‘Doctor Who: The Time Monster’ – Terrance Dicks (Target)

When I was a kid, I went through a phase where I would literally read nothing but the old ‘Doctor Who’ Target novelizations, either through the library or the small collection that I built up over Birthdays and Christmases. I’ve said it before but it really was the best way to catch up with adventures that were last seen on the TV years before I was born :o) I lost my original collection, years ago now, but I’ve been making up for that, recently, by picking the books up whenever I’ve come across them. I found ‘The Time Monster’ just over a week ago, in Halcyon Books, and a quiet afternoon, yesterday, was just the right time to pick it up for a read… This will be a shorter post than normal; I’m on the mend (after a rough week, last week) but I’ve got a ton of work to get through today so need to pace myself a bit ;o)

Outside the bounds of this world lives Kronos, the Chronivore - a mysterious creatures that feeds on time itself.

Posing as a Cambridge professor, the Master intends to use Kronos in his evil quest for power. To stop him, the Doctor and Jo must journey back in time to Ancient Atlantis and to a terrifying confrontation within the Time Vortex itself.

But can even the Doctor save himself from the awesome might of the Time Monster?

I’ll be honest, I’ve got a pretty good memory for the ‘Doctor Who’ books that I read as a kid but this one didn’t ring any bells; I’ve certainly never seen the TV serial. It may be that I never read it or it may be that I’m just getting really old and ‘The Time Monster’ wasn’t that memorable a read from my childhood. Either way, it felt like I was reading this adventure for the first time and…

It was, alright.

Half the fun of a ‘Doctor Who’ story, for me, is watching the Doctor work his way out of impossible situations and there were a couple here that looked like they would tax even him. You would have thought so but they were worked out so quickly, and with no real explanation, that they came off as anti-climactic. I wouldn’t normally use the phrase ‘deus ex machina’ in a ‘Doctor Who’ post but I am today and it was a bit disappointing.

Which was a real shame as the build up across the rest of the plot was brilliant with the Master being all evil and a monster that was clearly beyond the ability of either Time Lord to control and hence, all the more dangerous. I enjoyed the trip to Atlantis as well with its courtly intrigue thrown into chaos by the arrival of the Master. And what was the Doctors ‘Blackest Day’? That’s a pretty big question and one that I’m going to have to look into further. Like I said, I’ve never seen the TV serial but Dicks gives us a tale here that I found very easy to stick with; high stakes and a plot that flows at an urgent pace.

If I’m going to occasionally moan about Terrance Dicks sticking rigidly to what happens on the screen, it’s only fair to say that sometimes, all you can do is use what you have been given. ‘The Time Monster’ is an intriguing tale that is let down by the resolution of a couple of cliffhangers. That’s not Dicks’ fault though. Sometimes, you can’t do much more with ‘cliffhanger resolutions’ than just tell them and hope for the best.