Slipback:

The TARDIS materialises on board the Vipod Mor, a galactic survey ship captained by the repulsive Orlous Moston Slarn.
Things are not going too well on board the spacecraft: a mysterious killer stalks the sip's infrastructure; a junior officer, whose body is four years older than his brain, commands its bridge; the craft's computer seems to be developing its own distinctive personality; and Slarn threatens to vent his vindictive anger on his crew.

Soon the Doctor and Peri stumble upon a shocking secret, a secret upon which depends the fate of the entire universe ...

David, I don't want to be too critical, but aren't all these postings just the blurbs from the back cover of the books? That's verging on plagarism.

Is there anything you want to say about these books?

Just be grateful someone can be bothered to even read the blurb for Slipback. I heard the radio tape, and not only was it rather bad, but it gave a different explanation for the Big Bang than we heard in Terminus. Not that such a crime is unprecedented in Who history.

Actually Slipback wasn't that bad. It was better than bloody Ghosts of bloody N bloody Space. But then what wasn't. Oh yeah Vampire Science and the telemovie.

"Curse you god for making me this way!"

Oh no I'm agnostic. That's where it all falls down of course...

How do you know what happened in Terminus and Slipback didn't combine to make the Big Bang happen?

True; the Doctor sort of leaped to the conclusion that Terminus caused Event One. I wonder if the TARDIS made a recording of the BB during "Logopolis."

Aren't you thinking of Castrovalva?

Yes I am; my fingers are the ones that typed "Logopolis." Obviously I've been possessed by an alien, Doctor-hating race that causes me to make these foolish mistakes. ;)

Edje, what are you doing as a wishy-washy agnostic? Have you never heard Professor Richard Dawkins saying 'I'm not agnostic about the tooth fairy so I'm not agnostic about God'? And before anyone accuses me of getting off-topic...he's Lalla Ward's husband. AND he appears in The Dying Days.

Just remember - every god is really an alien and/or a computer hellbent on conquering the universe/sucking out your brain/making life hell just for the fun of it (unless it's a nice dodecahedron-shaped god, of course). If there was a REAL God, then the Doctor would have name-dropped Him by now.

According to writer Kevin Clarke, the big mystery about the Doctor in Silver Nemesis is that the Doctor WAS God, although script Andrew Cartmel and producer John Nathan-Turner forbade him actually saying so.

Well, in 'Christmas on a Rational Planet' and 'Transit' the 7th Doctor is referred to as/said to be Shango, an ancient eastern God of lightning.

When you think about it, it's amazing that more races don't worship the Doctor as a god. Maybe that's why he usually sneaks off quietly after saving the world - before anyone starts prostrating themselves in front of him (and I always thought it was to avoid clearing up the mess...) Or maybe it's because of what happened to Leela's planet when they worshipped their pseudo-Doctor.

The Paradise of Death:

I really wanted to be more cruel in my comments about this book, but I guess I'm too kind-hearted. Regardless, this is a real mess, both in plot construction and in basic writing skills.

Whilst I haven't had the, er, pleasure of reading this thing (I think I've got a copy somewhere though, I'll give it a go) I have acutally heard bits of it on the radio and nothing can convince me that its worse than the works of Mick Lewis, or indeed Barry Letts' very own abomination, The Ghosts of N-Space. (For a start, 'Paradise of Death' may be a bit silly as a title, but at least it doesn't contradict Who TWICE.)

I don't know, Emily, PoD is pretty full of contradictions (ex: The Doctor sings a Venusian lullaby in front of Sarah, but she doesn't recognize it later in "Curse of Peladon"). And while Mick Lewis' works may be offensive to read, it at least seems that he paid attention during Creative Writing class and learned how to construcct a sentence.

Ghosts of N-Space was almost enjoyable compared to PoD, even though it contained far more odes to the joy of marmalade.

Nooooooooooo no no no no! Firstly, I refuse to admit Mick Lewis is capable of stringing two words together, let alone a sentence. Secondly, however many flaws Paradise of Death has they are of NO importance compared to the full horror of the heavenly afterlife unleashed on poor atheist Who fans in Ghosts of N-Space. Sarah forgetting about Venusian lullabies (or even the utter absurdity of setting this before Invasion of Dinosaurs, or even the claim that the Doctor can survive falls from great heights (ha! Tell that to Logopolis!!)) are as nothing when set against the afterlife which renders every Who story ever completely pointless (LET them all die! They'll live happily ever after in heaven!).

