Let’s not beat about the likely raccoon-infested bush. As Rob Lowe’s Chris Traeger might say, ‘Pawnee: The Greatest Town in America’ is, literally, the best TV tie-in book ever written.’ Or, if you’d like it put in a more Ron Swanson style of succinctness, ‘It is a book. It is good. Read it.’
Kicking of the first in a trilogy of adventures, we find the Sixth Doctor travelling with his spirited young companion, Philippa “Flip” Jackson.
Followers of Doctor Who’s Companion Chronicles will already be familiar with Quadrigger Stoyn.
Tom Baker’s third series for Big Finish begins with a bang, bringing the Fourth Doctor into conflict with a rather unusual Sontaran, the formidable General Strang. Demonstrating his unique status, we hear him despatch a twelve strong assassination squad of his stubby comrades in the opening moments of the tale.
Sherlock’s back! No, not the Cumberbatchy one. The papery one made of words. The original and best. And in Titan Books’ The Further Encounters of Sherlock Holmes, the Great Detective and his companion are solving crimes far more outrageous than those created by common murderers or master blackmailers. The result is as entertaining as the stories are ambitious.
As the book’s dedication makes clear, ‘Harvest of Time’ is a story that is as much about the Master as it is the Doctor.
After his capture at the end of ‘The Daemons’ the delightfully evil Time Lord has been kept under lock and key. However, he has been periodically released from his unique Nuclear Reactor prison and coerced into assisting with a new submarine communication system.
David Lavery’s book was originally intended to chart Joss Whedon’s successful television career and then ponder over his failure to translate it into big screen success. Fortunately, with his abortive Wonder Woman project now career footnote, it revels in the triumphant box office success of Marvel’s The Avengers.
The final entry of this anniversary collection is a reprint of a larger, more mature story. First published in 2012, the novel pits the Eleventh Doctor, Amy and Rory against the Ice Warriors and predates Series 7’s ‘Cold War’.
If you are a fan of director Guillermo del Toro, who has created such amazingly visual films as Pan’s Labyrinth and Hellboy, you may often have wondered what goes on in the mind of someone who can create such worlds.
Gary Russell has connections with Doctor Who that stretch back many years. To name but a few, he has edited Doctor Who Magazine, produced, directed and written Big Finish audio stories and more recently been a Script Editor on both Who and Torchwood. He has also written a wealth of books on the subject, including ten novels across both the Virgin and the BBC ranges.