54:28
  that that's so much more interesting than anything we saw
• 1:54:31
  on the TV and have seen on the TV since.
• 1:54:36
  But I just find this book so impenetrable.
• 1:54:42
  I read it when I first bought it.
• 1:54:45
  Sorry, when I first bought it when it first came out and I
• 1:54:49
  didn't get it. I read it a couple years ago
• 1:54:53
  when I, when I, I sort of started working my way through,
• 1:54:57
  through the, the new adventures in in order.
• 1:55:00
  And I still, I didn't get it. And, and again, you know, I,
• 1:55:05
  I've, yeah, I've got a decent imagination where I can picture
• 1:55:08
  things in my mind. You know, it's, it's part of my
• 1:55:11
  job being creative and, and doing that.
• 1:55:14
  But this is so abstract. That it feels.
• 1:55:19
  Like it? Forgets to tell an.
• 1:55:21
  Engaging story and I I I think that it's hard when you spend
• 1:55:29
  the entire time reading the book.
• 1:55:32
  You're just wondering what the heck is is happening.
• 1:55:35
  What am I actually reading here and is this going?
• 1:55:39
  And it's not very satisfying, is it?
• 1:55:41
  No, no clue what's. Happening it isn't you know, I I
• 1:55:45
  I get that the the. City is the destroyed TARDIS,
• 1:55:52
  which is a great central concern.
• 1:55:54
  Yes, I get that The the the. People that they.
• 1:55:58
  Meet there are these ancient Galifian pioneer, you know, time
• 1:56:05
  pioneers and it's their ship that the TARDIS crashed into.
• 1:56:10
  I get that the process is basically the alien presence
• 1:56:13
  that starts the destruction of the TARDIS, but I don't know how
• 1:56:19
  it all other than that I don't know how it fits together and
• 1:56:24
  what's what is the story it's trying to tell.
• 1:56:28
  And I think I I struggle with all of the cats Cradle trilogy I
• 1:56:37
  think. Like the the.
• 1:56:39
  The linking theme between them is is pretty weak.
• 1:56:43
  If you compare it to like time worm, where where there was you
• 1:56:48
  could there's a there's a definite Andrew Carmel said that
• 1:56:51
  Cats cradle was no. Nothing to do with warheads.
• 1:56:54
  They wrote Warhead and they said, well, we're making it part
• 1:56:56
  of this series and we're going to add this one thing to link
• 1:56:59
  it. Yeah.
• 1:56:59
  And you can tell. You can.
• 1:57:01
  You can tell. Yeah, but but it that's the
• 1:57:05
  thing. It just I just don't get it.
• 1:57:09
  What what is the story? It's it's trying to tell.
• 1:57:12
  I mean, I, I know. So I, I, I kind of, I've looked
• 1:57:17
  at bits on, you know, on, on the Internet and, and, but you
• 1:57:21
  shouldn't have to do that, right, for a book to make.
• 1:57:23
  Sense Yeah, actually, yeah, you. Should, yeah.
• 1:57:25
  That that. Is not a good.
• 1:57:27
  Actually, no. The book should be enough to
• 1:57:29
  explain what's happening. You know, so I I get that the
• 1:57:32
  there's a lot. Of Gallifreian law in that.
• 1:57:35
  So I I'm kind of, it kind of feels like that.
• 1:57:39
  That's Mark Platt's obsession, in a way, because.
• 1:57:44
  Lung Barrow's the. Same obviously ghost like he
• 1:57:47
  wanted to to tell that sort of story, but you know, if if if
• 1:57:53
  the story is not understandable for the reader, then what's the
• 1:57:59
  point of telling the story because it just just
• 1:58:04
  meaningless. And yeah, I would say like, like
• 1:58:09
  you should have to put a bit. Of work.
• 1:58:10
  You have to put a bit of work into reading a book because it's
• 1:58:12
  not like ingesting television. It's not just a series of images
• 1:58:17
  with lovely music over it. And acting is you have to think
• 1:58:19
  about the words on the page, put it together, concentrate on the
• 1:58:22
  narrative, the characterisation, blah blah.
• 1:58:24
  I get that you shouldn't have to put this much work into a Doctor
• 1:58:29
  Who book for it to fucking make sense, you know?
• 1:58:34
  Although I'm learning from you, you know, I'll be so interested
• 1:58:38
  when you have read through all the Age Doctor books, because it
• 1:58:41
  seems like you have a similar issue with those early new
• 1:58:44
  adventures that you did with those early Age Doctor books.
• 1:58:47
  Yeah, yeah. It's it's it's funny how the.
• 1:58:50
  The the the there are definite patterns.
• 1:58:53
  You think they would learn from the New Adventures mistakes
• 1:58:56
  though, wouldn't you? But yeah, here we are.
• 1:58:58
  Yeah, but but you kind of. You kind of think that the BBC
• 1:59:04
  taking back the licence off of Virgin was kind of like a knee
• 1:59:09
  jerk reaction, like we can make some money.
• 1:59:12
  Yeah, this. This this TV movie is going to
• 1:59:15
  be huge. And we're going to be as big as
• 1:59:16
  Star Wars. How many copies of those new
• 1:59:19
  adventures are you selling? Right, we'll have a bit of that
• 1:59:22
  exactly. But but I think they, they, they
• 1:59:26
  took it back without really thinking of thinking full stop.
• 1:59:30
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK, Cat's got Yeah, that, that
• 1:59:35
  is. I'll imagine as I head onwards
• 1:59:38
  into these top ten lists that may turn up again at some point.
• 1:59:43
  Imagine here. Well, let's slingshot back to
• 1:59:46
  the Are we top now? This is your 4th best Doctor Who
• 1:59:50
  book, fourth favorite. OK, Yeah.
• 1:59:53
  So. This is The Dying Days by Lance
• 1:59:58
  Parking the very last Doctor Who new adventure.
• 2:00:02
  Yes, fabulous. Yeah, So obviously this was this
• 2:00:10
  was Virgin's one shot at doing the 8th Doctor.
• 2:00:13
  And they absolutely smash it out.
• 2:00:17
  They really do. It's it's just it's just
• 2:00:19
  phenomenal. But I mean, they, they made an
• 2:00:24
  excellent choice of author for this because I think, and and I
• 2:00:32
  think this was this was quite telling when I was putting
• 2:00:34
  together my pre list for this, Lance Parkin appeared quite a
• 2:00:42
  lot across the ranges of books. And I, I, I'm coming to the, the
• 2:00:49
  opinion that he's probably my favorite Doctor Who author from,
• 2:00:54
  you know, from these kind of these ranges.
• 2:00:58
  And I also, I don't, I believe he's ever written a bad Doctor
• 2:01:03
  Who book. And and I think like, yes, there
• 2:01:06
  are ones that perhaps aren't quite as good as his best, but
• 2:01:11
  his worse is better than some people's best.
• 2:01:15
  You know what? If that makes sense.
• 2:01:18
  Yes. So, you know, I was just kind of
• 2:01:20
  like this, this, you know? Like I say, I was.
• 2:01:25
  Fortunate enough to buy this when it was when it first came
• 2:01:28
  out. I feel really sorry for those
• 2:01:29
  people that haven't got it now because it's about like £250 to
• 2:01:33
  to buy off of eBay 200 as little as that you think?
• 2:01:37
  Well. Yeah, probably more.
• 2:01:41
  You know, and it's such a shame that that that there are people
• 2:01:44
  that won't get the opportunity to be able to read this because
• 2:01:47
  because it is so good. And I think like, you know,
• 2:01:50
  Lance Parkin, I, I, I believe he nails the 8th doctor.
• 2:01:56
  I, I can, in my mind's eye, I can see and hear Paul McGann
• 2:02:03
  acting out that dialogue that he's given him.
• 2:02:06
  And and that's quite amazing when you can see that he's just
• 2:02:09
  got the TV movie to go from because this is the 1st 8th
• 2:02:13
  Doctor book. There's no big finishes with,
• 2:02:16
  with Paul McGann in them. So he's just got like 90.
• 2:02:21
  Minutes or so I. Mean technically this is the
• 2:02:23
  last 8th Doctor book. Because Lawrence Parkins says in
• 2:02:26
  his notes that this is fair after all of the 8th Doctor
• 2:02:31
  books that came afterwards. Because he ages the 8th Doctor
• 2:02:36
  in the dying days and is older than he is throughout any of the
• 2:02:40
  rather the 8th Doctor books. So he goes.
• 2:02:42
  Look, you can write as. Many 8th Doctor.
• 2:02:44
  Books as you want. This will always be the last 8th
• 2:02:46
  Doctor book. No no no no.
• 2:02:50
  Wow. Yeah, and and because that that
• 2:02:52
  was also like why the Virgin publishing did did this 8th
• 2:02:57
  Doctor book, because the last one wasn't it because they
• 2:03:00
  wanted to be the ones that did the first yeah book we've and
• 2:03:05
  fair enough. I can.
• 2:03:06
  Understand why their nose. Was out of joy and why they
• 2:03:09
  produce something this good as their bow out you know but but
• 2:03:15
  you know I. Think also this feels like a a
• 2:03:19
  checklist of things that I, I, I love in the expanded universe of
• 2:03:26
  of of Doctor Who. It's got Benny in it.
• 2:03:30
  I I think, you know, she's considering that she's well, she
• 2:03:36
  is a a companion that's only appeared in the books and now
• 2:03:44
  audios, but I, I, I think she's one of.
• 2:03:48
  The one of the. Best creations within You know
• 2:03:54
  we've got the. We've got the.
• 2:03:55
  Brigadier in it and it's always it's always good to have him
• 2:03:57
  back and obviously at this point he's he's he's this is post post
• 2:04:03
  battlefield. So so he's he's retired and
• 2:04:06
  he's, you know, a lot older than the one we're used to on the TV.
• 2:04:11
  It's also got like Winnifred Bambera in it again, another
• 2:04:15
  character. My favorites.
• 2:04:17
  I love shame. Yeah.
• 2:04:19
  You know so. It so then you know, so it's.
• 2:04:21
  Got this, this UNIT tie in then. And also I've always loved that
• 2:04:29
  that sort of fictional thing that Doctor Who's done all
• 2:04:34
  throughout that that Britain had was it was a, was a, a player in
• 2:04:41
  the, in the space race. And they've got this, this
• 2:04:44
  astronaut program and all this sort of thing.
• 2:04:47
  I just love that. Well, it's all tied into our
• 2:04:48
  bass as a definite the old Mars. Probe.
• 2:04:50
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because.
