Tag Archives: writer: nick walters

Reckless Engineering, by Nick Walters

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Second paragraph of third chapter:

Anji shuddered. Whatever those buildings had once been, they were now unrecognisable, hulking ghosts being teased apart by ivy It was amazing how quiet everything was. No traffic, no birdsong, none of the hurly-burly of the city as it should be. Only the sound of their own footsteps and conversation, and the wind sighing through the trees.

Next in the sequence of Eighth Doctor novels that I read but did not review a decade ago, this has the Doctor, Fitz and Anji arriving in a parallel universe – Bristol, to be specific – where a chronological disaster has wiped out most animals and devastated humanity. There is some good action between the macro plot of trying to fix things and the micro plot of the local politics of the (doomed) inhabitants of the parallel timestream. Despite the fact that this Bristol is depopulated and desolate, there is a real sense of place and space in this book and good characterisation of the main characters, including more than one parallel version of Isambard Kingdom Brunel. I liked it more than some in this sequence. You can get Reckless Engineering here.

The Man from Yesterday, by Nick Walters

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Second paragraph of third chapter:

‘Stir your stumps, breakfast’s up.’ Bill grinned down at her.

Another very good installment in the series of Doctor Who spinoff stories featuring the earlier career of Brigadier Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart – in this case re-introducing his father, who falls out of a timewarp into 1970 having been missing since the second world war. I think this is tremendously effective as a gimmick – certainly I still have dreams of long-dead relatives turning up out of nowhere with no particularly good explanation of what they have been doing for the last few decades. There’s bad humans and not-as-bad aliens involved, and quite a decent sense of place for the desolate farmlands and coastline of East Anglia. Another good ‘un. You can get it here.

The Man from Yesterday

Lethbridge-Stewart: Mutually Assured Domination, by Nick Walters

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Second paragraph of third chapter:

The next day, Chorley rose at his usual hour of 7:30am and, fuelled by three cups of percolated coffee (an extravagance he could never forsake), he began his investigation into Dominex.

Another in the very enjoyable series of books about the career of Alastair Lethbridge-Stewart between the events of The Invasion and Spearhead from Space, this actually manages to tell a good story about the Dominators taking over part of Dartmoor for their own nefarious purposes, bringing in Harold Chorley and other figures from the relevant era of Doctor Who. I realise to my annoyance that I’m now out of sequence – I should have read Beast of Fang Rock before this – but it’s great fun, Lethbridge-Stewart forced to go rogue and ally with hippies at one point, and sinister insights into what the Estabishment is Really Up To. It doesn’t especially break new ground, but it’s another nice block in the secret history of how UNIT came to be.

MAD"

Dry Pilgrimage, by Paul Leonard and Nick Walters

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Next in sequence of the Virgin Bernice Summerfield novels, this time featuring a voyage by sea with an alien species whose life cycle and religious beliefs are worked out in interesting detail, of course largely driving the plot. I thought this was an above average book in this series, with convincing characters among both the humans and non-humans and a compassionate take on the conflict between them.

I am struck, though, that the standard mode of a Bernice Sumemrfield novel seems to involve her being sent on mission rather than staying at home. My memory of the audios is that a lot more of them have her dealing with problems at home base. (Though of course she has been on mission for the last few of those as well.)

Next up: Jim Mortimore’s Sword of Forever.

July Books 1) The Fall of Yquatine, by Nick Walters

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Doctor Who attempts to take on Babylon Five, just a little, in Yquatine, a world where humans and various alien species coexist in uneasy alliance. Except that when the Doctor arrives, it all gets destroyed, and then Fitz is warped back a couple of weeks and falls in love with the President’s girlfriend as planetary doom approaches. Several ideas from this book also popped up in last year’s TV Who, including the shape-shifting entities which deceptively contain the very people they look like. I enjoyed the same author’s Dominion last year and I enjoyed this too.

I have to say that I like my current run of the Eighth Doctor adventures, which I’m nearly half way through as a whole. Fitz in particular is a brilliant concept, a sort of Everyman whose closest counterpart in the classic series was Ian Chesterton (who of course also comes from the 1960s). I bet that 95% of Who fans wouldn’t even recognise Fitz Kreiner’s name, though he has featured in more Who books than any other companion. I am brewing a longer set of thoughts on this.

August Books 18) Dominion, by Nick Walters

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An imaginative combination of the elements which make up a Who story: the Tardis, with Eight, Sam and Fitz, lands in Sweden in 1999, but an unstable wormhole is allowing nasties from a dying dimension through, and the Doctor has to save the nice aliens before it is too late, with no help from UNIT. Well described, and the nice aliens have an interesting biology. Though I was sorry that the nice Swedish girl didn’t get to go with the Tardis at the end.