| SPIRAL SCRATCH by Gary Russell |
| Story ? Synopsis: The Doctor decides to visit his old friend Professor Rummas, on Carsus. But before he and Mel arrive, they are visited by several different versions of themselves. Then, on Carsus, they find Rummas dead - with the Doctor dead next to him - except Rummas isn't dead, the bodies are only holograms. With further signs of temporal anomalies, Rummas sends the Doctor and Mel to Earth, 1958, to trace a missing woman. They are unable to prevent her disappearance, by a creature the Doctor calls a Lamprey. They also meet alternate versions of themselves again. After further encounters, the Doctor realises Rummas is well aware of the Lamprey, having unleashed it in the first place. Rummas has a plan to catch it, but it goes wrong. The Lamprey is trying to find a way to break out and consume the energies of the multiverse. The Doctor vows to stop her, and many alternate versions of him are brought together on Carsus to try and overload the Lamprey. When that doesn't work, the Doctor manages to short-circuit the creature, at great personal cost... |
| Review:- Over the 8 year run of PDAs, Gary Russell has managed 3 adventures for the 6th Doctor and Mel. This, the conclusion, sees them pushed to the limit in a pretty hopeless situation, facing it in their usual manner. The story is presented in slightly non-linear fashion, but it can be understood what's happening, and the reader often feels "oh, so that's what that all meant". The apparent start of the story (who murdered Professor Rummas?) is the trigger for a complex and wide-ranging tale spanning the multiverse, as the Doctor and Mel go through a huge upheaval in their attempts to save everything. Personally, stories involving beings of immense power almost always get my vote, but not if said beings come across as too snide or jokey. Power is serious. Thankfully, Russell makes sure of this, as apart from naming his baddie Monica, he makes sure she's totally credible. It's also rewarding to find the really odd sections of the book do make a sense eventually, and it's charming that Russell clearly has a high opinion of this Doctor and companion team (and why not, eh?) Each version of them seems broadly similar to the heroes we already know, and thus they're all broadly appealing and friendly. The lesser characters we meet aren't quite so interesting, but then, they're not really meant to be. Even Rummas' assistants are mere ciphers to the overall story. Perhaps the only cloud in this sky is the ending. Whilst terribly powerful beings are interesting, stopping them generally isn't. Either someone more powerful must obligingly step in and then push off, or the all-powerful must be brought down by chance. Here, the idea of exhausting multiple Doctors to muddle Monica is pretty thin, so it's perhaps as well that Russell recognises this and allows the Doctor to step forward with a new answer. This conclusion does allow for a bit of setting-up, as the knackered-to-the-brink-of-regeneration Doctor finds himself caught up in the events from Time And The Rani. There are a couple of mentions of Lakertya during the story, which thus become obvious. It's no more offensive an idea than some that have been written over the years. On the whole, it's a decent read with a decent plot, even if it does provoke a bit of eye-rolling at Russell's corny ideas. |
| Disclaimer: I own a copy of this book. |