• 2:04:52
  Because thingy. Cornish he, he hits a cameo in
• 2:04:55
  it, doesn't he? I love, I love alien invasion
• 2:05:00
  stories, you know, you know, I, I, I as a kid, I adored War of
• 2:05:08
  the Worlds. So like, you know, if you think
• 2:05:12
  of those early Dalek stories, I prefer Dalek invasion of Earth
• 2:05:15
  over the Daleks because, because it's, it's, there's something
• 2:05:22
  more scary when it's, they're coming to you rather than you
• 2:05:25
  going to them, you know, you know, and, and the Ice Warriors
• 2:05:29
  as well. I, I don't know why, but I love
• 2:05:36
  the ice Warriors and, and, and I, I kind of like think, you
• 2:05:39
  know, like when you think of the classic series, I think they've
• 2:05:43
  got 2 decent stories and then two really, really bad ones and
• 2:05:49
  they're just lumbering, lumbering.
• 2:05:53
  Thank you. Look at the new series.
• 2:05:54
  Well, don't look at the new series for ICE.
• 2:05:56
  Warriors stories No no, this is the best.
• 2:06:00
  Ice Warriors story oh. Yeah.
• 2:06:02
  I I mean, that's the thing. You know.
• 2:06:05
  I don't know how how he managed to do it so well, but he he's
• 2:06:09
  he's put the menace into into the ice warriors.
• 2:06:12
  I mean, not the the the red death man alive.
• 2:06:16
  That sounds terrifying. That weapon, this gas with going
• 2:06:20
  up your nose and your claws. All scenes from Ice Warrior
• 2:06:24
  Point. Of view stepping out onto Earth
• 2:06:27
  atmosphere and being really heavy in lumber and explaining
• 2:06:30
  why they're rasping so great after, you know, God engine,
• 2:06:35
  which let's say explore. The Ice Warriors in a very
• 2:06:40
  different. Sort of a way.
• 2:06:42
  This was the the redemption book, I think, for the Ice
• 2:06:44
  Warriors. Yeah.
• 2:06:46
  And and, well, I mean, that's I. I don't know whether that is
• 2:06:49
  another sort of contributing factor to why I like the Ice
• 2:06:52
  Warriors because they were, I suppose, the most reoccurring
• 2:06:57
  classic villain in in them, you know, because you've got legacy
• 2:07:00
  and, you know, they they pop up in happy endings and yeah, yeah,
• 2:07:06
  yeah. So, so they're littered
• 2:07:07
  throughout the new adventures. But like you say, this is this
• 2:07:12
  is this is their best one. You know, they they are not
• 2:07:15
  better than than they are in this book.
• 2:07:19
  And, and I think like even there the, the slant that Lance Parkin
• 2:07:25
  puts on, on the invasion, it's only an invasion of of Britain.
• 2:07:31
  It's not an invasion of the world because it was the British
• 2:07:34
  astronauts that that, you know, blasphemed by by intruding on an
• 2:07:39
  ice warrior tomb up on Mars. It was a British politician that
• 2:07:46
  was doing all the yeah. Yeah.
• 2:07:48
  And then? That's the thing, because it's
• 2:07:51
  not just an invasion, it becomes an occupation in a way, and
• 2:07:55
  you've got this compliant government to the point where
• 2:07:59
  they actually crown, crown and ice, we're a king of England.
• 2:08:02
  Would you love to see that scene?
• 2:08:05
  Oh man. That would be brilliant,
• 2:08:06
  wouldn't? It yeah, and and basically the
• 2:08:09
  rest of the world is is just standing back as this happens
• 2:08:14
  thinking thank God it's not us and how how can we benefit.
• 2:08:18
  From this you know it's. It's.
• 2:08:20
  It's just brilliant. You know, and, and this is this
• 2:08:24
  is the first Earth invasion story that the whole of the new
• 2:08:28
  event. That's why they did it.
• 2:08:30
  Rebecca Levine said We haven't done one, we've got to do 1, but
• 2:08:34
  but yeah, it's yeah, I just. I just think it is absolutely
• 2:08:39
  superb book. It's everything that I love
• 2:08:41
  about Doctor Who and, and for me, that's that's the thing.
• 2:08:44
  It feels like a love letter to the past, but it's it's looking
• 2:08:52
  for it's looking ahead to the to the adventures that that are to
• 2:08:55
  come. And you know, yeah, this this is
• 2:09:01
  very much the new adventures going out on a bang.
• 2:09:05
  And, and I'm not making a reference to the doctor and
• 2:09:07
  Benny getting it on towards the end, although that's such a
• 2:09:11
  great. Scene I'll just kill myself if
• 2:09:14
  I. Didn't do this.
• 2:09:17
  Throws him on the bed. You never know what happened.
• 2:09:21
  We don't. Want to know?
• 2:09:23
  But yeah. It's just, it's just a fantastic
• 2:09:27
  way for for, for the New Avengers to bow out.
• 2:09:30
  It really is, you know, it's Michael Mills wanted to cover
• 2:09:32
  that as a as a. Political special, you know,
• 2:09:35
  when the the Prime Minister, so we did that book and I was like,
• 2:09:39
  what's he got to do in politics? Then I read it, I was like,
• 2:09:41
  bloody hell. It's got a lot to say about
• 2:09:43
  politics. That book as well as being an
• 2:09:45
  invasion story, as well as being a great character story.
• 2:09:48
  Fuck me, it's got a lot to say about politics.
• 2:09:51
  Yes, and it's and it's, it's not shy.
• 2:09:53
  About it, like it's, it's kind of ugly, I think.
• 2:09:57
  Very honest too. Yeah, yeah.
• 2:10:00
  OK. What?
• 2:10:00
  Look. We're on the home stretch here.
• 2:10:03
  Top three. So your third least favorite
• 2:10:07
  Doctor Who book? Yeah, this is.
• 2:10:12
  Tenity weeks by Paul Leonard again.
• 2:10:15
  It's one we've, we've, we've mentioned now you said Paul
• 2:10:19
  Leonard. There, didn't you?
• 2:10:21
  Is it Paul Leonard? Eternity Weeks is Jim Mortimer.
• 2:10:23
  Again. Oh, it's Jim.
• 2:10:24
  Mortimer Yeah, well. It is a tenity week, so yeah,
• 2:10:28
  sorry if I got I got that offer wrong.
• 2:10:30
  It's because Paul Leonard started to ape Jim Mortimer.
• 2:10:32
  So. Much they became the same
• 2:10:34
  writer. Yeah, yeah.
• 2:10:37
  Oh my goodness. It, it's so grim and it's, it's
• 2:10:41
  so depressing and, and it just, it just feels like one big
• 2:10:47
  argument stroke fight between Benny and Jason and it's just
• 2:10:53
  really, couldn't they be happy, Dan?
• 2:10:55
  Why couldn't they just be happy? It's just just really
• 2:10:59
  unpleasant. You know, and and I guess, I
• 2:11:05
  guess you know, go look looking ahead that their reason for
• 2:11:11
  breaking Benny and and Jason up is because they want frees Benny
• 2:11:16
  up then to become the lead in the new adventures after the
• 2:11:19
  Doctor moves over to the BBC. They keep having Jason.
• 2:11:22
  Turning. Up in those books, yeah, they
• 2:11:24
  do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:11:25
  And then they put. Put her back together again.
• 2:11:27
  When she skips over to big. Finish.
• 2:11:29
  It's like, OK, yeah, but you know, so.
• 2:11:32
  So I, I, I kind of understand that they needed to break them
• 2:11:36
  up, but we didn't read need a whole book about it split about
• 2:11:43
  them splitting up. You know, we could have, I think
• 2:11:46
  we could have gone down that route of, of, of that Terrance
• 2:11:49
  sticks would have gone. We'll just cover it with a line
• 2:11:52
  and we'll tell it a better story.
• 2:11:54
  Speaking of somebody who had an ugly divorce.
• 2:11:58
  Back in my life, I don't want to reread this book anytime soon
• 2:12:01
  because I remember those scenes of Benny Jackson.
• 2:12:04
  That is unpleasant. And I mean, it's accurate, but
• 2:12:07
  it's nice to read. No, and, and and I think that's
• 2:12:11
  that's you know. I think it could be triggering
• 2:12:14
  in a number of ways because because I think like, like for
• 2:12:17
  me, I I grew up in a in a household where there was a lot
• 2:12:22
  of arguing because my dad was such a problematic person.
• 2:12:28
  So yeah, you know that sort of, you know, that there's
• 2:12:33
  unharmonious relationships. I do find it yeah.
• 2:12:40
  I obviously can't relate to it in the way that you you were
• 2:12:42
  able to, but but it, you know, it just felt like there was
• 2:12:46
  always shouting, there was always arguing, there was there
• 2:12:48
  was always problems and and yeah, you know, I, I don't, I
• 2:12:55
  Doctor Who is my escapism from reality.
• 2:12:59
  I don't want to be. Reading about stuff that.
• 2:13:01
  That's similar to my own experiences, you know what I
• 2:13:04
  mean? It's and isn't there like a
• 2:13:06
  global threat in eternity? Weeps as well, like we're facing
• 2:13:09
  that every day, thank you very much.
• 2:13:10
  We don't want to read about them in our Doctor Who books.
• 2:13:13
  Which wipes out what, 8 tenths? Of the world's population or
• 2:13:18
  something? It's just miserable, you know,
• 2:13:22
  And then obviously you've kind of mentioned.
• 2:13:25
  We've mentioned it that, you know, it's another new adventure
• 2:13:29
  that brings back an old companion and treats them
• 2:13:35
  appallingly. You know, Liz, it's a horrible
• 2:13:39
  way. She dies in this.
• 2:13:42
  And there feels like there's no solid reason why it's Liz Shaw.
• 2:13:49
  There, there, there, isn't it? It could have been anyone on
• 2:13:51
  that, that that moon base. Yeah.
• 2:13:56
  And and and then, you know, then the doctors barely, barely in it
• 2:14:02
  as well. I think this was the first book
• 2:14:05
  where the doctor. Who logo came off, wasn't it?
• 2:14:08
  And it was just the new adventures and, and, and I guess
• 2:14:11
  that, you know, they're probably.
• 2:14:12
  Using it as a as a dummy run for for the the with any Summerfield
• 2:14:19
  new adventures. But when you think, you know,
• 2:14:21
  you've only got a handful of books left with the doctor in
• 2:14:24
  let's make the most of him while we got him, you know, and and
• 2:14:26
  yeah. So it just, it just feels.
• 2:14:30
  Oh yeah. It's just such an.
• 2:14:33
  Unpleasant read. You know I don't want to.
• 2:14:36
  It's not. It's not something I want to
• 2:14:39
  particularly experience again. You know it's another one on
• 2:14:43
  this list. Where it's like, yeah, I've read
• 2:14:45
  it once or twice. Yeah, I'm.
• 2:14:48
  I'm done, I'm out. You know your your list is so
• 2:14:51
  interesting because. You know, like what you've got
• 2:14:55
  stuff as sort of fun as shakedown, and as sparkling and
• 2:15:01
  effervescent as the dying days in there, which the new
• 2:15:04
  adventures were absolutely capable of.