While there are some similarities, I don't think what you saw in "Ghosts of N-Space" was the Christian afterlife. If anything, it resembled the Phantom Zone from Superman comics.

They're not ghosts, they're the sounds of fans playing back old videos. Such is the nature of the Doctor Who universe. Adric's playback spirit will haunt the TARDIS forever...

Scream of the Shalka:

***SPOILERS BELOW****


Just read the novelisation of the webcast - not the standard length of a typical BBC book; they pad out the rest with a "Making of..." feature in the end.

Paul Cornell said he was going to flesh out the explanations a bit more but still leaves you guessing.

It's apparent that:
1. This Doctor had some traumatic event with a previous companion - she probably died and he couldn't save her, or possibly there was a broken heart involved on the Doctor's part - but this trauma is why he's such an emotional island.
2. The Master was involved somehow and helped the Doctor out. In return for the help, the Doctor took whatever state the Master ended up in, giving him another chance as the servant Master-android.
3. "The Making Of.." section indicates the Time Lords have sent the Doctor to Lannet in 2003 to help defeat the Shalka - it's never explicitly stated in the webcast or book.
4. This Doctor is specifically referred to as the Ninth a few times in the book.

One possible nit struck me... towards the end the human slaves and Shalka are screaming into the sky around the world, affecting a major change in the atmosphere and weather patterns across Earth.

Various characters get badly sunburnt or cooked alive if they can't avoid the sun, as the ozone layer starts to disappear... yet while this is happening to almost anyone, not one of the human slaves appears to suffer horrific burns of this nature (at least one group was bound to be in the sun at this point). And there's no explanation for it, such as "The Shalka screams were protecting the slaves from the devastating effects of the sun - until they had served their purpose."

Right near the very end, there's a reference to someone called Kim... there doesn't appear to be anyone called Kim in the book... I kept thinking "Should that say 'Joe'?"

Lots of typos in "The Making Of..." section as well.

Slipback:

'On Setna, it is traditional for men to wear their hair long' - what, a tradition for ALL societies on all seventeen separately-evolved planets?

87% of life in the universe is carbon-based? I'd say more than that. Going by Doctor Who, obviously.

How could Captain Slarn NOT have known he was a quartz-based lifeform?

Time Lords need three hours sleep a day. Considerably less, I would guess.

Good to know that this captures SOME of the spirit of the era as Slarn (literally) drools over Peri and decides to 'use her to fulfil his fantasy.' And there's tons of the trademark Saward violence.

It was perhaps unwise to emphasise that the unlikelihood of Peri getting a soft landing after falling down a ventilation shaft was eight million and three to one.

Love the way the Doctor is 'a little more cheerful' after discovering that his Companion has actually survived despite these odds.

Why DID Vipod Mor warn the Setna Galaxy against time travel, then?

So what happens to Shellingborne Grant? He's still on the TARDIS at the end of the book.

The Pescatons:

Sarah Jane, Sarah Jane, Sarah bloody Jane. Can't this EVER just call her 'Sarah'?

'Sarah Jane made quite sure that she was not going to follow the Doctor out on to the beach until he thought it was safe to do so' - yeah, right, cos that's so in character. And this continues throughout the book, as she and the Doc proceed to freeze, cower, screech, forebode, panic, announce they've never been so scared in their life, feel their blood turn to ice, lose their nerve, become frantic, scream and jump into each other's arms...etc, etc, etc...

But never let it be said that Sarah (sorry, Sarah Jane) shows no cool initiative. We know all about it, what with being considerately informed that 'the Doctor was absolutely astonished by Sarah Jane's cool initiative.'

'Despite his many extrasensory powers, his nostrils always took a little time to detect any alien smells' - boy do we learn a lot about the Doctor! Including the unwelcome news that he eats scrambled eggs on toast, wears long-leg underpants, refers to Earth as 'our planet', is a human, acquires - hilarious! - a hole in the seat of his trousers, plays the flute, is devoid of a shred of compassion for his enemy, and has previous...er...'generations'.

So a meteorite lands in the Thames Estuary, the diving team investigating it disappears, alien monsters start rampaging across London...where the hell is UNIT while all this is going on?

'The first two world wars of the Twentieth Century' - ha! Not much of a prophet then.

Half the time Sarah (sorry, Sarah Jane) is defending the Doctor against sceptical humans, the other half she's throwing him sceptical glances and asking him sceptical questions about 'Fish who can build spacecraft?!'

The mid-70s is 'ten years or so' from Sarah's time. Thanks, like UNIT dating needed any more screwing up.

