‘Doctor Who and the Claws of Axos’ – Terrance Dicks (Target)

 

Page Count: 141 Pages

It was only a few weeks ago that I read ‘Doctor Who and the Invasion of Time’ but it feels like a lot longer. Time slows down when you’re unemployed, sometimes that’s a good thing but sometimes, not so much :o(

Anyway…

It felt like a long time since I’d picked up a ‘Doctor Who’ book and a walk through Greenwich Market, the other day, turned up a copy of ‘The Claws of Axos’; a book that I hadn’t read since… Erm… sometime in the ‘eighties? I can’t remember exactly, lets just say that it has been a while. Either way, it felt like everything had come together and it was about time I had a re-read. So… That’s what I did. When I’m hunting books, I never ignore tracks and signs and… I’m always hunting books ;o)

‘Axos calling Earth, Axos calling Earth…’

The creatures stood before them, beautiful golden humanoids, offering friendship and their priceless Axonite, in return for… what?

Only the Doctor remains suspicious. What is the real reason for the Axons’ sudden arrival on Earth? And why is the evil Master a passenger on their spaceship? The Doctor is about to find out?

When I wrote about the TV serial, back in 2021, I kicked things off by saying that,

‘The Claws of Axos’ gives the game away far too early and by ‘far too early’, I mean within seconds of the first episode with scary looking ‘tentacle aliens’ seen on board a spaceship headed for Earth.’

At the risk of repeating myself, that’s exactly what happens here, literally in the very first paragraph. No matter the format then, ‘The Claws of Axos’ is not a story that relies on subtlety to see it through. Everything is laid out on the table for the reader.

And as with the TV serial, the book uses this lack of subtlety to its advantage; mostly by making the reactions of various world governments (the British government in particular) even more grabbing and blinkered than they are on the screen. Wikipedia mentions that Terrance Dicks was the script editor for this story and while that doesn’t explain why the location changes slightly (I think), it does explain how Dicks shows such a deft hand with the plot.

If the Axon’s motive is never in any doubt, neither is the outcome and lets be honest, were you expecting otherwise? Nope, me neither. If you read the old ‘Doctor Who’ books then the odds are that like me, you’re reading to see just how the Doctor saves the day (this time). Or for a little ‘nostalgia hit’, either is good ;o)

‘The Claws of Axos’ is a good read, in this respect, as the Doctor isn’t just facing down the ‘latest alien threat’, he’s also trying to deal with the bureaucratic threat of the Civil Service as well as the Master (who has his own problems to deal with but really wants to kill the Doctor first). There’s plenty for the Doctor to go up against then and it ends up being a lot of fun watching the Doctor playing everyone (and everything) off against each other. This is even more so the case when you take into account that the Master is in the mix and should be more than capable of out-thinking the Doctor.

There are absolutely no surprises here then but like I said, that’s not really the point of a ‘Doctor Who’ book. Surprises were not what I was looking for here, more the kind of read where the journey counts more than the destination. And that’s exactly what I got here so I was happy.

I’m off to the dentist later on this morning, I suspect you’ll probably see a similar kind of book feature here tomorrow…