• 2:15:06
  Yeah, clearly those books exist. But they didn't choose to do
• 2:15:10
  that. More often than not, More often
• 2:15:12
  than not, they chose eternity weeps, you know, and in stuff
• 2:15:15
  like Transit and Foreshadow and Cat's Cradle and Parasite and
• 2:15:20
  just lots of people suffering unpleasantly for interminable
• 2:15:24
  periods of time. And I'm like, you can do these
• 2:15:28
  brilliantly fun books. Why don't you do more of these?
• 2:15:32
  Yeah, I I think that's that's that's the.
• 2:15:34
  Thing isn't it? It was.
• 2:15:35
  You know, and I don't, I don't know if you know, like what you
• 2:15:39
  said earlier, kind of hit it on the head that they didn't want
• 2:15:43
  to be put in the, in the child section or the children's
• 2:15:47
  section of, of, of of the shops or libraries or whatever.
• 2:15:50
  They wanted to be an adult 1. So they made them miserable.
• 2:15:54
  And I would, I would go as far as to say that.
• 2:15:57
  My. Education with the New
• 2:15:58
  Adventures has been to discover that last third is a very strong
• 2:16:02
  run of books and actually the Eternity weeps are the exception
• 2:16:07
  rather than the rule, whereas early on it's the rule rather
• 2:16:11
  than the exception. You know the.
• 2:16:13
  Exception early on is. Nightshade or something like
• 2:16:15
  that, you know? Yeah, totally agree with high
• 2:16:17
  science, you know. The occasional.
• 2:16:19
  Glimmer of light in all the bleakness.
• 2:16:23
  Well, talking of. Bleakness.
• 2:16:25
  Oh no, we're not talking of bleakness.
• 2:16:27
  No, we're light. We're looking good.
• 2:16:29
  We're looking at the good, so you're, you're #3.
• 2:16:34
  Yeah, favorite Doctor Hubert. Let's go.
• 2:16:37
  It's another non fiction book. So it's why it's one of us.
• 2:16:43
  I mentioned earlier on so this is time frame by David J Howe.
• 2:16:49
  So this is is is like, I suppose like a visual history of the 1st
• 2:16:57
  30 years of Doctor Who. So this came out 1990 three 30th
• 2:17:01
  anniversary. And, you know, it's full of like
• 2:17:06
  press cuttings, it's full of behind the scenes photos,
• 2:17:11
  publicity photos and, you know, bits of merchandise and all this
• 2:17:16
  sort of thing. So it's, it's, it's just this
• 2:17:18
  beautiful encapsulation of, of each year of, of Doctor Who.
• 2:17:26
  But, and, and it has 2 features in it.
• 2:17:31
  And I'm not talking about Katie Manning's boobs on the 60.
• 2:17:35
  It's it. There are two features.
• 2:17:37
  There's one called Magic Moments where David J how he picks one
• 2:17:45
  of the stories from that year. He does 4 or 5 frames or
• 2:17:52
  pictures of it and then takes the matching snippet of the
• 2:17:57
  target book and puts that underneath.
• 2:18:00
  So you've got like, you know, so it's the ones that kind of stick
• 2:18:04
  in my head are you've got like the the Sea Devils emerging from
• 2:18:10
  from the sea. So it's got frame by frame.
• 2:18:12
  And then it's got this little snippet from the Sea Devils.
• 2:18:16
  You've then got another one the the, the Imperial Dalek rising
• 2:18:23
  up up the stairs. And then then, you know, a
• 2:18:26
  little snippet then of of from, from Remembrance of the Daleks.
• 2:18:29
  And yeah, it's just got these the these littered throughout
• 2:18:34
  the how gorgeous people prepare a visual from the TV show.
• 2:18:38
  And the pros of the target, Yeah, yeah, matches them
• 2:18:42
  together really nice. Yeah.
• 2:18:43
  So it's it's it's normally like four or five of the pictures to
• 2:18:47
  kind of kind of, you know, frame it and then and then this this
• 2:18:51
  snippet. And yeah, I mean, some of some
• 2:18:56
  of them are a little bit bizarre, but I guess that
• 2:18:59
  that's, that's his personal taste.
• 2:19:02
  Yeah, yeah, you know, sort of thing.
• 2:19:04
  But a lot of Have you not seen my face as you've been going
• 2:19:06
  through this list? It's all personal taste, all
• 2:19:09
  right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:19:12
  And. Then it's.
• 2:19:15
  Then every other page in it is basically a full page print of
• 2:19:23
  of a of a target book cover. But what they've done?
• 2:19:28
  Is they've removed. All of the logos, they've
• 2:19:30
  removed all of the typography, so it's just just the artwork.
• 2:19:35
  Target covers gorgeous. And it it's definitely the
• 2:19:38
  Daleks in there with that. Exploding.
• 2:19:40
  Dalek. I should hope so.
• 2:19:42
  It's also got. It's also got because.
• 2:19:44
  Because it. Goes up to 93.
• 2:19:46
  It's also got a couple of the the the new adventures in there
• 2:19:51
  as well. I think this is the book I was
• 2:19:52
  talking about. I think Birthright is in there.
• 2:19:54
  Birthright is definitely in, yeah, and.
• 2:19:57
  That gorgeous cover. Which, Mark, you know, the
• 2:20:00
  fantasy one with the TARDIS and all the creatures looking at it?
• 2:20:04
  Yeah, yeah. So yeah.
• 2:20:08
  Yeah, it's just this vibrant, colourful visual book, you know,
• 2:20:14
  and it, and it, and it, and I, I can remember this was one that I
• 2:20:19
  ordered from, from the book shop in, in my town.
• 2:20:21
  I, I can remember going and picking it up just before mum
• 2:20:27
  and dad were, were taking us off to do the big shop at Tesco's.
• 2:20:30
  So it was, it was, so I was, I was just reading this in the
• 2:20:34
  car, you know, because, because our Tesco's was like 1212 miles
• 2:20:37
  away from where we live. So I don't, you know, as a, as a
• 2:20:41
  history of the show, though. In such a visual way, yeah,
• 2:20:46
  that's enticing. And and in in.
• 2:20:48
  In one book as well, because. Because I guess it, it feels
• 2:20:52
  like it's, I suppose like a shortened version of of the 60s.
• 2:21:00
  70s and. 80s but but, but, but there's more emphasis on the
• 2:21:05
  target books in it, you know, but yeah, you know, but, but
• 2:21:10
  it's a fantastic book and and I went to Hooverville recently and
• 2:21:18
  David J Howe was there, so I was able to get it signed as well
• 2:21:21
  and able to tell him that it. Is one of my.
• 2:21:24
  My all time favorite Doctor Hoover, so he was quite chuffed
• 2:21:27
  about that and I was flicking through this as a nipper.
• 2:21:31
  On the way to Tescos, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:21:34
  So, but yeah, it's just just a. It's just a phenomenal book, you
• 2:21:38
  know, and I'm really pleased with people putting on fiction
• 2:21:41
  books in as well. You know, it just and I'm hoping
• 2:21:44
  people that listen to these are sort of going, oh, I'm going to
• 2:21:47
  check that out. Mind you, that's probably quite
• 2:21:49
  pricey as well. Well, because I've done that.
• 2:21:54
  Like, like with listening to, to, to other people that you've,
• 2:21:58
  you've kind of done this with. Yeah.
• 2:22:00
  I, I, I, I can tell that is actually happening because I've
• 2:22:04
  there, there are a couple. And I was like, I've never even
• 2:22:07
  heard of those books. And I've gone and gone online
• 2:22:09
  and gone, oh, it's only 5 lbs on eBay.
• 2:22:11
  I'll have that. I'll get it.
• 2:22:13
  Yeah. I think you're a.
• 2:22:15
  You're a. Midnight Doctor Who buyer like
• 2:22:17
  me Yes No. We had a conversation in the
• 2:22:21
  middle of the. Night.
• 2:22:22
  What are you doing? Oh.
• 2:22:23
  I'm just searching for the cheapest Doctor Who books you
• 2:22:27
  bless us. OK, well, I'm.
• 2:22:30
  Almost too scared. To approach your top two worst
• 2:22:35
  Doctor Who books. But we have to do it.
• 2:22:38
  So what's number two? Number two, our friend John
• 2:22:42
  Peel. Has made his second division
• 2:22:46
  his. Legacy of the Daleks.
• 2:22:48
  I mean, it could. Have been anyone?
• 2:22:50
  Well, not John 2IN1 list, yeah, I mean.
• 2:22:57
  You said you liked the Darlaki version of Earth.
• 2:23:00
  Why didn't you like this book? Because it because it's.
• 2:23:03
  Another one of these continuity cakes, you know, it's sort of
• 2:23:07
  like he's he's taken this and this and this and this isn't the
• 2:23:10
  master in this. Yeah, The the.
• 2:23:13
  Delgado, Master. What are?
• 2:23:14
  The Darlaki version of. Oh, and and.
• 2:23:17
  Basically. Susan steals his target TARDIS
• 2:23:22
  and strands him on the planet where where Chancellor Gough
• 2:23:27
  picks him up. For fucks sake, what is wrong
• 2:23:30
  with his writers? That, that, that, that, that is
• 2:23:33
  my my big. Issue with with don't need these
• 2:23:35
  jigsaws filled in for. Us, I mean, it's, it's big
• 2:23:39
  finish now. Isn't it?
• 2:23:42
  It is. We'll.
• 2:23:45
  Plug any gap. Pretty much.
• 2:23:49
  Yeah, so. You know this is.
• 2:23:55
  I I again, it's one of those. Things I I'm.
• 2:23:57
  Struggling to kind of understand the logic behind the the way
• 2:24:04
  that civilization is going after recovering from the Dalek, the
• 2:24:10
  Dalek invasion, you know, so it's like that centers did not
• 2:24:14
  end where I think it. Was going I thought you were
• 2:24:16
  going to say I struggled to understand the way civilization
• 2:24:20
  has gone in a way that legacy of the Daleks could come to be no
• 2:24:24
  sorry please continue we could go that route as.
• 2:24:29
  Well, yes. What went wrong with
• 2:24:31
  civilization? Sorry, I don't know.
• 2:24:34
  I really don't know. Yeah, so so.
• 2:24:36
  You got these these weird pseudo nights.
• 2:24:42
  So, so it's almost like we've gone back to the medieval times,
• 2:24:48
  you know, so, so you know, they've got, they've got their
• 2:24:51
  armor on and their own horses and they, they're going around
• 2:24:54
  right and wrongs and all this sort of thing.
• 2:24:56
  And I find that quite bizarre because, because that's not, you
• 2:25:01
  know, if you would, if you were to go to everyone in, in the ham
• 2:25:05
  fam and go, right, what do you think happens after the Daleks
• 2:25:09
  are defeated in the Dalek invasion of Earth?
• 2:25:12
  I don't think anyone would go that route, no.
• 2:25:16
  I mean there are about 5 big. Finish.