So Pesca is 'beyond the galaxies'. Right. But not SO far beyond the galaxies that it - and even its geological activity - can't be spotted from Earth by users of telescopes. And not so far away that the Pescatons can't arrive on Earth the SAME NIGHT they left their own planet.

How, exactly, can barely-hatched Pescatons imitate a teenage boy's voice? And why do they need human help to get out of the hut anyway - they break out of the cones all by themselves.

So the Doctor goes to the seabed and spots the spaceship. Then Helen goes to the seabed and spots the spaceship. By the time Mike goes to the seabed and spots the spaceship I am feeling EVEN BOREDER than during the rest of this book, and that's really saying something.

Why...exactly...does Sarah (sorry, Sarah Jane) think that the death of ONE Pescaton is 'The end of the Pescatons forever!'?

So the world knows about the invasion. What with it being a bit difficult to miss. Just what Who's lacking - yet another First Contact to add to its list.

Why do the Pescatons' imitation TARDISes contain telephones inside? And why does the Doctor claim 'There's only one TARDIS'?

So the Pescatons invade Earth because it's got more water than anywhere else! (Note to Victor Pemberton: if you can't think of a decent excuse for an alien invasion of Earth, don't bother giving ANY excuse. This IS Doctor Who, for god's sake. Actually I WAS hoping that it was the Doctor's trip to Pesca that had provoked its people into invading Earth...but no, that would have been too interesting (erm...'interesting' only in relation to the rest of the book, obviously.))

Yeah, OK, so this abomination was apparently written in 1976, but that's not gonna stop me accusing it of ripping off Frontios with its only-one-monster-does-the-thinking stuff.

I knew it! This Pemberton creature is a cat-hater who refers to a yowling darling as a 'wretched thing'.

'We've never had to face anything like the Pescatons before!' - well, nothing as boring, anyway.

Wow. This certainly piles on the morals in an unsubtle way. Litter - bad! Environmental damage - bad! Football hooligans - VERY bad! And House of Lords - heroic!!

p100 - the Professor says Zor could be anywhere in the world; the Doctor says no, cos Zor wants HIM. p111 - the Doctor thinks that Zor could be anywhere in the whole world, it was an impossible task, like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

Why does Mike tell the generator men to stop working when they - well, light - is the only hope?

So did the Pescatons just attack London? What about the rest of the world?

How did three Pescaton babies get into the TARDIS? And, speaking of the TARDIS, since when has it risen up into space when leaving a planet?

While the LP version of this was recorded in 1976, the novelisation was written in 1990. And Victor Pemberton says he was gven a ridiculous deadline to complete the book and has gone on record to say he apologises for it.

Ah. Very interesting, but unless he apologised in the old-fashioned Japanese way, not really good enough. A short deadline makes it even MORE inexcusable that he should spend so many dozens of pages DESCRIBING everything in such minute and unbelievably tedious detail.

Oh I don't know. The Pescatons doesn't offer much, but I'd think 14 years is enough of a deadline to improve it *somewhat*.

Yes but he didn't have 14 years to write the thing - I know Terrance Dicks has occasionally been give only a week to write novelisation, so if you want to point the finger at anyone, it's at Virgin/WH Allen for setting ridiculous deadlines.

Obviously Virgin/WH Allen should be put up against the nearest wall and shot for even THINKING about novelising the godawful audio* but the Pemberton creature has got to take his fair share (i.e. an extremely LARGE share) of the blame too. Even if he wasn't planning on writing a book, fourteen years should have been long enough for a few improving thoughts to cross his mind vis-a-vis his masterwork.

*Actually I haven't heard the Pescatons audio, but I think I'm on fairly safe ground here.

Scream of the Shalka:

This Doctor is specifically referred to as the Ninth a few times in the book.

Ahhhh yes. And as far as a rude, heartsbroken, human-female-loving 'Nul point!'-ing Ninth Doctors who compare people to animals and blow up their Companions' homes/jobs is concerned...I've seen MUCH better

Various characters get badly sunburnt or cooked alive if they can't avoid the sun, as the ozone layer starts to disappear... yet while this is happening to almost anyone, not one of the human slaves appears to suffer horrific burns of this nature (at least one group was bound to be in the sun at this point).

Well, quite. Though at least we can assume they're protected by the Shalka even though it's never made clear...it's the fact that practically everyone ELSE on the planet survives that's even harder to swallow...

Right near the very end, there's a reference to someone called Kim... there doesn't appear to be anyone called Kim in the book...

