Second paragraph of third chapter of Blake’s 7: Their First Adventure:
Not a moment too soon, Vila Restal told himself, as the man’s eyelids fluttered and he started to come round. Affecting a look of concern, Vila lightly slapped the man’s face, leaning over him in the manner of an anxious friend.
Second paragraph of third chapter of Blake’s 7: Project Avalon:
Cally’s head was held rigidly in position so that she could only stare straight up into the pitch blackness. She was aware of movement, of murmuring voices. A face loomed over her, garish shadows thrown upwards making a black slash of the mouth, the nostrils broad and flared, and a single slitted eye gazing down. The eye regarded her as it might a specimen in a test-tube, then looked away into the outer darkness.
Second paragraph of third chapter of Blake’s 7: Scorpio Attack:
He didn’t reckon much to the ship. An obsolete class of cargo freighter by the look of it, and judging by the fixtures and fittings long overdue for the breaker’s yard. But if-what was the name he’d seen on the peeling hull? Scorpio? – if Scorpio had brought Dorian to the planet, presumably she could lift them off it. Yesterday wouldn’t be too soon for him.
I picked these up at Gallifrey One, a few years back. There’s no need to write too much about them. The first two are novelisations of four episodes each from the first series of Blake’s 7; the third covers three episodes of the fourth series. (What has happened to Blake, Jenna, Gan and the Liberator in the meantime is not explained.) Hoyle, who wrote some memorable stuff in his own right, hasn’t tried too hard for innovation here, simply turning the TV scripts into fairly vivid – though very male gaze-y – prose. In the days before home video, this was the closest we could get to re-experiencing the stories as broadcast, and I must admit it brought back a smile or two.
The books are not difficult to acquire. You can get Their First Adventure here, Project Avalon here and Scorpio Attack (a bit rarer) here.
Blake’s Seven: Scorpio Attack was both the shortest unread book that I acquired in 2023, and the sf book that had lingered longest unread on my shelves. Next on those piles respectively are Christopher Priest: The Interaction, ed. Andrew M. Butler, and Agents, Adepts and Apprentices, by Kathryn Sullivan.