• 2:25:17
  Box sets that we'll. Tell you, but no, I I wouldn't
• 2:25:21
  think we're doing the Arthurian legend, you know, Albion, that
• 2:25:24
  sort of thing right it and so so it's just.
• 2:25:28
  Yeah, that just a bizarre that that's where John Peel went with
• 2:25:32
  that. Yeah.
• 2:25:35
  And I think it's, you know, also, you know, that that
• 2:25:39
  relationship that David Campbell and and Susan have got in, it
• 2:25:44
  is, is is kind of bizarre. Again.
• 2:25:46
  It's sort of like, why can't they just be happy?
• 2:25:49
  Because it's sort of, you know, because he's obviously aging.
• 2:25:53
  She isn't. So she has to done the makeup
• 2:25:56
  and the wig and that's causing friction between them.
• 2:26:00
  But it's sort of like, well, surely she's told him and he
• 2:26:03
  knows that she's not human that, that, you know.
• 2:26:08
  Yeah. And it's sort of, you know, and
• 2:26:10
  then he, I mean, you know. He's a.
• 2:26:14
  Bit wet in in the Dalek invasion of he is, yeah, but he's a nice
• 2:26:19
  guy. You know.
• 2:26:20
  And it's horrible that he he ends up dead in this book, you
• 2:26:25
  know, and that's all that can happen in these original books.
• 2:26:29
  You're. Either miserable or dead.
• 2:26:31
  Yeah, when he was both and. Yeah, and and and it's also.
• 2:26:37
  It's also quite horrible because the last time you see Susan,
• 2:26:42
  they've had an argument and he never gets to see her again and
• 2:26:46
  she dies. He dies, sorry, and she steals a
• 2:26:50
  TARDIS and goes off and we never see her again.
• 2:26:53
  Do you think people don't like Carolyn Ford?
• 2:26:57
  I'll just say it's this because. Obviously, this is what happens
• 2:26:59
  in this book. In Big Finish they brought in a
• 2:27:03
  son and murdered him off horribly by the Daleks.
• 2:27:06
  Like, I just feel like people don't really love Susan very
• 2:27:09
  much. They want to suffer.
• 2:27:12
  Well, yeah, I I can understand that because.
• 2:27:19
  Vicky. Vicky is a much better companion
• 2:27:21
  than Vicky gets. She gets books.
• 2:27:23
  Books like the Plotters. You know, yeah, fabulous books
• 2:27:26
  like that. But it's.
• 2:27:30
  Yeah, I, I you. Know and so again it's another
• 2:27:33
  like, oh, it's another returning companion from from the classic
• 2:27:37
  era. They're not happy go through go
• 2:27:43
  through terrible things in this book and and I think I'm right
• 2:27:48
  in saying she doesn't actually meet up with the doctor.
• 2:27:52
  They never they never meet in the book as well.
• 2:27:57
  You know, he keeps them both separated and and you think,
• 2:28:00
  well, isn't that the whole if, if you were going to do a story
• 2:28:05
  where the Doctor goes back to Earth after, after the diet
• 2:28:10
  invasion of Earth, that would be his first priority, perhaps.
• 2:28:15
  To kind of. Have that reunion moment, you
• 2:28:21
  know, And there's only one thing that legacy of the Daleks.
• 2:28:24
  Has got going in its favour is this is just after that
• 2:28:27
  appalling scene where Sam Jones was given the Doctor mouth to
• 2:28:30
  mouth and ended up snogging him and then running away from him.
• 2:28:33
  And so she's not in this book at all.
• 2:28:35
  So we're spared that. Sam Jones from War of the
• 2:28:38
  Daleks, definitely. I think that that is is is.
• 2:28:43
  A blessing that you can count that, that, that she's not in
• 2:28:46
  it. And.
• 2:28:47
  And we don't. Yeah.
• 2:28:48
  Isn't she replaced by some girl called Donna though?
• 2:28:50
  It's one of these Knights. One of the Knights, yeah.
• 2:28:53
  Donna the knight, I mean. It's.
• 2:28:57
  Yeah. Very odd and yeah and.
• 2:29:00
  And of course like. You know, her father doesn't
• 2:29:05
  approve of her being annoyed, all this sort of stuff, because
• 2:29:08
  it's not what women do. And it's like, oh God, you know,
• 2:29:12
  isn't it baffling, right? But you can have a book come.
• 2:29:14
  Out like any embodies yet, which uses continuity.
• 2:29:18
  It weaves Doctor Who got it's got the Crotons in it, for
• 2:29:21
  fuck's sake. Mentions of the Daleks,
• 2:29:23
  Gallifrey, a Time War, all of this stuff.
• 2:29:26
  Yeah. And weaves it into this
• 2:29:27
  massively ambitious, exciting new direction.
• 2:29:32
  And then a few books later, you got John Peel coming along with
• 2:29:36
  as much continuity in it, and it just sinks the book like a
• 2:29:39
  fucking lead stone. Yeah, yeah.
• 2:29:43
  And then and then. Isn't the next one placebo
• 2:29:45
  effect, isn't it, I think, Oh, always coming up, isn't it you?
• 2:29:49
  Are right, this was a. Tricky period for the.
• 2:29:52
  Doctor books and that was that was like oh who knew we.
• 2:29:55
  Needed a story with the Firmazy and we're in it.
• 2:29:58
  Stacy and the Ice. Warriors, OH.
• 2:30:02
  Boy, oh boy. Yeah, I'm surprised they ever
• 2:30:05
  dug themselves out of this, however, I'm honest.
• 2:30:08
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 2:30:09
  I mean, it's, it's quite a rally round, isn't?
• 2:30:11
  It it really is because, you know, another jump hill, I think
• 2:30:14
  that's a, that's a a. Solid choice there for your #2
• 2:30:19
  but you know, let's let's be positive again and go back to
• 2:30:22
  your number two in the top ten list, yeah.
• 2:30:26
  Right. So it's a target book.
• 2:30:32
  So this is Remembrance of the Daleks by Ben Aranovich.
• 2:30:34
  Do you know I just recorded? Oh, OK, no.
• 2:30:38
  Sorry, no, I mean it's. Yeah, again, it's another one I
• 2:30:43
  can remember pre ordering from my my local, from my dealer.
• 2:30:48
  Yeah, but but I think like, I know, I know he wasn't he wasn't
• 2:30:54
  the the range editor at this point.
• 2:30:56
  But I think Nigel Robinson needs to be applauded because when he
• 2:31:02
  he. He.
• 2:31:03
  Kind of came on board. He he made this decision to if
• 2:31:11
  he could get the people that wrote the TV story to to write
• 2:31:16
  the the target book, that was his first choice.
• 2:31:20
  Then if they couldn't he would bring in Ian Marr or terms
• 2:31:24
  Dicks. And.
• 2:31:26
  He mostly succeeded, didn't he? Yeah.
• 2:31:29
  And and and I think you know that.
• 2:31:30
  That, you know, from, from the, the mid 80s to the end of the
• 2:31:35
  range, it was a, it was a period of there's some absolute bangers
• 2:31:41
  in there, you know, because, because I think like, I think
• 2:31:43
  you've got those, those that initial batch of like classics,
• 2:31:47
  you know, The Cave monsters, day of the Daleks, you know, they're
• 2:31:50
  absolutely fantastic. And then you kind of had, you
• 2:31:53
  know, poor old Terrence, They're, they're getting into
• 2:31:56
  churn out a book every week, you know, kind of thing.
• 2:31:59
  So it does kind of sag in the middle a little bit and the
• 2:32:03
  quality isn't, isn't quite there, but there's still good
• 2:32:05
  ones that don't get me wrong. But then, you know, you've got
• 2:32:09
  Nigel Robinson comes in and goes, right?
• 2:32:11
  Yeah. Let's turn this on the head, you
• 2:32:13
  know? So you've got like those Donald
• 2:32:15
  Cotton books. I mean, you get time in the
• 2:32:20
  Ronnie by Pippen. Jane Bay.
• 2:32:22
  Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
• 2:32:23
  It's just a triumph. In my eyes.
• 2:32:25
  Yeah, every chapter ending has an exclamation mark.
• 2:32:30
  Yeah. So I think you sounded pain.
• 2:32:34
  Then. See.
• 2:32:37
  Stephen Wyatt did his his stories.
• 2:32:39
  To me, yeah, yeah. Yeah, we and, and we even got a
• 2:32:45
  Robert Holmes target as well. Yeah.
• 2:32:48
  Oh God. And you know what?
• 2:32:50
  He did with that story in Price. Yeah, yeah, definitely.
• 2:32:55
  Yeah. So, so, you know, so, so you
• 2:32:59
  know, I think that that that's really a really big step forward
• 2:33:03
  in the quality of these these later targets.
• 2:33:06
  But also I think like with with remembrance of the Daleks and
• 2:33:10
  again, this is something that's been said a million times
• 2:33:12
  before. So it's nothing new, but this
• 2:33:14
  feels like the evolution of the target books into the new
• 2:33:20
  adventure. The the start is here and and
• 2:33:24
  and it and it keeps going and by general consensus in.
• 2:33:28
  That recording or. Remembrance, we all said that
• 2:33:30
  was the first new adventure. Yeah, yeah.
• 2:33:33
  And and you know you. Can't.
• 2:33:35
  You can't argue with that. And and trouble is though, is no
• 2:33:39
  one can do it quite like Ben. Aronovich That's why they
• 2:33:42
  struggle at the start. You know, no one's as good.
• 2:33:45
  Yeah. And even he.
• 2:33:51
  Yeah, yeah. So.
• 2:33:53
  You know. You know not.
• 2:33:55
  Only is this sort of like a brilliant retelling of what we
• 2:33:59
  what we saw on screen. But you've got these, these
• 2:34:05
  lovely little passages from, from books that start each
• 2:34:10
  chapter and it's sort of like the, the most of them are kind
• 2:34:13
  of about the history of the Daleks and, and all this sort of
• 2:34:15
  stuff. And it, it's kind of just adding
• 2:34:17
  these little flourishes. What's about the start of unit,
• 2:34:22
  isn't it? Yeah, yeah, Cadea too, isn't it?
• 2:34:26
  Who comes if we know? Where that would end?
• 2:34:29
  Up. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 2:34:32
  And then, and then also you've got these cutaways to to
• 2:34:38
  Gallifrey, but it's, it's it's sort of like ancient Gallifrey.
• 2:34:44
  So, you know, we're dealing here with with Russell on and Omegar
• 2:34:48
  and and the other. Is he the Doctor or I don't
• 2:34:50
  know, anonymous fellow? Yeah, yeah.
• 2:34:55
  And it. And it's sort of detailing, I
• 2:34:57
  suppose, like the, the, the creation of the hand of Omegar
• 2:35:00
  and how it how it left Gallifrey and, and all this sort of stuff.
• 2:35:04
  But you you've then got like you we mentioned in the dying days,
• 2:35:09
  we've got those POV's of the ice worries.