Actually Kim is Alison's mate from work who got covered in lava. (I had to look that up - I too did a 'Who the hell's Kim' double-take - Cornell obviously grossly overestimated the memorability of his tedious book.)

'And something twisting on the ground. Moving with the unmistakable motion of life. "It's just the smoke"' - not THAT unmistakable, then.

'The sudden freeing idea that mankind wasn't alone in the cosmos' - come off it, that idea has been around a long time, it's the actual proof you've got here, moron.

'This was the TARDIS, an advanced craft from a distant and mysterious world' - firstly, anyone misfortunately fannish enough to be reading this won't need several paragraphs waffling on about such basic matters as the TARDIS, regeneration, etc, and for another, Gallifrey isn't remotely distant (it's in the same galaxy as Earth, right?) and certainly not mysterious post-Deadly Assassin, Invasion of Time, Five Docs, etc.

'But now there was a look of worry on the Doctor's face, a tension born of responsibility. As if these days he was at work rather than on holiday' - oh right, yeah, of course, so he spent his first eight regenerations just lying on the beech, did he.

The Doc's Edwardian costume 'was perfect in every detail' - how would Alison know? Sure, she's interested in history, but unlike her I actually bothered to GET my history degree, and it never covered costumes.

'They were the eyes of a troubled prince. They wanted to sparkle, but they could not. Because of some great burden' - oh puh-lease.

'Human-being' - since when has that been hyphenated?

'He liked to keep up a veneer of confidence, even now when he had none' - look, the Doc's lost a Companion (YEARS ago, by the sound of it) - it's not the end of the world! When REAL Doctors lose the Love of their Lives at regular intervals AND blow up their homeworld, THEY don't make such a fuss about it.

So Mathilda Pierce has spent 'years on the street'. Except that...er...she left her house when the floor was no longer solid and her twenty-eight cats ran away. I.e. when the Shalka took over THREE WEEKS AGO.

'His wages couldn't keep them both' - I realise this was before the Government accidentally 'negotiated' the most generous contract in human history, but still, a GP's wages would have been MORE than adequate for two people.

What kind of people have a metal serving dish under the table? And one with the power to reflect back screams, to boot.

'"You're insane!" Joe shouted at the Doctor. "What do you think you can do?!"' - er...this is the guy who has just exploded two monsters right in front of Joe.

"If I can find a little something to add to this then Johnny Alien is going to get a good seeing-to" - like ANY Doctor EVER talks like THAT!

'He felt relieved. His work here was done' - what, because 'the sonic pulse...will stun those creatures underground. For hours...The ones who were in the shop will take days to reform' - gee, thanks, Doc, that's really sorted out the Shalka Confederacy.

'There was no answer. He hadn't expected one. They would play their game. He would be their pawn. Until he could persuade, cajole, escape, destroy...' - sorry, WHAT?! Even Pertwee was never quite THAT pissed off with the Time Lords using him as their odd-job man.

'The control room of the TARDIS had changed its appearance many times. Its owner had spent hundreds of years balancing the demands of modernity and tradition, function and style' - he had? Since when! Why does the control room usually look a bit rubbish, then?

'A light designed to salve the inhabitant from whatever awful burdens wthe world might have placed on his shoulders' - quite apart from this being pretentious twaddle, it should be 'worlds'.

"I pride myself that I am the dearest companion to the owner of this craft" - someone PLEASE tell me the Master is lying...and what's this stuff about 'They had been at school together, on the Doctor's home planet'...? 'It was fitting that they had ended up, however awkwardly, on the same side' - er...why, exactly?

'He'd served in the Gulf, and he didn't like the look on the faces of the people he was rescuing here, in comparison. They hadn't welcomed his men' - OH boy have Wars in the Gulf changed since THIS was written...(and seven pages later the population are HUGGING the soldiers so really, how welcoming did he WANT?)

'And like all professional soldiers, he was pleased to be in actual combat circumstances again' - seriously? ALL of them?

'Go and find someone else to play your filthy games with' - blimey. And we thought Tennant was a bit hard on the military in Sontaran Stratagem...mind you, when he starts grovellingly apologising it's even WORSE.

If the local fire brigade were behaving as usual, why WEREN'T they and their sirens 'next for the chop'?

Alison and Joe stared at their house burning for an HOUR before they (or anyone else) thought to ring the fire brigade? How thick ARE these people? (And how fast are fires? Shouldn't it have spread to neighbouring houses by then?)

