5.0 out of 5 stars
Where the newcomer learns t'aint easy to travel in the TARDIS, July 14, 2009
This review is from: Doctor Who and the Taint (Doctor Who Series) (Paperback)
Otherwise known as "The Readable One With the New Companion".
Okay, I think we're all in agreement that "The Eight Doctors", which introduced Sam, was a bit of a mess. If you're still reading the series by this point you've either forgiven them for that transgression or just never read the book in the first place. But it did give us Samantha "Don't call me Samantha" Jones, in all her thinly sketched glory and the writers for the line have been trying to make some sense of her ever since. Some have done better than others, although in all fairness to the ones who botched it, they weren't given much to work with in the first place. She was more an idea for a character than a character herself, a real shame since the Doctor's companions from Virgin's New Adventures (Bernice Summerfield, Roz and Chris) were all memorable in their own right. After doing such a good job making those people work, the disappointment of Sam turning out to be so darn annoying was galling.
So here, they try to rectify that goof by giving us a new companion in the form of Fitz, a swingin' lad from the sixties who's a bit on the selfish side (but with room to grow into being a hero), somewhat resourceful and able to bluff in an impressively swaggering fashion. From the start he's marked as companion material, mostly because he feels like the only person in the book who isn't wearing a shirt that says, "I'm Doomed".
But what dooms them, you ask? Landing in the aforementioned 1960s England, the Doctor and Sam run across a doctor performing psychoanalytical experiments on a group of mentally ill patients who don't know each other but appear to be suffering from the same shared memories and nightmares, all of which are centering around a cave. A cave that the Doctor knows.
This is one of those books where I wish they'd just dispatch with the apparent mandate that an alien menace has to be behind whatever weirdness is occuring. Because the early scenes when its clear that Something Weird is going on, scattered hints of memory, strange reactions, an ever-growing atmosphere of dread. It's not Gothic and its certainly not Lovecraftian but it gets the job done and everyone goes through their paces well. Fitz and Sam have a nice repartee going, the Doctor is sort of playing detective, the novel isn't shying away from the cost of trying to live with a mental illness or the debate about their rights in society, it all starts to shape up rather nicely.
Oh, but then we have to go into science-fiction again. When the explanation does come, as we know it must, it involves aliens and long-forgotten alien experiments/doomsday weapon and robots and what was once creepy and skewed now becomes Just Another Doctor Who Episode, where the resolution depends more on the Doctor rigging up something technobabblish and it all feels rather drab and rote. It doesn't help that the actual explanation for all the hoopla feels a little overcomplicated.
So the ending and the climax fall a little flat. Oh well. The book does have other points to recommend it. As others have pointed out, the little vignettes with the patients are revealing and stand out from the rest of the book even if little of the background detail is relevant to the plot itself (in the novel at large, the patients don't progress much beyond "they're crazy" and basic characterizations). The early setup around the house as the mystery builds is effective. And the characterizations of the main cast are decent, Sam especially. She's still no Bernice Summerfield but she's had a streak for a while of not being annoying so it seems that the writers are getting a handle on her. Of course, they're also still beating the crap out of her way too much (this is like the third time she's suffered greatly and/or come near death in recent memory) but all things in time.
Fitz meanwhile acquits himself well on his first outing. His dialogue is snappy and he plays off Sam well. It remains to be seen what the other writers do with him but here he definitely has potential. Granted there appears to be no earthly reason for him to come along with the TARDIS crew other than "the plot requires it" but if I didn't want to see plot contrivances, I'd go read something else. And its not like there haven't been worse reasons (yeah, I'm looking at you, Dodo Chaplet). It would be nice to see the dynamic change up slightly and after having to sit through Sam's mooning over the Doctor, having someone aboard who doesn't have a crush on the Doctor would be a change of pace.
What we have in the end then is an okay story that introduces a new companion. If you skip it you won't be treated to "Fitz's Origin Story" so if that bothers you, then by all means dive in. Otherwise its all rather standard.
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3.0 out of 5 stars
Not great, not horrible, July 2, 2001
This review is from: Doctor Who and the Taint (Doctor Who Series) (Paperback)
The pacing in THE TAINT is so much more even than in THE LONGEST DAY that it is difficult to believe that they were written by the same author. Where Michael Collier's debut novel had plodding sequences that stretched on and on into nothingness, his follow-up consists of many short and snappy scenes, each giving way to the next before they outstay their welcomeness. Unfortunately, while the story may flow better, we find that the plot contained within isn't all that much more interesting.
It should be no surprise to anyone that this story introduces a new companion to the Doctor's traveling crew. Throughout the entire book Fitz Kreiner is a breath of fresh air, not only for a relatively lackluster story, but also for a book series that was in danger of stalling on account of its two fairly unappealing central characters. He seems real and human in a way that the alien Doctor can't be and the no-dimensional Sam isn't.
The storyline is not terribly complicated. There's a spooky, old house inhabited by several mental patients who all believe that they are being possessed by the devil. There's a meddling psychiatrist who wishes to discover the common characteristic that binds them all together. Into this mix lands the Doctor who, of course, manages to get himself entangled in the situation almost immediately and discovers that the patients aren't actually being controlled by Satan (though we never really expected that they would be), but are in fact an off-shoot of an alien engaged in a war against a long-forgotten enemy. The story isn't terribly bad, nor is it overly engaging. In a similarity to ALIEN BODIES, each of the patients have part of their past story told in their own separate flashback chapter. These sections are by far the most interesting portions of the story. We are shown how their disability has affected them throughout their existence. It's very appealing writing and it's miles better than rest of the stuff in between. Unfortunately, very little of this wonderful character development makes its way back from the flashbacks into the main portion of the story. The individuals of the flashbacks are people with fears, insecurities, pains and stories. The patients of the main story are bland, faceless and easy for the reader to confuse.
Although I've spent most of the space here complaining about the books faults, I will be looking forward to Collier's next book. There aren't any major flaws present and it is a definite improvement over his previous work. If his next offering is as improved, then it should certainly be worth reading.
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2.0 out of 5 stars
This could have been a whole lot better, January 4, 2000
This review is from: Doctor Who and the Taint (Doctor Who Series) (Paperback)
After reading Collier's "Longest Day" I really expected a better story from him. His previous novel is very well written and enjoyable. This one, however, is just dull. The bad guys seem to be without a real motive, as if they're being evil just because they like evil, and the leader talks like a cheesy Bond villain. He also gets his Crowley lore all wrong, as if Collier just heard a few quotes from the man (perhaps in USENet posters' sig files?) and decided to use them as bad-guy dialogue without actually finding the quotes in their original context. Fitz is an interesting character, but only seems to irritate the Doctor and Sam, and has no credible reason to tag along with them at the end (that's not really a spoiler, since the book is billed as the introduction of Fitz, the new companion). In all, if it weren't for the introduction of Fitz, I'd recommend skipping this one in the series. But if you need to see each companon in their first appearance, go ahead and get it. It's not nearly as bad as "The Eight Doctors."
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