• 2:35:12
  Well, you've got the POV's of Daleks in this as well.
• 2:35:15
  So, you know, and I think I think it's really clever that
• 2:35:20
  relationship between the Dalek Supreme and, and the little girl
• 2:35:25
  that's used as the battle computer because she's skipping
• 2:35:28
  off down the road. And then the, the, the, the for
• 2:35:31
  a moment, the Supreme. Dalek wanted to.
• 2:35:33
  Skip and it and it's just that like family and chilling.
• 2:35:37
  Yeah, yeah, just. Adding all these bits to it.
• 2:35:39
  And then, yeah. And then then obviously you've
• 2:35:44
  got things like with the the special weapons Dalek and how
• 2:35:49
  the other Imperial dialects don't like him and call him the
• 2:35:52
  Abominate abomination and all this sort of stuff.
• 2:35:56
  And it's just all of this, you know, when you think what we saw
• 2:36:00
  on TV is is a classic, you can't could you make?
• 2:36:05
  That any better? Probably not, but better, better
• 2:36:08
  Arabic you know it's and just the huge character insight into.
• 2:36:13
  All of those characters down to the smallest character on on
• 2:36:18
  that that TV story, they all get a moment which really shows
• 2:36:23
  backstories and shades and nuance that you just wouldn't
• 2:36:27
  even suspect watching the TV story.
• 2:36:29
  No, you know, and and I think, I think that's.
• 2:36:32
  You know, I think that those are my favorite.
• 2:36:35
  I think my favorite targets are those ones that don't just do a
• 2:36:39
  straight retelling. They, they take what we saw and
• 2:36:43
  they run with it, expand it, make it better, add backstories
• 2:36:47
  and, and, and, you know, extra little bits and yeah, and and
• 2:36:51
  and and, but, but yeah, this, you know, you could argue that
• 2:36:58
  maybe a lot of this is nostalgia.
• 2:37:00
  Because it is a book that. That I had when when I was, you
• 2:37:04
  know, a nipper. But I read it 3 weeks ago.
• 2:37:08
  Sorry I. Nostalgia for me, no, but but
• 2:37:10
  that, that's the thing I it's a. Another book that if I need to
• 2:37:17
  read a book that I want to enjoy, I'll I'll pick up
• 2:37:21
  remembrance of the. Daleks.
• 2:37:22
  It's one I've read numerous occasions that to the point
• 2:37:25
  where my my target book is very doggy.
• 2:37:30
  And so I was quite grateful when the reader came out because it
• 2:37:33
  can save. They read beautifully.
• 2:37:35
  They're they're. Round.
• 2:37:37
  I wish they would. Redo.
• 2:37:40
  Keep doing those. All of them.
• 2:37:42
  Yeah. Every book, yeah.
• 2:37:44
  You know, but but I you. Know the price of books
• 2:37:47
  nowadays? Bloody yeah.
• 2:37:48
  They would be about 20 lbs each, wouldn't they?
• 2:37:51
  Yeah, yeah, yeah. The skill of of translating the
• 2:37:55
  TV. Story so accurately because it
• 2:37:56
  doesn't divert from the TV story, but by showing so many
• 2:38:02
  different points of view. It is if someone made the
• 2:38:05
  argument this was the best target book, which I'm assuming
• 2:38:08
  you're #1 isn't a target book. So you are making that argument
• 2:38:12
  that this potentially is the number one target group I.
• 2:38:17
  Wouldn't. Argue with them, no.
• 2:38:20
  And and when you. Consider how inexperienced Ben
• 2:38:24
  Eronovich was and a lot of those writers from this this time and
• 2:38:29
  and it's a very different skill being able to write a screenplay
• 2:38:33
  to writing prose, isn't it? I mean, it's and to think, you
• 2:38:38
  know, this, this was his first, first television story and his
• 2:38:42
  first novel. It's just I read Kevin Clarke's
• 2:38:45
  silver nemesis. Some people can.
• 2:38:47
  Struggle, right? Yeah.
• 2:38:50
  No, I mean that. That.
• 2:38:52
  That is a real that's a real disappointing 1, isn't it?
• 2:38:55
  Because I think that sticks to the he said, he said she said
• 2:38:59
  kind of thing. It's Although to be fair, I
• 2:39:01
  think Ben Oronovich may have had a head.
• 2:39:02
  Start with the TV story. You know, it's just how good it
• 2:39:05
  was in comparison. Yeah, but but.
• 2:39:09
  Yeah, I, I just. I just think this is brilliant
• 2:39:12
  and gold, absolute gold. Wow.
• 2:39:17
  Here the number one spot, the summit, the zenith, the
• 2:39:21
  apotheosis of Doctor Who fiction.
• 2:39:25
  I would I would like to hope. That you have not seen this.
• 2:39:29
  Coming in a million. Years.
• 2:39:31
  What? Your least favorite Doctor Who
• 2:39:33
  book of all time? Yeah.
• 2:39:35
  OK, well my reaction will. Attest to that if you go.
• 2:39:40
  It's the. Target.
• 2:39:42
  Of slip back by. Oh my God, Ghastly.
• 2:39:54
  No. I did not, but I mean I can't.
• 2:39:57
  I don't really disagree after having read 1 of Eric Sabel's
• 2:40:02
  recent Attempts at Ryan Ed book So Tell Me Why.
• 2:40:08
  Yeah, I think the, the 1st problem I had with it and, and
• 2:40:15
  and I think this is telling to how bad I thought the story was,
• 2:40:21
  was that it took three false starts over a period of three
• 2:40:27
  years before I could actually read this story from start to
• 2:40:31
  finish. Yeah, yeah, so, so.
• 2:40:35
  I. Yeah, I started.
• 2:40:37
  Got 20 pages in put it down and go, yeah, there must be
• 2:40:42
  something better on my shelves. And I kept, I kept doing that.
• 2:40:47
  And then and then this fourth time I, I, I was like, no, I've
• 2:40:51
  got to see this. I've got to do this to the to
• 2:40:54
  the end, because I, I went through a, a period of kind of
• 2:40:59
  like, right. I pick a doctor and I'll, I'll
• 2:41:02
  read all of their Target books. So I was, I was doing Colin's
• 2:41:05
  era and, and, and that was the, the motivation to see this fruit
• 2:41:11
  to its bitter end because you will find some gems in Colin's
• 2:41:16
  era. Oh.
• 2:41:16
  Yeah, yeah, and and to. Be honest.
• 2:41:19
  A couple of them are Eric Saywood's, you know, Twin
• 2:41:22
  Dilemma, I think is a great one. And, and.
• 2:41:24
  Also I I I. Quite enjoy attack of the
• 2:41:27
  Cybermen as well. You know so so it's it's not
• 2:41:31
  that he can't do this it's just more often than not he does
• 2:41:35
  something like this yeah. So I am going to be Douglas
• 2:41:40
  Adams this. Week and.
• 2:41:41
  I will get away with it, Yeah, Because.
• 2:41:43
  Because that's what I. Put in my notes, it feels like
• 2:41:46
  he's trying to be Douglas Adams. And when you consider how unique
• 2:41:54
  a writer Douglas Adams was, he was, he was a maverick.
• 2:41:59
  I mean, I, I, I would use the word genius in in, you know,
• 2:42:04
  nobody's going to get close to that.
• 2:42:06
  So, but, but I feel with Eric Saywood, it's so a lot of his
• 2:42:13
  books, the ones that aren't successful, he's trying to
• 2:42:17
  mirror someone else's style. You know, this week he wants to
• 2:42:20
  be Robert Holmes. This week he wants to be Philip
• 2:42:22
  Martin. In this instance, he wants to be
• 2:42:27
  Doug Douglas Adams and. You just.
• 2:42:29
  Think you know? Just do your own thing.
• 2:42:32
  Be Eric Saywood and then you think, oh, actually, you wrote
• 2:42:37
  in revelation of the Daleks target.
• 2:42:38
  So maybe that isn't a good idea, but you you get the you know,
• 2:42:42
  you get that, you know, it's like he doesn't know he doesn't
• 2:42:46
  know his own style, so he's trying to be other things and
• 2:42:49
  and you know, that's never ever a a a a there's never really a
• 2:42:55
  good outcome from that. I mean, I know obviously we've
• 2:43:00
  got retellings of of Douglas. Adams, Doctor Who's?
• 2:43:04
  Now you know the first James Goss is He's not.
• 2:43:07
  Douglas Adams But he dared to write those books and did
• 2:43:11
  extremely well and they're very enjoyable and.
• 2:43:14
  And yeah. I don't want to mention him
• 2:43:16
  again, but the the Gareth Robertson, yeah, he can do it.
• 2:43:18
  And Johnny? Morris is a.
• 2:43:19
  Great. Like the Tomorrow Windows was a
• 2:43:23
  brilliant Douglas Adams pastiche.
• 2:43:25
  Yeah, so some can do it. Yeah, but but but.
• 2:43:30
  But. Unfortunately.
• 2:43:31
  Not, not Eric Saywood. And which sort of start of the
• 2:43:36
  universe? Theory do you subscribe to then?
• 2:43:39
  Is it the Castro Valva a hydrogen in rush?
• 2:43:44
  Is it the? Oh, sometime never from the 8th
• 2:43:47
  Doctor books. The seeding of the crystals at
• 2:43:49
  the start of the universe. What other start of the
• 2:43:51
  universes have we had? Oh, Terminus, you know the the I
• 2:43:56
  don't know what happened there, the engines blew up or something
• 2:43:59
  or what the ever the hell happened in a slip back.
• 2:44:05
  Yeah, it's not a slip back. It definitely isn't because
• 2:44:10
  because that's the thing I am struggling to kind of remember
• 2:44:18
  anything that kind of happened in it.
• 2:44:20
  So, so like these, these are the things.
• 2:44:24
  That I remember. Happening, and I think this is
• 2:44:25
  very telling about how, how, how bored this book is.
• 2:44:29
  One thing I can remember is that the doctor doesn't appear in the
• 2:44:33
  1st 50 pages of the book, you know, And then when he does
• 2:44:39
  appear, he's sleeping a hang, sleeping off a hangover.
• 2:44:45
  He's from right? He can come over and it's like,
• 2:44:47
  wow, OK. And then he basically just runs
• 2:44:51
  up and down corridors. Monster is.
• 2:44:53
  Chasing him, you know, I I can remember.
• 2:44:56
  That the the captain of the ship had some sort of disease or
• 2:45:01
  illness and spends a lot of time in a in a bath.
• 2:45:04
  Is that right? That's right, yeah.
• 2:45:05
  And and that that sounds like Douglas Adams because because
• 2:45:08
  the captain in in hitchhikers. He was he was in a bath.
• 2:45:13
  That was Valentine Darw in the. Audio version.
• 2:45:19
  Yeah, and and beyond. That I cannot remember a lot
• 2:45:24
  about it. I know that's about it.