'He'd been thinking about getting down on one knee soon' - isn't that a bit thick, given that 'It worried him, off and on, that she'd taken the job to...put off living with him long enough to realise that she shouldn't be staying. There was a hole at the heart of them, but they kept walking around it'...?

'The Doctor was about to make him aware of his many qualifications from the best colleges of strategy and tactics' - his WHAT?!

The TARDIS has got a phone. And a resident robot-Master. The Doc's got a mobile. Are you SERIOUSLY claiming it's been 'years' since the Doc phoned home and got the answering machine?

The Master's BATTERIES are exhausted? Well, I suppose compared to the Doctor building an android and sticking the Master's soul in it so they can live happily ever after together, making said android battery-powered isn't THAT ridiculous.

'The butterfly tunnel inside was a visual representation of the chaos of the space-time vortex...It was a bit of the raw universe displayed like a hunter's trophy' - sorry, is it a representation or is it the real thing? And if the latter, why isn't it driving everyone mad, a la the Untempered Schism?

'The Doctor had given him all the dignity he could find for his former foe' - oh, that'd explain why the Doc's got an 'infernal device' that can switch the Master off, then.

"Why couldn't you have offered to sacrifice yourself or something?!" - yeah, cos the Doctor would've been so much happier to watch Alison being burnt alive in lava if she was being all noble about it.

So the Shalka can open AND operate the TARDIS, as well as conquer most of the universe...pity they're bog-standard failed-invader-snakes...doesn't make this particularly plausible. And why haven't they invented time travel themselves?

'All his nightmares had come true. Again' - look, he hardly KNOWS Alison!

A certain over-confidence is of course to be expected of the villains, but...'The lower creatures have no intelligence' is going a bit far, when you're standing in one of said lower creatures' time-and-space-craft.

'The Doctor had been inside black holes before, of course' - so why was he overreacting so much in Impossible Planet?

'Battery low' - oh, not the phone as well as the Master. It's part of the TARDIS! It should be drawing its power from the Eye of Harmony, not batteries!

"I was finished anyway. Hopeless. I can't do this any more" - yeah, like any Doctor'd say THAT, let alone to some military bloke he barely knows and thoroughly disapproves of.

'He felt as though this was really the end. In the most ignominious possible manner' - what's so ignominious about being thrown into a black hole? What a way to go!

'As always, somehow, the TARDIS grudgingly listened to him' - since when has the TARDIS taken the blindest bit of notice of the Doctor?

If the Doctor 'gently intercepted' Kennet's hand as it was reaching for the Play button, how come the first part of the message DID play?

'The Doctor was good at languages, so good that he could understand instantly most alien forms of communication' - ha! As if it isn't the TARDIS's doing!

"Blast!" is extremely mild swearing, but since when has the Doc even done that?

'Not for nothing had the Doctor been a Rugby Blue at Keble in the 1930s' - it's amazing he has time to save any planets, what with all this intensive sports-playing AND war-training...

So why don't more Governments try a lot faster to kill the Screamers - or at least their leaders? The Doctor dismisses the idea because ALL Governments wouldn't do it within the hour, but a) the Doc's grossly underestimating the time Earth has left, and b) they just need to destroy enough groups to disrupt the planet-spanning network, surely?

"We take the weakest of the herd: Soltox; Dupres, Valtanus..." oh my god. Is the Prime planning on listing 80% of the universe's planets by name...??

"Dead worlds. Lost civilisations. History says they destroyed themselves" - what, history says that EIGHTY PER CENT of planets in the universe spontaneously destroyed themselves thanks to their silly populations (kind of implying that all planets are populated, though come to think of it, maybe they ARE in the Whoniverse)...and NO-ONE GOT SUSPICIOUS?

"You're not predators. You're death incarnate!" - no, that's the Fendahl. And stop trying to puff up these stupid snakes, whatever hyperbole you employ they'll still be stupid snakes.

The Prime is allowing itself 'the luxury of killing this "Doctor" in its real form' (anyone else find themselves crying 'Victory should be naked!' at this point?)...so why does it then (oh god)...tie him to a wall instead?

'The Doctor was an expert fencer, obviously, a member of Salle Paul, pupil to the great Italo Sentilli, tutor to the Chevalier d'Eon and Abraham Lincoln. He had been denied Olympic medals only by his reluctance to adopt a national team and, thus, a nationality' - oh, give it a BREAK.

'It was as if the triumph had been a luxury he'd allowed himself, something he'd been missing for so long that he had to indulge himself in it when it came' - what, the death of his girlfriend stopped him planet-saving for years, did it? A likely story, especially when "those who punish us are always sending us into danger".

