2007 Book Log #40: The Sands of Time, by Justin Richards

[annathepiper]

I know that there are better Doctor Who novels than The Sands of Time by Justin Richards--I've read them. But unfortunately I hadn't realized until partway into this one that it was written by the same gentleman who wrote The Clockwise Man... which was a shame, since this made for a less than impressive first novel exposure to the Fifth Doctor.

Now, to be fair, Mr. Richards was also starting off a bit handicapped with this one, writing about the Fifth Doctor in the first place. My Fifth Doctor fu is admittedly scanty; of the various Classic Doctors, he's one of the ones for whom I've seen only a tiny handful of episodes. But so far my impression of him is... well, let's put it this way. Five isn't half-bad looking, and I'll give him marks for brains, but he's just dull. Especially when compared against the vivid charisma of Tom Baker's Four, and certainly compared to Nine and Ten. I am told by spazzkat and solarbird that yeah, that's about the size of things with Five. Problem was, when I compare this book to the other Richards Doctor book I've read, I could see practically no difference whatsoever between his handling of Five and his handling of Nine, past basic physical description. This does not assure me well that this gentleman would do better writing any of the other Doctors.

It also doesn't help that Five's companions, at least in this novel, are deeply annoying. Nyssa didn't get to do much more than lay around in an induced coma through most of the plot, and Tegan? Tegan was actively grating. She pretty much spent the first half the book whining about how bored she was, which honestly made me want to punch her lights out. I kept wondering exactly why this girl had decided to go haring off with the Doctor to begin with. I mean, sure--Four and Ten do just as much if not more technobabbling than Five, but at least with Sarah Jane or Rose or Martha, you have the sense that even if they don't understand half of what the Doctor's yammering on about, they at least give enough of a damn to try to pay attention and get a decent idea of what's going on. I am informed that this is also rather par for the course with Tegan in the actual episodes--so again, while one can give Mr. Richards marks for accurate portrayal of the character, this doesn't say much when the character in question needs to be pitched headfirst out the TARDIS door.

There are aspects of this book I did like--as with Jonathan Morris' excellent Festival of Death, Richards does try to liven things up a bit by jumping around in time and reminding the reader that why yes, the Doctor is after all a Time Lord and his adventures will sometimes just not be linear. That in fact is what kept me just interested enough to read through until the end to see what happened, but once I was finally done, I'm afraid I came out of it with an overall "meh". Sorry, Mr. Richards. One and a half stars.

Comments

[ariaflame.livejournal.com]

Tegan didn't decide to join initially. She wandered in and the TARDIS took off while she was looking through the back corridors. I think part of the fifth's problems was too many companions, (at least half of them annoying).

I personally have a soft spot for the Fifth Doctor (partly because that was where I came in)

[annathepiper]

Heh, I've read Tegan's Wikipedia page, so I have at least some basic idea of her history--but what I don't get is what made her actually decide to hang around for a while rather than asking the Doctor to drop her off right back where she came from. This novel takes a stab at showing how Tegan and Nyssa are supposed to be friends, but only in one scene, and it gives very little indication of any connection at all between Tegan and the Doctor past 'he's the guy that drives the time machine Tegan's riding around in'.

I guess it's another example of a Doctor Who novel really needing to be read like it's another episode, which allows for the assumption that a reader is already familiar with the characters. But the problem with that approach is, if you're not already familiar with the characters, they come out kind of cardboard. Which felt like the case here. I'd be willing to take a stab at a Fifth Doctor story where that wasn't the case, though. :)

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

but what I don't get is what made her actually decide to hang around for a while rather than asking the Doctor to drop her off right back where she came from.

She spent an entire series asking exactly that, non-stop. The doctor has got decidedly better at controlling the TARDIS in recent incarnations - earlier variants were lucky to hit the right galaxy, let alone the right time period when they got there....

[ariaflame.livejournal.com]

Admittedly the 4th one added a randomiser for a while which didn't help, and the fifth one started off having to dump large portions of the TARDIS which couldn't have done good things to the calibrations systems.

[annathepiper]

Ah okay, so "the Doctor was in a Has No Idea What He's Doing With the TARDIS" phase, that would explain it. ;) Thanks!

[annathepiper]

Hee, I'm beginning to see that very point, yeah. spazzkat and I watched "Seeds of Doom", the six-parter KBTC was showing over the weekend as part of a fundraiser marathon, and when that started off, it had the Doctor and Sarah Jane heading down to Antarctica... by helicopter.

"What happened to the TARDIS?" I asked, at which point Paul promptly snarked how Four couldn't take the TARDIS down here, he'd overshoot by two million years. Hee!

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

Oh, I like The Seeds of Doom a lot, it's great fun. Some stories really do benefit from a severely OTT villain in black leather gloves XD

[annathepiper]

Yeah, the villain was pretty prime. And lots of fun snark out of Four, too, who apparently was in a general "stupid monkeys" mood towards humanity through most of the episode. Also, Action Doctor! Diving through skylights to rescue Sarah Jane! Jumping guards to knock them out--and doing this thing, I might add, where for an instant he actually looked like he broke the guy's neck and I went WHOA! But then the guy got up. ;)

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

I adore the fifth doctor. He is simultaneously one of the most human and caring of the doctor's incarnations, while having to deal with the biggest load of pain and guilt to get dropped on any of them prior to the new series. And he did deal, never backed away; he regularly questioned himself (unlike some of the more arrogant variants) and then ran with his convictions, and had some fantastic stories doing it.

Tegan, yes - she was effectively kidnapped from earth, wanted nothing more than to get back to her life in London, and whined about it a lot. She eventually fled from the TARDIS in a state of distress, having been witness to one more set of brutal deaths than she could stomach.

I thought it was pretty brave to have a character who reacted more like a normal person to travels with the doctor, but it's a pity that the actress wasn't really good enough to do it justice, and that the viewers are stuck with her tantrums in the mean time XD

I do enjoy these reviews of yours and your perspective on both literary talent and characters, please keep them up :-)

[annathepiper]

I'm willing to be convinced that there's more to Five than meets the eye; I'll keep an eye out for any of his episodes that come across KBTC. Or if there are any particular episodes that are rentable and which you would recommend, sing out. :)

I agree, it is rather cool that they tried to deal with the concept of a companion that actively did not want to be there--but that's a hard road to follow if you want to maintain viewer sympathy, I think. I can see that being a reason to have Tegan latch onto Nyssa as a friend.

And thank you, I'm glad this is enjoyable reading! I have more novels in general as well as Doctor novels on the queue. I hope to hit a hundred novels this year. :D

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

The Visitiation, Black Orchid and Earthshock run. Orchid's pretty much just a fun romp that fills a 2 episode gap, but it's nice for characters and for showing us the fun side of life with TARDIS travel, which the series doesn't often do.

The Guardian Trilogy - because Mawdryn Undead and Enlightenment are good enough that you just have to suffer through Terminus in the middle for plot purposes....

From his last season, Resurrection of the Daleks and The Caves of Androzani without question. I like the issues dealt with in Warriors of the Deep (the Fifth doctor always did seem to get stuck with the no-win scenarios!) and The Awakening's another short entertaining one.

[annathepiper]

Turns out spazzkat has "Resurrection of the Daleks" on tape--he just brought up all of his Dalek episodes out of his closet, to let me watch 'em. Yay! So I'll get in quite the smattering of every Doctor except Two going up against the Daleks. This should be fun. ^_^

Hrmm, a fun romp sounds good! You're right, we always see the TARDIS and the Doctor and his Companions having perilous adventures, they hardly ever have a holiday. ;)