Book Review: Short Trips: The Quality of Leadership (ed Keith R A DeCandido)
Who_Daily: < a href="http://persiflage-1.livejournal.com/140911.html">Book Review - Short Trips: The Quality of Leadership ed. Keith R A DeCandido by < lj user=persiflage_1>
This latest "Short Trips" collection from Big Finish contains 12 full length stories and an epilogue. The book's framing device is that King Loran of Zalezna has been the victim of an attempted coup, and his son (and heir) Mihal manages to stop the rebels and claim the throne for himself, but he faces the prospect of ruling before he feels he's ready. In order to help him prepare for his new role, the Doctor tells him of many leaders he's met over the course of his lives...
This book appealed to me as soon as I heard about it, because the majority of the tales are historical ones, and if there's one thing I love as much as Doctor Who, it's history!
I confess, I couldn't finish either Peter David's "One Fateful Knight" or Allyn Gibson's "The Spindle of Necessity" - but this was purely a matter of personal taste: Arthurian stories have never had much interest for me, and I found Gibson's story didn't engage my attention. (Sorry!)
However, I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the stories.
"The Slave War" by Una McCormack features the Second Doctor, Jamie, Ben and Polly. The three companions become separated from the Doctor and encounter Spartacus, his wife and an army of 10 thousand slaves who are rebelling against their Roman masters. The Companions endeavour to make Spartacus' venture a success, even though they all know history is against them. The end of this story brought me close to tears and reminded me (in a good way) of "Fires of Pompeii" because the Doctor knows that his Companion(s) want to help people but also knows they cannot interfere (admittedly FoP has a slight twist on that).
"Goths and Robbers" by Diane Duane features the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan meeting a man in Italy in 493 AD who has met them before - but they haven't yet met him, so after a conversation with him about the political situation in Northern Italy (where the Goths and Vandals are battling for power), the Doctor takes them back to meet Theodoric as a young boy in order to ensure that Theodoric's personal timeline runs true. I confess, I love stories in which characters meet the Doctor before he's met them for the first time (which is probably a large part of the reason why I love "Blink" and "Silence in the Library"/"Forest of the Dead" so much.)
"Good Queen, Bad Queen, I Queen, You Queen" by Terri Osborne features the Fourth Doctor and Romana I - and Queen Boudicca. And it completely blew me away with its twist ending that I won't reveal because I don't want to spoil it for you - but I said a very loud "Oh my God!" when I reached the end!
"The Price of Conviction" by Richard C. White features the First Doctor and Susan visiting Worms the day before Martin Luther is about to be tried as a heretic - and someone wants to assassinate Luther before he can be tried so the question is whether Susan and the Doctor can (or should) do anything to keep him safe, even though they know he's about to be tried.
"God Send Me Well to Keep" by Linnea Dodson features the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa. I confess, this was one of the first stories I read after the opening two pieces because I know the author (ie she's on my FList) and I was very keen to see what she'd written.
The Fifth Doctor and Nyssa arrive at the court of Henry VIII just as he's waiting for Anne of Cleves to arrive from the Continent, Cromwell having arranged that Henry will marry Ann - something that the Duke of Norfolk strongly opposes. He decides to make use of the arrival of the Doctor and Nyssa in an attempt to persuade Henry to marry someone else (preferably his neice Katherine). I have to say that I've forgotten watching the Fifth Doctor's episodes, but reading this story made me want to go back and watch him and Nyssa all over again (which is a good thing as far as I'm concerned!)
"Peaceable Kingdom" by Steven Savile features the Seventh Doctor visiting a desert world on which a group of scorpion/spider hybrids live, connected by a hive mind. To their world comes a visitor known as the "White Preacher" who tries to persuade them to change their savage ways, for reasons of his own.
"Rock Star" by Robert T. Jeschonek features the Third Doctor and Jo, who are visiting an alien world for a music festival during which severe earthquakes begin to occur. The festival organiser helps them to uncover who is responsible for artificially creating the quakes.
"On a Pedestal" by Kathleen O. David features the Second Doctor, Jamie and Victoria in which Jamie gets to meet one of his greatest heroes, William Wallace, and learns that putting heroes on pedestals is not the wisest thing one can do.
"Clean-up on Aisle Two" by James Swallow features the Seventh Doctor visiting a late-night supermarket, and facing down a pair of thuggish thieves with the aid (or lack thereof) of the manager and his staff.
