Dreams of Empire by Justin Richards

Well, here it is, the second of the two Doctor Who 50th Anniversary novels I’ll be reviewing for this site. If you’re not familiar with the good Doctor, check out my summary on Beautiful Chaos; otherwise, here’s the one sentence review for Dreams of Empire: it was really--surprisingly--good.

Beautiful Chaos, while it did capture the feel of NuWho fairly well, was a pretty by the numbers affair. The plot was unsurprising, the prose was utilitarian, and the science was... unique, to say the least. That’s not to say it wasn’t enjoyable, but for someone who wasn’t a fan of the series, I don’t think it would hold much appeal.

Dreams of Empire, on the other hand, could have functioned, with a fairly minor rewrite and one large plot shift, as a solid science fiction story if the Doctor wasn’t involved at all. I’m no hardcore sci-fi nerd--I think I missed that boat by panning both Neuromancer and Snow Crash--but I am a fan of well-told, well-written stories. On that count, Dreams succeeded beautifully.

Set mostly on a space station on the outer reaches of the Republic of Haddron, an interstellar kingdom in decline, the story’s events are set into motion by a political intrigue, an interstellar civil war initiated by one Hans Kesar, one the nation’s top generals. His rebellion is put down within the first twenty pages by Milton Trayx, another general and one of Keser’s closest friend, and is moved to the aforementioned outpost to prevent his assassination, thus preventing his becoming a martyr and weakening the empire further. The Doctor and his companions arrive on the outpost just in time to welcome a military vessel that seems intent on finishing the job of killing Kesar, but there are more complex machinations afoot.

I don’t want to go too deeply into the plot, because there are a number of wonderful twists throughout the story, most of which I didn’t see coming, but even from the summary above, it’s clear that this, unlike Beautiful Chaos, isn’t a (sort of)man vs. alien story. In fact, more time is spent in back-alley skullduggery that is spent in combat, until the last 20 pages or so. Maybe readers picking up a Doctor Who novel don’t want a science fiction reimagining of Caeser/Brutus but I was glad to get it.

As for the Doctor himself, this is the second Doctor, as portrayed by Patrick Troughten, and very few of his serials still exist. As a result, I’ve seen only one of them, and can’t entirely vouch for his characterization here. From what I do know, however, it seemed accurate--Number Two is a court jester with a dark, analytical side, a hero who often seems to simply bumble into the solution to the problems he comes into contact with, and that tone is well-captured here. The characterization of Jamie, a young Scot from the 1800s who’s always ready for a fight, is great here too, and lends the book a lot of its frequently understated humor.

Aside from circumstances like this tour, I don’t read much genre fiction because most of it is trash. I think the highest praise I can give Dreams of Empire is that, if more pulp was this well-done, I’d read a lot more of it.

Doctor Who - Beautiful Chaos by Gary Russell

November 23, 2013 marks the 50th Anniversary of the BBC’s flagship sci-fi series, Doctor Who. Largely unknown to American audiences before its 2005 revival, it’s a weird show that follows the titular Doctor, a Timelord who travels through time and space in a big blue police box, picking up companions along the way for company. Having existed in one way or another for half a century, with eleven different actors playing the Doctor,  it’s not the most consistent property but it’s rarely less than enjoyable, and sometimes much more.
As a promotional push for the big 5-0, the BBC is reissuing a tie-in novel for each doctor. I’m going to be reviewing two of them, and we’re also doing a giveaway, about which, more info is forthcoming. But for now, onto the book itself.

Beautiful Chaos features the tenth doctor, as portrayed by David Tennant, and his final companion, Donna Noble. The storyline follows the Doctor as he attempts to prevent a malevolent alien intelligence from taking over the world with purple lightning and wifi. As expected from the tech-heavy premise, there’s a lot of technical mumbo-jumbo, including this, my favorite:

“I sent out a cancellation signal, via the net, to the M-TEKs everywhere. As soon as they are synced with computers, instead of downloading your orders, they’ll install a virus which will defrag the platform and erase their memories completely.” Dara Morgan tapped the return key one last time. “And, I’ve password protected it.”

Here’s a tech-support pro-tip: if defragging your computer erases its memory(sic?), you’re doing it wrong.

There’s a secondary plot, clearly close to author Gary Russell’s heart, about a secondary character, Nettie, and her gradually worsening Alzheimer’s. The plotline is handled tastefully until the end, when SPOILER the Doctor thwarts the intelligence by tricking it into inhabiting Nettie’s deteriorating brain--a weird, pretty cold-blooded tactic, although the world WAS in the balance, so let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

I never really know how to review these kinds of books. Aside from the Alzheimer’s subplot, there wasn’t a lot of subtext. It was basically an action movie in book form and didn’t take too much longer to read than watching a pair of episodes. It did a respectable job of matching the voices of the characters and it was nice to see some of these people again, since they’re no longer on the show. I guess if you’re familiar with Doctor Who, you pretty much know if you want to read this book or not. I enjoyed it for what it was--a very quick, somewhat silly read, that neither approaches the highs of the show’s best episodes or embarrasses the property. It does what it says on the tin.