'They would know better than to try again' - yeah, cos any species who gets defeated trying to invade Earth NEVER comes back for seconds...

This is the SECOND time Earth gets comprehensively trashed in 2003 (see Eternity Weeps) without apparently doing it any long-term harm...

If Alison and Joe are so shaky, why doesn't she take this heaven-given opportunity to dump him, instead of making Rose-like assumptions about him hanging round waiting for her?

The REALLY annoying thing is that occasionally a really witty line shines through the hideous morass, just to rub it in that this appalling waste of our time is actually inflicted on us by Mr Father's Day/Human Nature/Family of Blood himself.

'The Making of Scream of the Shalka'

Yeah, like I give a ••••...

Still, Cornell's delusion that he's making real new Who provides more amusement than the actual product. 'I was eating an apple and planning new Doctor Who. I tried to seem blase about it', ha ha. And as for 'I'd been asked on convention panels if I thought the show would ever come back, or if I would ever write for it again, and had fended off such questions as best I could. Or sometimes just lied'...And then there's his touching astonishment that a secret of this magnitude was successfully kept from fans...

Dear god, his previous plans were even worse than what made it on to the page/screen. What kind of sicko rips off TWIN DILEMMA of all stories? Though the attempt to resurrect that godawful Doctor's-subconscious-chained-in-dreamscape stuff from Timewyrm: Revelation would have been almost as bad. And that was a LOT of people he wanted to keep slaughtering to protect his precious Alison, for some reason.

'He's asexual' - NOW you tell us! After droning on at inordinate length about the Doctor losing his girlfriend (and DON'T tell me they were Just Good Companions, he sure as hell didn't react like that over Adric).

Love the way Cornell gives the Doctor an Edwardian costume and then smugly announces that he's given the Doctor 'clothes rather than a costume'.

Oh, and then there's the truly hilarious line that they were 'scared' of 'the phone turning into a magical gimmick'...that's the phone that magically gets the Doctor out of a BLACK HOLE...

If Wilson has a 'lack of knowledge of Who', why is he claiming 'I'd watched Doctor Who wren [sic] growing up in Seattle and loved it'?

Sarah Jane, Sarah Jane, Sarah bloody Jane. Can't this EVER just call her 'Sarah'?

OK, I take it back. I LIKE her being called 'Sarah Jane'...post-SJA.

'Despite his many extrasensory powers, his nostrils always took a little time to detect any alien smells'

What absolute nonsense. We all KNOW his nose has special powers. OK, not all Doctor's noses have AS special powers as Eccy's, but don't tell me it's a coincidence that practically every Doctor has a delightfully overlarge beak.

And, speaking of the TARDIS, since when has it risen up into space when leaving a planet?

OK, that would be since The Runaway Bride.

Obviously Virgin/WH Allen should be put up against the nearest wall and shot for even THINKING about novelising the godawful audio

Well, the poor dears WERE desperate. From what I remember of The Target Book, it had (understandably!) never occurred to 'em that they could run out of REAL Who stories to novelise...

Actually I haven't heard the Pescatons audio

Well I have NOW. And it's definitely better than the book. ('Better' meaning 'shorter', obviously.)

"Obviously Virgin/WH Allen should be put up against the nearest wall and shot for even THINKING about novelising the godawful audio"

But in 1991 'Doctor Who and the Pescatons' was unique. Just think how many godawful audios there are to adapt now!

DWM on Shalka: 'You'll like this if you like....Rags' - look, it's rubbish but it's not anything like THAT rubbish...

'I was trying to approach it like Terrance Dicks...Not that I could ever approach the abilities of Terrance, but the idea was to write a neo-Terrance book' - Oh-kay. In retrospect, the guy who wrote Human Nature and Father's Day demeaning his own abilities when compared to the hack who churned out, say, the Claws of Axos novelisation, is taking 'false modesty' to insane new levels.

On the other hand, I didn't enjoy the Scream of the Shalka novelisation ANYTHING LIKE as much as I enjoyed ANY Terrance Dicks Who novelisation.

ME in Audios: Radio Adventures section: 'Saward: 'People said Slipback was like Douglas Adams - a criticism also levelled at the novelisation' - I can't imagine anyone REALLY compared Slipback to Douglas Adams - or why Saward would think that was a CRITICISM.

Oh look, I DID compare The Abomination to Douglas Adams after all:

'All in what Saward obviously fondly imagines to be a Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy style - complete with mind-destroying concerts and mad Captains in baths, but devoid of any actual wit.'

