The Secret Lives of Monsters

Some of this book is pretty interesting and engaging, especially the behind-the-scenes sections at the end of a chapter. But the glaring typing mistakes and missing words in sentences can take you out of the book. The worst offender I've seen, was a factual error, crediting 'Into the Dalek', as a Matt Smith episode. For a book that only pages earlier was taking a punt at the Dalek Jast/Dalek Rabe BBC error, I found this mistake to be rather ridiculous. Why should I further spend time engaging with a book that I can't trust to provide me with correct information, while it wastes no time in making jokes about others who have done the same? I will say the book's pages were well presented and the artwork and concept art, etc were nice to look at, but errors and inconsistencies make this read a painful one. I shall be wary of Justin Richards' work in the future. ( )

https://nwhyte.livejournal.com/3217610.html

I grumble sometimes that Justin Richards is either rather good or rather average in his Who writing. This is a good one. Published in 2014 (so covering the first Capaldi season), it looks at the classic and new monsters of Who, with chapters on the Cybermen, the Daleks, the Great Intelligence, the Ice Warriors, the Judoon, the Krillitanes, the Nestenes & Autons, the ood, the Silence, the Silurians & Sea Devils, the Slitheen, the Sontarans, the Weeping Angels and the Zygons. Most of each chapter is an in-universe account of the history of each alien and their televised encounters with the Doctor (all spinoffs are excluded, which is a bit of a missed opportunity for cross-marketing), finishing with a few pages from the real-world perspective about how the monsters were actually made and brought to the screen. It's well-written and gorgeously produced. There wasn't a lot that I didn't already know, but I enjoyed looking at it. ( )