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APRIL 2009

Given the flood of Doctor Who produce that has flowed through stores world-wide since 2005, Joe Public probably wouldn’t believe you if told him that Prisoner of the Daleks was the first full-length Dalek novel released to tie-in with the new series. He would almost certainly laugh in your face if you told him that it was only the third full-length original Dalek novel ever. Suffice it to say then that the release of Trevor Baxendale’s seventh Doc-tor Who novel is something of an event, to say the least.

However, historically Dalek novels have not gone down very well amongst fans. Unlike his novelisations of certain 1960s Dalek television serials, John Peel’s brace of eighth Doctor adventures for BBC Books in the late 1990s were almost universally loathed. I say ‘almost’ because I actually found the first of the pair, the oft-lambasted War of the Daleks, curiously compelling. Fortunately though, Baxendale has evaded the curse of the literary Daleks… and in style too. Indeed, Prisoner of the Daleks has to be my favourite new series novels to date, and here’s why.

Whenever they appear on television these days, the Daleks are nothing short of magnificent. But as most of the new series’ Dalek episodes have been by their very nature climactic, we haven’t been treated to what I would call a ‘traditional’ Dalek story for a very long time. Even the Evolution of the Daleks two-parter, which is perhaps as close as the revived series has come to a ‘run of the mill’ Dalek adventure, was laden with continuity stretching right back to before the Time War had begun and that would run all the way up to the following season’s Journey’s End (and possibly beyond).

“That’s the trouble with jumping time lines… It’s difficult to work out where we’re up to.

Dalek history was confusing enough before the Time War.”

And so perhaps with a view to injecting his story with a slightly more traditional flavour (or possibly to avoid the unenviable task of following Journey’s End!), here Baxendale takes

the extraordinary approach of sending the Doctor back into his own relative past; at least,

in a manner of speaking. The TARDIS jumps a time-track and the Doctor finds himself in

or around the 26th century, at a relative point before the Daleks had even developed time corridor technology, let alone begun to wage Time Wars. Instantly this setting taps into the tense atmosphere created by stories like Frontier in Space, Love and War and Deceit;

the Dalek Empire is hell-bent on wiping out humanity, and only a ruthless group of Ace / Abslom Daak-esque eye-stalk harvesting bounty hunters stand between it and Earth’s outermost colonies.

“On full power, they can blast a human being into atoms in a split second.

But they never do that. Every Dalek dials down the power on its gun-stick…

so that the beam burns away the central nervous system from the outside in,

meaning that every human being dies in agony.”

That’s not to say though that the Daleks of this tale are gunmetal grey and sound uncannily like Zippy and George. Hindsight being the wonderful “wibbly wobbly timey wimey” thing

that it is, Baxendale has been able to revise these ‘period’ Daleks to make them every bit

as imposing as those that would follow them, if not even more so. Complete with modern catchphrases like “elevate!” and all the rest of their new series accoutrements, these Daleks really are the business. Baxendale even does what only a scant few have managed over the years in that he successfully creates a unique Dalek character – “the Inquisitor General”, “Devil in Dalek form” , or just plain old “Dalek X” for short. This black and gold monstrosity positively exudes dread; even the Doctor, once he has become the titular Prisoner of the Daleks in the second half of the book, is absolutely terrified of this fetid creature.

The Doctor’s fear in itself would be horrifying enough to make this story work, but Baxendale really lets rip here. His distinctive brand of darkness certainly sets this novel apart from most others in the range; so much so, in fact, that it is hard to see how it could profess to be for a ‘young adult’ audience. At times, this one makes Fear of the Dark look bright and breezy.

For me, the tone of Prisoner of the Daleks was set by the early death of the character that

I had imagined would be the Doctor’s stand-in companion for the adventure, and from there onwards things would only get more grim. The human colonists on the planet Auros destroy their world using the Osterhagen system, only for their refugee fleet to be decimated by their would-be invaders; a woman and her young child are set to work in a Dalek mine and threat-ened with extermination; and the Doctor can only look on as, one by one, his acquaintances on the Wayfarer are slaughtered around him.

“So long, suckers.”

And possibly more unsettling still, the evil of the Daleks is reflected back at them through

the actions of the Wayfarer’s crew of bounty hunters. Cuttin’ Edge may speak like a mellow Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle, and Scrum might look like he should be manning a comic book store in The Simpsons, but that does not stop them and their ‘Captain’, the renegade Space Major Bowman, from freezing a Dalek (hence Lee Binding’s startling cover image), cracking it open, hauling out the mutant inside and – much to the Doctor’s disgust – torturing it to death. It is very Dalek / Jubilee, and certainly makes for some gripping – though rather unpleasant – reading.