'[Alison] makes a good companion in Scream of the Shalka, but given Anji's ignominious fate, and the currect telefantasy vogue for kickboxing, wisecracking female characters, whether Alison could have survived as written here is debatable' - DWM in 2004.

WHAT ignominious fate of Anji???

And the distinctly un-kickboxing female characters of Rose, Martha, Donna, and Amy prove that her lack of kickboxing skills is the LEAST of Alison's problems...

"WHAT ignominious fate of Anji???"

Being stuck in the EDAs just as Justin Richards' Reign of Torpor was really getting underway?

Yeah, like DWM would EVER have the guts to view it like THAT...and when DID JR take over? Surely his Reign of Torpor started YEARS earlier...?

And obviously I'd consider being a billionaire stockbroker with a fiance, psycho-kid (like there's any other kind) and psycho-dog (ditto) to be a Fate Worse Than Death, but the EDAs seemed to consider this a HAPPY ENDING for poor Anji...This was (obviously) in the Good Old Days BEFORE you built a Dimensional Cannon to blast universes apart to get back to your Doctor...

Justin Richards in DWM thought that the Shalka novelisation might tie in with a DVD release? It's only nine years late, then.

And he was planning on having a quarterly extra book for a Ninth Doctor sub-range?? ('Ninth Doctor' meaning 'Cartoon Richard E Grant'!!) My GOD we were desperate in those days.

Don't forget how awful it was in those days - with only 11 slots available per year, it was getting harder than ever for Justin Richards to keep commissioning himself!

I'd've thought the opposite - than it was getting harder than ever for Justin Richards to keep commissioning anyone OTHER than himself...

The Paradise of Death:

OK, that grinning Sarah on the cover is freaking me out before I've even OPENED the abomination.

'Oh Lordy! Was there ever a story here! Let them try to stop her coming too!' - it's one thing for JEREMY FITZOLIVER to be 'Oh Lordy'-ing. It's quite another for SARAH JANE SMITH...

'Sarah looked at him. "Why didn't I go in for shoveling horse manure like my dear papa wanted?" she said.' - Oh-kay. I'm assuming this is some sort of...joke...and I shouldn't get started on pointing out that her dear papa dumped her at the side of the road and went splat before she was old enough to get any lectures on the benefits of a career in horse manure...

Sarah Jane calorie-counts. And wants a man. Since WHEN!

Me NO LIKE Sarah's 'Life goes on, let's develop those pics!' attitude towards the Doctor PLUMMETING TO HIS DEATH. I don't expect her to rip a few universes apart to get him back, a la Rose Tyler, but at the very least she could hurl herself sobbing across his corpse, as she did NUMEROUS TIMES in Monster of Peladon alone...

'As Officer Commanding the United Nations Intelligence Task Force in the UK, I am empowered, under the treaty, to take any action I consider necessary to safeguard international security' - WHAT treaty? And since WHEN! Every OTHER story our poor Brig has had to beg Geneva/the regular army/the Cabinet/the nearest civil servant for authority to do ANYTHING AT ALL.

'They've had two cats apiece, a Labrador and a cocker spaniel' - MORE oochie-murdering!!

'Lucrezia Borgia put her poisons into only the finest vintages, or so she once told me' - isn't this now considered foul slander - Lucrezia was innocent?!

'The Brigadier would remember the ride back to UNIT in Bessie as one of the most hair-raising experiences of his life' - course he would. It's not like he has regular encounters with potentially-Earth-destroying alien invasions on a four-weekly basis, or anything...oh, wait...

'Sarah had thought that nothing could ever make her feel worse than she did when she saw the monstrous dog creature' - look, who doesn't hate DAWGS, but...has she REALLY got such a limited imagination?

Oh for ••••'s sake. Why can't the TARDIS just GET TO PARAKON?? She's not a sodding sniffer-dog, she has NEVER - before or since - needed some artifact to guide her to a planet...

'A small creature the size of a squirrel or small cat' - a small cat is MUCH bigger than a squirrel, you moron!

'As Sarah followed him to the grand front door, she talked to herself like a Dutch Aunt. (Good that: a cliche caught bending and given a swift kick up the bum!) Listen to me, my girl, she said to herself. You are an investigative journalist on a story. The last thing you need is an emotional involvement with a handsome hunk who isn't even a real human being.' - Can you imagine WRITING such drivel? Can you imagine PUBLISHING it? Let alone with the words 'Doctor' and 'Who' in the title...?

