Darkstar Academy

This set contains two audio-exclusive adventures featuring Eleven, Amy, and Rory. Darkstar Academy sees the trio visiting a 50s-style boarding school with a sinister secret, while Day of the Cockroach features a 20th-century Earth with nuclear war. Each story was read by a single narrator. Alexander Armstrong narrated Darkstar, with good results: he didn’t try to imitate Amy’s Scottish accent or even do too much to his voice to sound female. Arthur Darvill, meanwhile, played Rory on the show, so he is allowed to do the little imitation of Amy’s accent that he does (very mild).

Both stories were good, but I’d give the edge to Day of the Cockroach, because the sound effects were skin-crawlingly effective. The title doesn’t lie: there are some nasty bugs in this story! ( )

My review is for only Steve Lyons' Day of the Cockroach portion of this double book. My local library's CD for the Mark Morris' Darkstar Academy portion needs cleaning before I can hope to listen to it. I won't bother, though, because that same Mark Morris wrote a book in which a nasty character cruelly killed a nice cat. Mr. Morris had the audacity to not only fail to devise a horrible death for the cat killer; he let him live!

Day of the Cockroach finds the 11th Doctor, Amy Pond, and Amy's husband, Rory, in 1982. They have found a body. There will be more bodies amongst the trapped before this adventure is over. The cockroaches were scarier than the ordinary variety. It's a decent horror story with touches of humor in the dialog. ( )

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1916113.html

read by Alexander Armstrong (whose accent is occasionally a bit surprising - his "stall" sounds like "stool" which doesn't quite have the same meaning). All but completists can safely skip this one; the setting is a future-kitsch 1950s public school which turns out rather pointlessly to be In Space, and the Doctor compassionately tells the victim of bullying that he should ruddy well get over it; that will be very helpful to any young (or older) listeners who find themselves in that situation. ( )