Customer Reviews

Love or War (Doctor Who New Adventures)

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4 star:		(1)
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2 star:		(2)
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Wow. Reading LOVE AND WAR is a startling reminder of exactly how good Doctor Who can be. It does so many things so well, that it becomes difficult to break down and show off the individual parts. However, there are a number of fundamental things that Paul Cornell did particularly well, and they deserve to be given a closer look.

While I first read LOVE AND WAR quite a number of years ago, my recent rereading (done about seven or eight years after my initial perusal) contained a fair amount of surprise for me, solely by the amount of sequences that were very familiar despite the passage of time. There are quite a lot of memorable scenes that had stuck in my brain, and the crystal clear familiarity with several passages meant I couldn't fully believe how long it had been since I had last read it. Contrast this with my experiences with another early NA like TIMEWYRM: APOCALYPSE, that contained a similar time between initial and second reads, but for which the amount of material that I remembered from the first time was practically nil.

This is a story that can change drastically upon rereading. If you've previously read it, then on the second reading you can see all the little touches and foreshadowing that Cornell slipped in. For me, the first time I read it, LOVE AND WAR was the story of the Doctor's betrayal. Yet, aided by the benefit of hindsight, it's possible to view this as an epic tragedy, with the Doctor attempting to, but eventually being unable to hold back the inevitable conclusion. There's a lot of subtlety at work here and one almost certainly will not catch everything on the first reading.

The emotional content of the book is quite heavy. There are huge doses of angst, particularly during the end, and yet the book never lets itself be overly weighted down by it. The emotion is realistic and hard-hitting, but never gratuitous. It could have so easily bounced straight into the realm of overbearing melodrama, but fortunately, Cornell choose not to do so. He gave enough so that the audience could establish an emotional connection to the characters, but not so much as to cause us to be sick of them. The balance is perfect.

While the plot of LOVE AND WAR is excellent, it's primarily the story of the characters that makes this such a memorable tale. The character motivations are meticulously worked out. It's a rare story where you can rationalize every single person's actions and still completely understand why the final conflict between the main protagonists has to occur the way that it does. The plot drives the characters, but the characters drive the plot. It's very neat.

In addition to what I've already mentioned, there are loads of slight details that make this a wonderful read. The way the plot perfectly ties in with the characters. The wonderfully realistic interactions between Ace and Jan, and Ace and the Doctor. The great and understated introduction of Professor Bernice Summerfield. The prose is on par with some seriously good books out there. If you haven't read LOVE AND WAR, then beg, borrow or steal a copy immediately. Sell your kids to the BBC. Eat a whole pound of butter. Do whatever it takes to get your hands on a copy of this book.

This is the first of the "New Adventures" I've read, so hopefully they get better. I loved the problem the Doctor had to solve but found Ace's romance to be overly contrived.

A race of creatures that absorb the dead's memories is hardly a new concept, but combined with the infecting of live people and being able to see what they see, hear what they think and control their actions made for quite an adversary. Although I would have thought the Hoothi would be a bit smarter given the millions (billions?) of creature's memories they had absorbed and lives they controlled.

The Doctor being forced to not know what he was doing in order to hide it from the Hoothi made for an interesting plot line. However, the romance between Ace and Jan got tiring real fast as it was weakly set up and quite over the top. I loved the ending and how the Doctor beat the Hoothi, although I really should have seen it coming. It was forshadowed a number of times but I did not pick up on it until just before it actually happened.

Earth is at war with Draconia, and one planet is kept out of it: Heaven, where both sides bury their dead. But it is not only the dead who are on Heaven: there are also the living, and something in between, an ancient terror whose activities on Heaven are the reason for the Doctor's visit...

The books prior to this in Virgin's Doctor Who series were an extension of the TV series (although people would argue about how successful they were). Here, the Virgin New Adventures start firmly establishing their own style here.

The book also sees the introduction of the first new companion created for the books - Bernice Summerfield, a professor of archaeology. Benny (as she is known to her friends) stays with the Doctor for a long time, and eventually heads up a series of books and audio plays of her own.

The story also explores the Doctor's character, and what regeneration means.

Amongst all this, there is a good story to read. Paul Cornell is one of the better writers in the Doctor Who range.

The Doctor and Ace arrive on Heaven, an idyllic world where humans, Draconians and other races live togther in peace, and Ace finds herself falling for another traveller. But the peace is about to be shattered by invasion, and this time the Doctor's game of traps will hurt those closest to him...

Love and War is perhaps one of the most important New Adventures in the series for many reasons. First of all, it introduces the wholly literary companion, Professor Bernice Surprise Summerfield. Based in part on Kate Lemon, Emma Thompson's character in "The Tall Guy," Benny has grown to become one of Doctor Who's best-loved companions, and her debut is suitably brilliant. Love and War's cover features perhaps the best illustration of her from any of the books in which she features.

However, despite the arrival of new friends, the book is not overall a happy one; the relationship between Ace and the Doctor becomes strained to breaking point, and she leaves. The reasons for her departure, and the development of the Doctor's role as a manipulator, have been a source of controversy since the book's publication, and the debate continues today. The reader, hoever, is not guided towards a decision over the Doctor's methods; his side of the story and Ace's are both presented, and while it hurts to see Ace hurt by him, sympathy goes out to both characters.

Whether you agree with the move or not, Love and War is definitely a required read, with Paul Cornell's usual blend of continuity (here much subtler in most places than in his later novels), well-drawn characters, and strangeness (for instance the scene in which the Doctor speaks with Death over his bargain with his sixth life).

Love and War sees a new Doctor evolve from the old, and regardless of how you like him, the story and presentation of Cornell's second New Adventure make his book unmissable. I felt truly sad when the Doctor and Ace parted company; no doubt you will too. And a book that can make you sad is a rare, and special, thing.

The Doctor and Ace end up in too nice place.
The Doctor runs off to find a book.(so he says)
Ace becomes ingaged to a man who just happends
to be a pyrocenitic. The Doctor kills her
fiance to save the universe.

This book didn't stick to the Sylvester McCoy
character. The Doctor in this book
came out looking too much like an evil maniac
who dosen't care about the truth.