Something Borrowed

Probably the best feature of this installment of 12 Doctors, 12 Stories is that it's told in the first person, from the perspective of Peri. This is a pretty rare occurrence in tie-in fiction, and its deployment here is, I suspect, one of the benefits of hiring authors that aren't the usual tie-in suspects to pen this series. Mead captures Peri's voice well, and the story also features a return by 1980s villain the Rani, which evokes the right level of nostalgia for this project. Middle-of-the-road, but solid.

Warning: this review contains spoilers

****

Yay, the Rani! I totally predicted that she was the villain of the piece as soon as she was introduced. And I assume that, if she wanted to find out how to control the regeneration process that Time Lords go through, she had already tried asking Romana (who chose to regenerate into the form of Princess Astra). But Romana would probably not have given anything away, so never mind, I suppose this plot makes sense. ( )

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2137504.html

The Puffin series of successive Doctor novellas continues with this June release by urban fantasy writer Richelle Mead featuring the Sixth Doctor. Unusually, she tells the story in the first person from Peri's viewpoint; there are only a handful of Who books that use the direct voice of the Doctors or companions - I can think of Doctor Who in an Exciting Adventure With The Daleks, Doctor Who and the Romans, Bunker Soldiers, Ghost Ship, Eye of Heaven, and The Last Dodo, and there's also a very good short story from Peri's point of view in one of the Big Finish collections. Indeed most of the above list are decent enough, and at least two are among the best Who novels (with one crashing dud that I will let you discover for yourselves), so it is surprising that writers don't do it more often. (I am not counting books where the story is told in the first person by a non-regular character, and of course many of the audio plays use that approach, often very successfully.)

Anyway, this is short but sweet: Peri is a great character to write for anyway, I suspect, and the setting is a futuristic world where they do Las Vegas-style weddings, with the Doctor and Peri getting involved in a planned nupotial where it turns out that one of the prospective spouses is an old acquaintance. Not quite the best of this sequence, but far from the worst. ( )

The sixth book in the 50th anniversary series. I have no background information on the 6th Doctor, his companion Peri, or the Rani - all of whom are in this book. The Rani is in disguise, set to marry a Koturian man. The Koturian have the ability to, during their wedding ceremony, change their appearance by holding hands and touching a large ceremonial stone. The Koturians have complete control over this change. The Rani is doing scientific research in hopes that the results will allow Time Lords to control their regenerations. Unfortunately she's had to kill a few innocent Koturians along the way. Luckily the Doctor and Peri are invited guests of the grooms side.
I really enjoyed this one. Also, it's good to finally have some knowledge of the Rani. ( )