All in all, a great collection of stories, which I (mostly) thoroughly enjoyed reading.
This latest "Short Trips" collection from Big Finish contains 12 full length stories and an epilogue. The book's framing device is that King Loran of Zalezna has been the victim of an attempted coup, and his son (and heir) Mihal manages to stop the rebels and claim the throne for himself, but he faces the prospect of ruling before he feels he's ready. In order to help him prepare for his new role, the Doctor tells him of many leaders he's met over the course of his lives...
This book appealed to me as soon as I heard about it, because the majority of the tales are historical ones, and if there's one thing I love as much as Doctor Who, it's history!
I confess, I couldn't finish either Peter David's "One Fateful Knight" or Allyn Gibson's "The Spindle of Necessity" - but this was purely a matter of personal taste: Arthurian stories have never had much interest for me, and I found Gibson's story didn't engage my attention. (Sorry!)
However, I thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the stories.
"The Slave War" by Una McCormack features the Second Doctor, Jamie, Ben and Polly. The three companions become separated from the Doctor and encounter Spartacus, his wife and an army of 10 thousand slaves who are rebelling against their Roman masters. The Companions endeavour to make Spartacus' venture a success, even though they all know history is against them. The end of this story brought me close to tears and reminded me (in a good way) of "Fires of Pompeii" because the Doctor knows that his Companion(s) want to help people but also knows they cannot interfere (admittedly FoP has a slight twist on that).
"Goths and Robbers" by Diane Duane features the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Tegan meeting a man in Italy in 493 AD who has met them before - but they haven't yet met him, so after a conversation with him about the political situation in Northern Italy (where the Goths and Vandals are battling for power), the Doctor takes them back to meet Theodoric as a young boy in order to ensure that Theodoric's personal timeline runs true. I confess, I love stories in which characters meet the Doctor before he's met them for the first time (which is probably a large part of the reason why I love "Blink" and "Silence in the Library"/"Forest of the Dead" so much.)
"Good Queen, Bad Queen, I Queen, You Queen" by Terri Osborne features the Fourth Doctor and Romana I - and Queen Boudicca. And it completely blew me away with its twist ending that I won't reveal because I don't want to spoil it for you - but I said a very loud "Oh my God!" when I reached the end!
"The Price of Conviction" by Richard C. White features the First Doctor and Susan visiting Worms the day before Martin Luther is about to be tried as a heretic - and someone wants to assassinate Luther before he can be tried so the question is whether Susan and the Doctor can (or should) do anything to keep him safe, even though they know he's about to be tried.
"God Send Me Well to Keep" by Linnea Dodson features the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa. I confess, this was one of the first stories I read after the opening two pieces because I know the author (ie she's on my FList) and I was very keen to see what she'd written.
The Fifth Doctor and Nyssa arrive at the court of Henry VIII just as he's waiting for Anne of Cleves to arrive from the Continent, Cromwell having arranged that Henry will marry Ann - something that the Duke of Norfolk strongly opposes. He decides to make use of the arrival of the Doctor and Nyssa in an attempt to persuade Henry to marry someone else (preferably his neice Katherine). I have to say that I've forgotten watching the Fifth Doctor's episodes, but reading this story made me want to go back and watch him and Nyssa all over again (which is a good thing as far as I'm concerned!)
"Peaceable Kingdom" by Steven Savile features the Seventh Doctor visiting a desert world on which a group of scorpion/spider hybrids live, connected by a hive mind. To their world comes a visitor known as the "White Preacher" who tries to persuade them to change their savage ways, for reasons of his own.
"Rock Star" by Robert T. Jeschonek features the Third Doctor and Jo, who are visiting an alien world for a music festival during which severe earthquakes begin to occur. The festival organiser helps them to uncover who is responsible for artificially creating the quakes.
"On a Pedestal" by Kathleen O. David features the Second Doctor, Jamie and Victoria in which Jamie gets to meet one of his greatest heroes, William Wallace, and learns that putting heroes on pedestals is not the wisest thing one can do.
"Clean-up on Aisle Two" by James Swallow features the Seventh Doctor visiting a late-night supermarket, and facing down a pair of thuggish thieves with the aid (or lack thereof) of the manager and his staff.
All in all, a great collection of stories, which I (mostly) thoroughly enjoyed reading.