• 2:45:26
  Wasn't there? Wasn't there like?
• 2:45:27
  Art thiefs or. Something as well wasn't, I
• 2:45:30
  think, like a Sandra Dickinson style character.
• 2:45:32
  Pops up, obviously, Doug Saddams again.
• 2:45:35
  Yeah, yeah, you know, and. I think the fact that it took
• 2:45:40
  you three years to get through this.
• 2:45:42
  Is all the evidence you need to put this on your number one
• 2:45:46
  worst book ever? And I think that's the thing.
• 2:45:49
  I think like. The the bottom 10 was harder for
• 2:45:55
  me to put together than than my top 10.
• 2:46:00
  But Slip Back was the 1st that I put on that list and I knew it
• 2:46:05
  was going to be #1 Because yeah, it just, it's horrible to say
• 2:46:13
  this about someone's work, but it it just has no redeeming
• 2:46:17
  features or anything that you can go.
• 2:46:19
  That was good. We finally found the Doctor Who
• 2:46:23
  book with no. Literary merit whatsoever and
• 2:46:26
  and the and the cover's shite as.
• 2:46:28
  Well, so it's the horrible warty.
• 2:46:31
  Green Man, is that the captain? Yeah, I guess it must be.
• 2:46:35
  I'm not sure. Awful.
• 2:46:38
  Awful. Yes.
• 2:46:39
  Yes. It's not good.
• 2:46:40
  That means I've got to cover. It at a book club at some point
• 2:46:42
  then. Well, I do have one question for
• 2:46:45
  you though, Dan. What is the single best number
• 2:46:49
  one Doctor Who book of all time? It's a target book, remember?
• 2:46:58
  Sort of Daleks. You know, it's almost the best
• 2:47:00
  ever target book of all time. Yeah, for me.
• 2:47:05
  I thought this was going to be a new.
• 2:47:06
  Adventure. Yeah, Yeah.
• 2:47:08
  No, it's for me. It's Battlefield by Mark Platt
• 2:47:14
  which has appeared on some lists.
• 2:47:17
  In the top ten and people are scrambling to do this on the
• 2:47:21
  book club. Please explain to me why I was
• 2:47:24
  quite disappointed when I when I realised that our.
• 2:47:27
  Group had kind of missed out on it, but it's fine.
• 2:47:29
  Maybe we'll have to do Book Club Fest and you can jump.
• 2:47:32
  From one group or the other, just for one book guest.
• 2:47:34
  Appearance. Yeah.
• 2:47:38
  So I, I think, I think with this that there are a lot of personal
• 2:47:43
  stories, but behind this, again, this was another one that I that
• 2:47:48
  I got from a little shop in, in, in South Mole.
• 2:47:51
  And is it still there? No, no, it's what is it now?
• 2:47:57
  I think it's. Like a.
• 2:47:58
  Solicitor's now which is what? Happens to the world.
• 2:48:02
  We keep saying that, yeah. And also.
• 2:48:07
  For GCSE English literature, we were allowed to pick one non
• 2:48:13
  curriculum book to to write for coursework.
• 2:48:19
  And I picked Battlefield. I think it was, it was, yeah.
• 2:48:25
  What would did Battlefield come out?
• 2:48:28
  Was it 91 or 92, something like that?
• 2:48:31
  So, so I think I would have, this would have been 94, I
• 2:48:36
  think. So I'd had it for a while and I
• 2:48:37
  probably read it, read it a couple of times.
• 2:48:39
  And I was like, yeah, and, and, and I think so I think like, you
• 2:48:45
  know, it helped me get AAB grade for my GCSE.
• 2:48:51
  Yeah. So what?
• 2:48:52
  Was your thesis. After you were in legends.
• 2:48:56
  Timey wiminess. Yeah, yes.
• 2:49:00
  So you know. But also, I, I, you know, I'm
• 2:49:06
  one of the few people that actually sees a lot of good
• 2:49:09
  things in the actual TV story of Battlefield.
• 2:49:11
  Yeah, you know, got Angela Bruce on it for goodness sakes.
• 2:49:15
  What more? Do you need Yeah, Angela Douglas
• 2:49:18
  as. Well, Ling Tai, Fabulous
• 2:49:20
  Xiaoyong. She had a bit where she gets out
• 2:49:23
  of the car and goes. Yeah, so.
• 2:49:30
  I, I, I love, I love the TV story and, and I think it's
• 2:49:33
  also, it's interesting to, to that, that it's the only 7th
• 2:49:38
  Doctor story that's novelized by someone that didn't write it for
• 2:49:43
  the TV as well. So, so it's it's James Locke
• 2:49:47
  Holby does a beautiful dedication.
• 2:49:50
  To Ben Aronovich by Mark Platt. He calls Ben my gentle night or
• 2:49:56
  something like that, as on the first page.
• 2:49:59
  Yeah, yeah, there was a real. Lovely, click there.
• 2:50:03
  Wasn't there at the time, you know what I mean?
• 2:50:06
  Yeah, because. Because it.
• 2:50:07
  Almost had that sort of writers room kind of vibe to it, didn't
• 2:50:11
  it? You know, yeah, I think and that
• 2:50:13
  and that kind of shows with, you know what, what was actually put
• 2:50:17
  onto the the the TV and how they you know, which which is weird
• 2:50:22
  why Silver nemesis happened, wasn't it?
• 2:50:25
  Because because it's like, you know, if they were all that, you
• 2:50:27
  know, they were doing this kind of totally knit thing, why they
• 2:50:30
  would then put Remembrance and Silver's nemesis in the same
• 2:50:35
  season when it's fundamentally the same story, isn't it?
• 2:50:38
  But with different monsters, isn't it?
• 2:50:40
  But, well, they was also helping each other out, they sort of.
• 2:50:43
  Looked at silver Nemesis and went Oh no, you're right.
• 2:50:46
  We we can't improve that dog. You're OK.
• 2:50:51
  Although I'm told on good authority.
• 2:50:52
  That all the stuff in Ghost Light about Manisha and, you
• 2:50:59
  know, the firebomb that went off and drove her out of London,
• 2:51:04
  that was all Ben Aronovich's idea.
• 2:51:06
  So they really were adding ideas to each other's stories.
• 2:51:11
  Yeah. And I forgot to say actually
• 2:51:13
  when. When we were doing talking about
• 2:51:15
  blood heat mini mini ship is in that he's got his name that's
• 2:51:21
  using continuity do very. Well though, isn't it like a
• 2:51:25
  grown up version of it, you know?
• 2:51:27
  Of of her. Sorry.
• 2:51:29
  Yeah, because because she didn't didn't get firebombed in in that
• 2:51:33
  reality. Yeah.
• 2:51:33
  But anyhow, I remember reading Battlefield when I was a kid,
• 2:51:37
  right? And it had the words piss off in
• 2:51:39
  it. And it just felt like the most
• 2:51:41
  subversive literature I'd ever read in my life.
• 2:51:45
  I'm sort of there in the corner of the room going, oh, my mum,
• 2:51:47
  don't see this over my shoulder. What's is it?
• 2:51:50
  Is it invasion? Boy, boy E martyrs, oh, enemy of
• 2:51:54
  the world. Enemy of the world I knew.
• 2:51:56
  It was an E. Martyr but yeah, but yeah, this,
• 2:52:01
  you know, this just feels like a a fantastic way to to write a
• 2:52:08
  target book because you've got those expanded scenes, you've
• 2:52:15
  got scenes that are kind of adding more, you know, more
• 2:52:20
  background to the story. You know, you've got things that
• 2:52:28
  that Ben Aranovich wanted to to to put on TV that weren't
• 2:52:33
  possible to achieve. And Mark Platt is putting them
• 2:52:36
  into the into the book, you know, and it just feels, you
• 2:52:43
  know, it just feels like it's yeah, it's just been so well
• 2:52:47
  thought out. And when you think that it
• 2:52:50
  wasn't Mark Platt's story, but he's obviously spoken to to Ben
• 2:52:55
  Aronovich. He's got notes off of Ben
• 2:52:58
  Aronovich and, and, and really, really run with that story with
• 2:53:03
  with like a a care. And a love.
• 2:53:08
  And a you know, that that that, you know, is almost as if he it
• 2:53:12
  was his story, you know, and and I think like it also ditches
• 2:53:19
  various scenes as well. So we no longer have the the
• 2:53:24
  opener of of two OOAPS in a garden centre by buying buying a
• 2:53:29
  tree. It it starts, you know, with the
• 2:53:34
  tail end of Arthur's final battle.
• 2:53:37
  And I wouldn't say that's much more of a Riverside.
• 2:53:41
  Opening than the one we got, yeah, You know, they've both got
• 2:53:45
  merits, you know. This would look good by one of
• 2:53:48
  our Athena. Beds.
• 2:53:50
  I wonder how high it will get. What?
• 2:53:54
  Were I thinking Yeah. And then and.
• 2:53:58
  Then you you've got the the Merlin doctor, then, you know,
• 2:54:06
  putting Arthur into suspended animation in the spaceship under
• 2:54:10
  the lake. So it's it's it's then playing
• 2:54:16
  around with that tiny whiny thing even before Steven Moffett
• 2:54:20
  had even coined that phrase, because you've then got a future
• 2:54:26
  incarnation of the. Doctor.
• 2:54:29
  Doing events in the past of the present Doctor and it's just,
• 2:54:33
  it's just, that's just brilliant.
• 2:54:35
  And when you think that the 7th Doctor?
• 2:54:40
  Is the. Ultimate chess player and here
• 2:54:45
  he is playing Catch up with yourself, you refute yourself.
• 2:54:51
  And. Having to.
• 2:54:51
  Piece and having to piece it together as he goes you know and
• 2:54:56
  and to kind of understand it I think that's just a fantastic
• 2:55:00
  idea given you have professed your love for this book I'm.
• 2:55:03
  Assuming you remember what his last words are in Longbarrow.
• 2:55:11
  As he goes off to face the future.
• 2:55:14
  Oh yes, I haven't. Been the Merlin doctor yet?
• 2:55:17
  Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Mark Platt was paying attention
• 2:55:21
  to. His own book he certainly would.
• 2:55:26
  But it. But it but I think.
• 2:55:27
  It's also like. You know the.
• 2:55:29
  Bits that that he's also kind of added back in.
• 2:55:33
  So like there's a lot, there's a lot of passages of the book that
• 2:55:40
  are set in a valion, you know, so you've got Mordred in a in a
• 2:55:47
  Tavern with with these his drinking buddies who he's bummed
• 2:55:53
  to despise and hates. And you know, he gets summoned
• 2:55:57
  by more gain because they've picked up the signal from from
• 2:56:00
  Excalibur. You see, you've got all of this
• 2:56:03
  setting and then there's a bit more of a back story added to
• 2:56:08
  Anselin where he, he, he bet it was a, it was a, it was a, a
• 2:56:16
  family pledge that should, they would answer Arthur's call, you
• 2:56:24
  know, So, and because of that pledge, it means that he, he, he
• 2:56:30
  has to basically give up his, his position in Morgane's army
• 2:56:36
  as, as I think it's a knight general or something.