'The trouble is, it's too dangerous for those of us who think so to speak out. You never know when somebody listening might have ER needles implanted' - er...quite. Maybe you should SHUT YOUR GOB, Waldo...?

What on Earth is the point of a paralysing gun that paralyses you for the rest of your life? Why not just KILL you?

'"There's only one person who can find out the answers and still be safe," the Doctor said, "and that's the President himself"' - what on EARTH would stop Tragan shoving him down a liftshaft, a la Caves of Androzani?

'"Can't think what they're waiting for," said the Brigadier.' - Er...QUITE. DON'T lock up the Doctor n'chums for hours AFTER you realise what a threat they are.

'Freeth has to convince his father that we've left Parakon before he can do anything final' - er...WHY, exactly? And would the senile cretin REALLY be that hard to convince of, well, ANYTHING?

'Jeremy could almost imagine that he could smell fried bacon. He could feel the saliva gathering in his mouth. It was true, then. Your mouth really did water!' - he REALLY hasn't noticed that BEFORE?

And blimey - didn't notice that Sarah and Waldo were IN LURVE in that godawful audio ('She'd been in love before, but this was somehow different...There was no question of it. She preferred men with small bums.' 'Oh Waldo! she said in her mind. If only it was me instead!' 'It was as if Waldo's death had left a black hole in her heart'). Funny, cos she seemed cheery enough in Invasion of the Dinosaurs...

The Brig is OUT OF CONDITION? This isn't Battlefield or Mawdryn Undead, y'know...

Onya's spiritual journey is vomit-inducing. Just sayin'.

Why not CHECK THAT DARSHEE IS DEAD, first?

Why doesn't this marvellous magical healing work with childbirth?

Water doesn't put the Gargan off the scent - yet it doesn't sniff its prey nearby?

The people who FLY AROUND ON GIANT BATS just totally forgot that they could FLY AROUND ON GIANT BATS until the Doctor reminded them?

'Servants are as invisible as postmen. Who would suspect a chambermaid with an armful of sheets of ulterior intentions, or for that matter a uniformed bondservant carrying a tray of cool drinks?' - er...ANYONE who had heard that the President's bondservant had betrayed him?

'A dribble of pus trickled onto this purple lips. He put out his tongue and licked it off' - y'know, EVERY TIME you think this book can't get any worse...

'Sarah had thought that nothing could ever make her feel worse than she did when she saw the monstrous dog creature' - look, who doesn't hate DAWGS, but...has she REALLY got such a limited imagination?

Well, I suppose it depends a lot on what the creature actually LOOKS like.

What on Earth is the point of a paralysing gun that paralyses you for the rest of your life? Why not just KILL you?

It could have been designed for the same reason anti-personnel mines were, a weapon who's purpose is not to kill, but to maim. They create lots of wounded that need to be taken care of, slow down the ennemy and forces them to divert precious resources away from actual battle. But you'd have to be a sadistic bastard to use one oustide of a battlefield. Come to think of it, you'd have to be a sadistic bastard to use one ON a battlefield too.

'Sarah looked at him. "Why didn't I go in for shoveling horse manure like my dear papa wanted?" she said.' - Oh-kay. I'm assuming this is some sort of...joke...and I shouldn't get started on pointing out that her dear papa dumped her at the side of the road and went splat before she was old enough to get any lectures on the benefits of a career in horse manure...

I was obviously being over-optimistic. Island of Death:

'Her mother, the ultra-genteel daughter of a Harrogate vicar, used to be teased by her father (Liverpool born and bred) calling her "the foreigner from across the border"; and her mum had responded with traditional Yorkshire aphorisms' and yup, we're talking about stuff Sarah SAW AND HEARD not that was related to her later....OK, which bit of THEY NOBLY SELF-SACRIFICED THEMSELVES WHEN SHE WAS A BABY is Barry Letts somehow not grasping?

I'm well aware of how crass this sounds, and that this isn't the kind of comment I'd usually make but...

https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/The_Second_Master_Collection

...isn't that exactly the expression you'd expect when the Master thought it was just going to be gas..?

'Audio novelisations' is actually for audios that have been novelised rather than novelisations that have been, um, audioised. I realise the title is REALLY CONFUSING but I can't think of a better one.

Slipback was 'the worst-selling Target novel' (Time's Mosaic). I had a gleeful cackle to myself before remembering there was a LOT worse out there and at least Saward made an EFFORT to turn his incredibly-awful radio play into an amusing read. Plus, he kept his Terileptil-obsession in check which is more than you can say for his Dalek novelisations...