As mentioned in my review, The Girl Who Waited reminded me of Jim Mortimore's The Book Of Shadows, a 1st Doctor short story published in Decalog, Virgin's inaugural Dr Who short story collection.
And whilst pottering about today, I stumbled across my copy. (Somewhat depressingly, it is now of driving age).
So I dove in.
And The Book Of Shadows still is a brilliant time-travel story about a couple divided by fate.
In those days, the Doctor travelled with Susan, his granddaughter (how true that is depends upon your views), and two of her teachers, Ian and Barbara. The latter over time become a couple (though this is more clearly stated in the spin-off books than the show ever did).
The story starts with Ian the wrong side of a cave-in in ancient Egypt.
And two Barbaras, one eight years further back in the past.
This isn't so much an exploration of Ian and Barbara's relationship as The Girl Who Waited (but there is a bit of that and exclusively from Barbara's point of view).
Instead it looks at the rules of interference in time, as well as showing the havoc and horror that the Doctor can unwittingly cause.
Seeing Barbara become married to Ptolemy and become queen and a mother is a shock.
We know that it'll be undone by timey-wimey but, as well as the strength of writing, it's the richness of the historical backdrop that lifts this, certainly in comparison to The Girl Who Waited IMHO.
No comments:
Post a Comment