• 2:56:39
  So yes, so that's that, that's why you get all of those, those
• 2:56:44
  exchanges between Mordred and Anslin where, where he's calling
• 2:56:48
  Anslin a traitor and all this sort of stuff.
• 2:56:51
  But then later on in the book when Bambira and the Brigadier
• 2:56:56
  are quizzing him about the weaknesses and strengths of
• 2:56:59
  Morgane's army out of honour, he he couldn't tell them because he
• 2:57:05
  was still on a bound as, as a general and all this sort of
• 2:57:09
  stuff. So it's.
• 2:57:10
  Why do I not remember any of? This I know, I read this book
• 2:57:15
  and I've had like 3. People give me these, all these.
• 2:57:19
  Reading and I don't remember any of it.
• 2:57:22
  I mean, it's going to. Be brilliant when I.
• 2:57:24
  Reread it now because of this stuff.
• 2:57:26
  I'm I'm here for this stuff to the expectations.
• 2:57:31
  Yeah. But but and and.
• 2:57:33
  We even get. We even find out how the
• 2:57:35
  Brigadier and Doris met and and get together and all this sort
• 2:57:39
  of stuff. It's not in too much detail, I
• 2:57:41
  hope. No, Yeah, not.
• 2:57:42
  In that, yeah, not. Was it in Bryson by any chance?
• 2:57:48
  I think it I. Think it possibly could have
• 2:57:49
  been true, Yeah. And then she sees some sort of
• 2:57:52
  documentary about UNIT and she she gets that man I met in
• 2:57:56
  Brighton. Yeah, goes goes to find the
• 2:57:58
  brick. Yeah, and I think, I think at
• 2:58:01
  that point he's he's he's teaching at the school math, you
• 2:58:04
  know, maths teacher and all that sort of stuff.
• 2:58:07
  But for me, the absolute best bit about this novelization is
• 2:58:14
  that Ben Aranovic wanted the Destroyer to initially appear as
• 2:58:22
  this sort of urbane businessman, but having a shadow of a demon.
• 2:58:30
  Wow, right? And then?
• 2:58:33
  Slowly. As as the story progressed, he
• 2:58:36
  would transform into the destroyer that we got on on on
• 2:58:40
  TV. So obviously they couldn't do
• 2:58:44
  that, you know, didn't have the budget, didn't have the
• 2:58:46
  technology, whatever. But Mark Platt put that back in
• 2:58:50
  the book. So, so you know, the destroyer
• 2:58:53
  steps out of the shadows and he's just this businessman.
• 2:58:57
  And then as as the time goes on, he he becomes, you know, the the
• 2:59:01
  demon that that that would have been a great cliffhanger though
• 2:59:04
  you. Know the the.
• 2:59:05
  Businessman stepping out and. Then she's like.
• 2:59:07
  And become his handmaidens. Inhale and then just see the
• 2:59:11
  shadow of the the holes on the wall.
• 2:59:14
  Oh my God, it would have been brilliant.
• 2:59:16
  But but we actually get that. In in the book, so you know it.
• 2:59:21
  It just feels like there's so much in this book that elevates
• 2:59:28
  what we saw on TV and and yeah, and and I yeah, you know, hand
• 2:59:37
  on heart, this for me is is is the best target and, and and I
• 2:59:42
  feel it's the it's my favorite Doctor e-book as well.
• 2:59:46
  Wonderful first choice and. Not.
• 2:59:49
  Controversial really, because because it's been held in high
• 2:59:53
  esteem. There was a few surprises in
• 2:59:56
  those in that there. Yeah, that I wasn't expecting.
• 3:00:00
  And some fabulous non fiction choices as well.
• 3:00:04
  Do you know what I'm going to, as we go on in the book club,
• 3:00:07
  you know, maybe in like sort of five years time, that's how many
• 3:00:10
  books we've got on our lists at the moment.
• 3:00:13
  I shall come back and do everyone's top 10 lists again
• 3:00:15
  and say, right, has anything changed in five years?
• 3:00:18
  It'd be interesting to see. Yeah, because.
• 3:00:20
  Because that's because that's the thing.
• 3:00:22
  It's sort of. I think other other than
• 3:00:26
  Battlefield and Remembrance, I think that I think we were
• 3:00:30
  saying earlier on in the day that I, I'd kind of moved books
• 3:00:36
  in and I moved books out and I did know mine.
• 3:00:39
  In fact, my list today. Would be quite different to what
• 3:00:41
  it was, yeah, when I recorded it, I think.
• 3:00:43
  I think that's the thing. Because it's sort of like
• 3:00:46
  because I because I kind of kept kept.
• 3:00:47
  So like I had things that nearly nearly got into the top ten were
• 3:00:52
  like the killing grounds by Steve Lyons, who who adventures.
• 3:00:57
  I mentioned that one, the eater of Wasps as well, that that was
• 3:01:00
  in there for quite a while. And then I, I, I pulled it out
• 3:01:03
  and then Wasps is the book that got me back into.
• 3:01:07
  Reading after many years of not reading.
• 3:01:09
  It's a fantastic. I just saw it in Waterstones.
• 3:01:12
  So I had to buy. It Yeah, and and it.
• 3:01:16
  Doesn't disappoint. Fabulous.
• 3:01:19
  Yeah, like myth makers. Father's Day all.
• 3:01:21
  Consuming Fire, they were all ones that that sat in that top
• 3:01:24
  ten at some point over the last couple of weeks and kind of just
• 3:01:28
  shifted. When there's so many, there's
• 3:01:31
  such a library of doctor. Who books?
• 3:01:32
  Now to just pin it down to 10 in both directions.
• 3:01:36
  It's tricky. It is.
• 3:01:38
  It's, it's not easy. It's.
• 3:01:40
  The fortunate thing we've got is is with our new book.
• 3:01:43
  Club form now is that we can explore, critique and challenge
• 3:01:49
  our opinions on and we've got such a why.
• 3:01:52
  We've got Targets, new series, we've got Virgins, we've got
• 3:01:56
  BBC, everything is in there that we're going to cover.
• 3:02:00
  I think it's going to be exciting, Bob.
• 3:02:02
  And before you go, I am going to ask you now.
• 3:02:05
  My last question to you is to rank the ranges.
• 3:02:09
  And it's so different from person to person.
• 3:02:12
  The first three I did, the target books were the bottom of
• 3:02:16
  the list, right? OK.
• 3:02:18
  The last two I did, the targets were the top of the list.
• 3:02:21
  All right, Yeah. So so our ranges are.
• 3:02:28
  Targets Virgin New Adventures, Virgin Missing Adventures, BBC
• 3:02:34
  Eight Doctor Books, BBC Past Doctor Adventures, New Series
• 3:02:37
  Adventures if you want to include them, and Telos novellas
• 3:02:40
  if you want to include them. OK, Yeah.
• 3:02:45
  Yes. I think the the tellos.
• 3:02:46
  Books would. Be at the bottom for me.
• 3:02:52
  I can't say I've read them all, but I've I've.
• 3:02:54
  I've read. Probably about half of half of
• 3:02:57
  them. And there was very varying
• 3:03:00
  degrees of, of quality and success in them sort of thing.
• 3:03:03
  There was, some were very good and then, yeah, a lot of them
• 3:03:07
  weren't, weren't, weren't so and and they, they, I seem to
• 3:03:12
  remember they were quite expensive as well.
• 3:03:13
  It was very expensive, especially deluxe editions as
• 3:03:17
  well for 20. 5 lbs Yeah, yeah, so so yeah.
• 3:03:22
  That that would be bottom for me.
• 3:03:29
  Yeah, I would put the new series ones next.
• 3:03:33
  And I think that's purely because they're not aimed.
• 3:03:37
  They're not aimed at me. And and that's not that's not to
• 3:03:42
  say that that there isn't good ones in there because, because
• 3:03:45
  there are. And it's not to say the quality
• 3:03:47
  isn't good because it is, but but yeah, if you came with them
• 3:03:51
  between the targets. And the Virgin New Adventures,
• 3:03:55
  that might have been the perfect time to read them, you know?
• 3:03:58
  Yeah. I mean, that's the thing, isn't
• 3:04:00
  it? It was.
• 3:04:00
  Sort of like, yeah, I mean, that's that's the thing.
• 3:04:04
  They would have been a perfect stepping stone from from the
• 3:04:07
  targets to to, yeah, 8th Doctor or new adventures or whatever,
• 3:04:14
  you know? Yeah.
• 3:04:16
  But but I'll put those next. Yeah.
• 3:04:22
  I. Think.
• 3:04:24
  Next one on my list would then. Be the the.
• 3:04:27
  Past Doctor adventures. And I think my reasoning behind
• 3:04:32
  that is that, you know, like I said, when I was putting my list
• 3:04:36
  together, there was only there was only a couple that I kind of
• 3:04:40
  put on my list. So like the, the Infinity
• 3:04:42
  Doctors, the time travellers, but that was that was pretty
• 3:04:47
  much it. I could you know from memory, I
• 3:04:49
  couldn't, I couldn't put any more on on there.
• 3:04:53
  So so I'd I'd put that, put that next.
• 3:05:00
  This is when it starts getting a little bit trickier.
• 3:05:04
  So I'm surprised the 8th doctors lasted this.
• 3:05:07
  High if I wanted to yeah. No, no, I, I, I think like.
• 3:05:11
  It was like I was saying earlier, I think if you asked 12
• 3:05:14
  year old me, the, the, I think the past doctors and the missing
• 3:05:20
  adventures would be a lot higher on the list and the 8th doctors
• 3:05:24
  would be a lot lower. But, but I think because I,
• 3:05:26
  I've, I, I guess your, your tastes change and, and, and what
• 3:05:30
  have you. And I've now read more of the 8
• 3:05:33
  doctor ones and I, I can see that there's a lot of good stuff
• 3:05:37
  in there and there's also the promise of more good stuff to
• 3:05:40
  come. Yeah.
• 3:05:42
  So, so I would put the Missing Adventures next.
• 3:05:51
  Yeah, because I think that was the thing I think, and I think I
• 3:05:57
  think you might have mentioned this on another podcast or on
• 3:06:01
  Twitter or something where that first batch of 5 or 6 was, was,
• 3:06:08
  you know, Goth opera was quite good.
• 3:06:12
  Venusian Lullaby, that was another one I remember being
• 3:06:15
  reasonably good. But then you've got evolution
• 3:06:19
  and what, what was the state of change in Christopher Blue?
• 3:06:23
  Yeah, yeah. So, so the, the, the, the lows
• 3:06:27
  were pretty bad. But then when they when they hit
• 3:06:32
  it, you got like the plotters or I, I really love Code Fusion.