My only real quibble with this novel is to do with how the plot is resolved, or rather how it is not resolved. The first half of the story sets it up as being the one in which the Daleks will  acquire time travel technology – at one point the Doctor even says that he cannot prevent what they are about to discover. Yet, come the end of the novel, the Arkheon Threshold has been sealed and Dalek X left to rot. Has the Doctor prevented the Daleks from discovering the secret of time travel forever, or has he just delayed them, as he once delayed their deve-lopment on Skaro? I presume it must be the latter, otherwise there would be one hell of a “wibbly wobbly timey wimey” furore, but I thought that this was far from clear.

All the same, my own failure to wrap my head around all

the ins and outs of the plot’s ramifications does not stop Prisoner of the Daleks from being an unremitting brute of

a novel; outstanding in almost every respect. And, given just how divisive previous Dalek adventures in print have proven, this has to be considered something of a bloody miracle.

And you have really got to dig that font…

Copyright © E.G. Wolverson 2009

E.G. Wolverson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

Prisoner of the Daleks is, in my opinion, the best of the new series novels yet released. OK; I admit I haven’t yet read all of them, and there could be an unexpected diamond waiting. Still, with the exception of a handful – Only Human and The Eyeless spring to mind – the majority of the new series tie-ins have had the feel of kids’ books. All right and proper, really – these books are aimed at the same audience as the television series, one which comprises a great many children, and it is they who will end up buying / being bought the most of the tie-in merchandise. Still, for those of us who had grown used

to the increasingly sophisticated and adult themes of the Doctor Who novel series that began with the Virgin New Adventures and continued through the BBC’s ongoing eighth Doctor range, it has been a little bit of a come-down.

Prisoner of the Daleks is something

different. Although there are plenty of

humorous moments – mostly involving

the Doctor’s facetiousness in the face

of danger – the overall tone of the novel

is unremittingly bleak, with death and destruction dogging the lead characters throughout. However, this never drags the novel into depressing territory. Even when events threaten

to overwhelm him, the Doctor maintains a dogged determination to keep going, something which eventually rubs off on his unwitting compatriots. In the end the good guys do win, but things look grim very often. There are many horrific moments, dealing with the horrors of Dalek warfare, be it their destruction of whole worlds, their arbitrary extermination of slaves, or their desire to adjust their energy beams to cause maximum pain.

The main characters, including the Doctor, who is faithfully and engagingly portrayed throughout, are well characterised, if not well-rounded, individuals. Bowman leads the

crew of the Wayfarer and much of the story. A gruff, almost brutish ex-space commander, Bowman has a cold exterior that hides a deep concern for his crew. The strength of his hatred of the Daleks is second to none – not even the Doctor is as vehemently against

them – and this threatens to overcome his sense of right, to the point where he orders the torture of an imprisoned Dalek. Naturally, he and the Doctor grate against one another immediately, but eventually earn mutual respect. The other main characters – brash old Cuttin’ Edge, straightforward but intelligent Scrum, and the feline alien Koral are equally

well drawn. All but one end up dead by the end, but not until we’ve become familiar and

fond of them. Just as tragic is the death of Stella, the first of the crew to die. Set up as the Doctor’s perfect temporary companion, she dies at the hands of the Daleks only very

shortly into the book in one of the story’s grimmest moments.

It’s not hard to see why this story was selected for the privilege of becoming the first un-abridged reading of a new series novel. At over six hours, this rivals the BBC’s previous releases of unabridged Target readings, and is far longer than the previous abridged adaptations, which rarely clock in at much over two hours. The choice of Nicholas Briggs

as reader is also an excellent one, although it’s actually a bit of a given. Briggs simply is

the voice of the Daleks these days, so it would have been a let-down to have anyone else. Briggs provides a compelling reading of the text, providing distinct voices for each of the characters. His vocal dexterity is impressive, to the point where he can make each Dalek – albeit with a helping hand from his trusty ring modulator – sound distinct. I was looking forward to hearing his portrayal of the Doctor, seeing that he has played the part before. Here he goes ahead with a fine impression of David Tennant’s mannerisms. Bowman, although he’s so gruff that he sometimes sounds like a laryngitic Phil Mitchell, could be a different actor. Equally effective are the casual drawl of Cuttin’ Edge, the quiet tones of Scrum and the sibilant whisper of Koral.

Overall then, this is an excellent reading of a cracking novel.

Copyright © Daniel Tessier 2009

Daniel Tessier has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

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