BOOK
Doctor Who
Fallen Gods

Authors: Jonathan Blum and Kate Orman
Telos Publishing
www.telos.co.uk
RRP £10.00 (standard hardback), £25.00 (deluxe hardback)
ISBN 1 903889 20 0 (standard hardback)
ISBN 1 903889 21 9 (deluxe hardback)
Available now


In Bronze Age Thera, a former priestess learns the mysteries of magic from a tutor who has fallen from the skies. With the Doctor's encouragement, she is able to surf the time-streams and fly through the air. Her powers are tested to the limit when fiery creatures in the shape of divine bulls begin attacking the population...

This, the second Telos novella to feature the Eighth Doctor, is also the first to make allusions to events in the BBC's series of Doctor Who books, though fortunately the authors are vague enough to ensure that you don't need to have read any of the novels beforehand. The Doctor refers to a couple of absent travelling companions, who could really be anybody, but I reckon they are Fitz and Trix. This is because other passages suggest that the Doctor, just as he is doing in the current arc of BBC novels, is in the gradual process of recovering memories of his traumatic role in the destruction of Gallifrey (in The Ancestor Cell). He also refers obliquely to his rescue from that doomed world by his ex-companion Compassion.

The Time Lord's persisting guilt ties in well with the overall theme of this novella, in which altitude is a metaphor for morality. In learning to fly, like a superhero for the ancient world, the character of Alcestis is literally able to take the moral high ground. Meanwhile, the ethics of various other entities, including the Doctor and the gods of the title, are seen to have taken a fall.

However, I wonder why Jonathan Blum and Kate Orman feel the need to forgo the use of good old-fashioned quotation marks in favour of an em-dash at the start of every speech? Sure, it gives the text a distinctive appearance, but it isn't always clear when a speech ends and the narrative recommences.

The first third of the book is engaging enough as it documents the training of Alcestis, with the Doctor fulfilling the riddle-talking role of Yoda or an Eastern-style master. However, the plot runs out of steam soon after that, when the action moves to the royal island of Kaménai. At 140 pages' duration, Fallen Gods outstays its welcome, ignoring the "short and sweet" approach that usually works to the benefit of this format.

Following a promising start, I'm sad to report that the narrative, like the Greek gods to which it alludes, also takes quite a fall.

Richard McGinlay

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