• 3:06:36
  I don't know if that's a that's popular opinion or not, but but
• 3:06:40
  there were ones that were really, really good and there
• 3:06:42
  was ones that were really, really shit.
• 3:06:44
  And I think most, like any of the other Rangers, they were
• 3:06:46
  sort of figuring out. What they were doing, and
• 3:06:49
  there's not many of them. So.
• 3:06:51
  So they had to kind of figure it out quickly.
• 3:06:54
  I think there's only, was there 30 or something?
• 3:06:56
  There's not that many misadventures.
• 3:06:58
  There's not even that many, I think.
• 3:07:01
  Yeah. But when they did, when they
• 3:07:03
  found writers that could do it, they were like, right, we'll
• 3:07:06
  have them back. Gareth Roberts come back, you
• 3:07:08
  know, Yeah. Yeah, yeah, now, now I think I
• 3:07:14
  would put the 8th Doctor Adventures next and then my top
• 3:07:20
  2 target second, New Avengers third.
• 3:07:28
  You are the first person to put the new.
• 3:07:30
  Avengers off. Thank you.
• 3:07:32
  I wanted somebody to do it. Yeah.
• 3:07:36
  I mean it's. Now explain yourself, Sir.
• 3:07:42
  Yeah, I, I, I think like I, I love the target books.
• 3:07:51
  There's a lot of nostalgia there, you know, like, like, you
• 3:07:55
  know, similar experience to to Cy heart that, you know, started
• 3:08:00
  with my mum reading them to me and then, you know, you know,
• 3:08:03
  started reading them myself. You know, my top two were
• 3:08:09
  targets, but but I, I I just think when the new adventures
• 3:08:17
  got it right and like we say, that last third was more often
• 3:08:24
  than not, they. Got it right there.
• 3:08:25
  There was there was very there were few dips like eternity
• 3:08:28
  weeps and what have you by by by goodness, they were good they.
• 3:08:36
  They, you know they. And and you know, they they
• 3:08:39
  weren't, they weren't afraid to take a chance and be
• 3:08:46
  experimental didn't always come off.
• 3:08:50
  But but you know, you've got to love someone who takes a chance,
• 3:08:54
  don't you? I mean, they would.
• 3:08:55
  I don't think they would never not trying.
• 3:08:58
  No, no, that's pretty incredible for a range.
• 3:09:00
  That spans sort of 60. Five books and.
• 3:09:03
  And when you think about it, they.
• 3:09:05
  Were they were also the the the blazing a trail really as well?
• 3:09:09
  Because, you know, yes, they did use people like John Peel and
• 3:09:17
  Terrence. Dicks and Mark Platt.
• 3:09:19
  And Cartmel and Aranovich. But the majority of the books
• 3:09:25
  were written by people that hadn't written novels before,
• 3:09:30
  hadn't had any dealings with the show other than perhaps like
• 3:09:36
  fanzines and fan fiction and stuff like that, you know, and
• 3:09:41
  then a lot. A lot of those.
• 3:09:43
  Went on then to do BBC books, you know, Kate Orman did a load,
• 3:09:46
  Paul Cornell did a load, you know, So you know, I just think
• 3:09:50
  you know, yes, they made a lot of mistakes in the beginning,
• 3:09:55
  but when they got it right, it was it was fantastic.
• 3:09:57
  And it also then laid the foundation for what came after
• 3:10:01
  the Virgin books. So yeah, they're just the joy of
• 3:10:07
  trying so many new writers. Was one joy for me is.
• 3:10:12
  That he. Just went in both directions.
• 3:10:14
  So they found Cornell, Lance Parkin, Kay Orman, obviously
• 3:10:19
  Beno Ronovich did some like just just brilliant, brilliant
• 3:10:23
  writers. Yeah.
• 3:10:25
  And then they also found Crakington, Gary Russell,
• 3:10:28
  Christopher Beulis, you know, Neil Penswick.
• 3:10:31
  And I just love, I love how this this range just slingshots
• 3:10:37
  between writers that could. Very easily go on to have a.
• 3:10:42
  Successful writing career away from Doctor Who and writers that
• 3:10:46
  will only ever write Doctor Who books because they know people
• 3:10:49
  in the know. Yeah, and and I and I.
• 3:10:53
  Think it's it's quite an eye opener to to think that those
• 3:10:59
  those authors that you mentioned.
• 3:11:00
  Kind of being at the. The lower end of the spectrum
• 3:11:03
  were also the ones that kind of went continuity heavy as well.
• 3:11:07
  You know, because, because Craig Hinton, it was he, he, he
• 3:11:12
  created the the the term and and.
• 3:11:17
  That's what his books were just. Full of it, you know, kind of
• 3:11:20
  thing, you know? Yeah.
• 3:11:22
  And obviously Gary Russell, he loved a bit of continuity as
• 3:11:26
  well, didn't he? So I also think this book club.
• 3:11:30
  Is, you know, weirdly enough, the people that have come on to
• 3:11:35
  do the book club I. Found entirely.
• 3:11:37
  Randomly I did a Twitter plea saying does anybody want to talk
• 3:11:41
  about Doctor Who books? Yeah.
• 3:11:42
  And the order that people said, Oh yeah, I wouldn't mind, I
• 3:11:46
  wouldn't mind. I wouldn't mind.
• 3:11:47
  So when I had three people say that successively, I said right,
• 3:11:50
  that's one book club and put them.
• 3:11:52
  And just through sheer joy, those people have met now formed
• 3:11:56
  friendships and and it's it's it's a really nice thing.
• 3:12:00
  But I do seem to have attracted a lot of people that have the
• 3:12:04
  8th Doctor books and not as many people now there's a few more in
• 3:12:09
  our book clubs. I'm Rod.
• 3:12:10
  Absolutely. It was a new adventures.
• 3:12:12
  So I'm pleased now to be welcoming in more people with a
• 3:12:18
  lot of heart for those for that early range, I think.
• 3:12:22
  I think it's a range that even if it's not always demiotic, it
• 3:12:26
  absolutely needs to be celebrated for what it is.
• 3:12:29
  Yeah. Oh, for sure.
• 3:12:31
  And, and you know, when you when you it was funny kind of looking
• 3:12:37
  at, you know, preparing this, this list for for tonight.
• 3:12:41
  It it's funny how many ideas have been taken from the New
• 3:12:49
  Avengers and the 8th Doctor Avengers.
• 3:12:53
  Oh boy. And I.
• 3:12:57
  Think a few writers. Have been a bit miffed about
• 3:12:59
  that actually. 11 in particular, but I've just.
• 3:13:04
  Finished. Interference and I made a list
• 3:13:06
  of about. 15 concepts that have made it into the new series in
• 3:13:10
  various ways. But.
• 3:13:13
  No, yeah. So, so it you know, you feel
• 3:13:17
  like you know, would the TV series be as?
• 3:13:21
  Good as it is. If it, if it wasn't for, you
• 3:13:25
  know, those ideas that that kind of the seeds from those books,
• 3:13:31
  it does make you want to because I do think they started.
• 3:13:33
  Looking at Doctor Who, certainly in a more emotional and less
• 3:13:40
  plot driven way than the classic series.
• 3:13:42
  And that is absolutely the template for how the new series
• 3:13:45
  came back, you know, with long term arts, which the books did
• 3:13:48
  as well and that they came back with that too.
• 3:13:51
  Yeah. I, I, I certainly think they are
• 3:13:53
  very influential. Yes.
• 3:13:54
  Whether they actually went right.
• 3:13:56
  We'll have that idea. We'll have that idea.
• 3:13:58
  I've no idea at all. It could be a coincidence.
• 3:14:00
  We know those showrunners read these books.
• 3:14:03
  One of them wrote one of these books for good sex.
• 3:14:06
  You know a very good. One at that.
• 3:14:09
  Yes, Yeah, it is. Yeah, I like that one.
• 3:14:11
  Dark but good, yeah. Yeah, definitely.
• 3:14:16
  Well then I can only say thank you very much.
• 3:14:18
  Wonderful putting on all the work into this list.
• 3:14:22
  I I'm impressed by not only the choices that you've made but
• 3:14:27
  your wonderful arguments that you've made free to the books as
• 3:14:30
  well. Of course I will be sending on
• 3:14:33
  your e-mail address to all the writers from the bottom 10 list.
• 3:14:37
  Naturally wish to contact you. You know John Phil will be after
• 3:14:41
  me. He he appeared on it twice.
• 3:14:43
  But as, as I said, sort of many. Times.
• 3:14:46
  Throughout this episode, which you'll be pleased to know is now
• 3:14:49
  the longest top, bottom 10 episode at 3 1/2 hours long.
• 3:14:55
  Yes, we've nearly breached. The four hour limit for the
• 3:14:58
  book. Club.
• 3:14:59
  Fuck you, Strictly come hamster. Oh sorry, that's mine as well,
• 3:15:02
  isn't it? I do apologise.
• 3:15:07
  Don't you care? Talk about these books.
• 3:15:09
  Is my favorite thing to do, Dan, I've got yeah, yeah.
• 3:15:14
  I love, I love the book club episodes.
• 3:15:17
  I mean, don't get me wrong, I love the original, you know?
• 3:15:21
  Oh shit, don't listen to that And and and.
• 3:15:23
  Strictly as well. But is that still going
• 3:15:26
  strictly? I think so.
• 3:15:28
  I edit a bloody thing it does. Well, look, can you tell the
• 3:15:34
  listeners please, and where? We are going next in our very
• 3:15:38
  first book club episode. What are we reading?
• 3:15:42
  Yeah, we have. An Eighth Doctor adventure and
• 3:15:48
  it is seeing eye, and there's been some interesting comments
• 3:15:53
  flying around. In that group chat, I feel this
• 3:15:56
  may be divisive. I I think it's going to be a bit
• 3:15:59
  spicy, isn't it? It's.
• 3:16:01
  Yeah, because it, because it's sort of, there's definitely
• 3:16:05
  polarized opinions on it. And then a few in the middle as
• 3:16:09
  well. So, so yeah, it'd be, it's the
• 3:16:11
  best kind of conversation, I'd say.
• 3:16:13
  Yeah. Oh yeah.
• 3:16:13
  Definitely. Everyone's coming at it from A.
• 3:16:15
  Different direction. Yeah.
• 3:16:17
  God, even that sounded rude. Jesus Christ, I need to go to
• 3:16:20
  bed, Dad. Thank you very much for.
• 3:16:23
  Your time. It was a wonderful list and I
• 3:16:25
  just. I can't wait to get started.
• 3:16:27
  Yeah, No, thank you for having me, Joe.
• 3:16:28
  It's. Yeah, I've really enjoyed
• 3:16:31
  putting this together and obviously recording it with you.
• 3:16:34
  And here's for the next 5 years of reading.
• 3:16:37
  And I will cut. It there.