❌(3.6) = VERY BAD!

Thworping through time and space, one adventure at a time!

Andrew Cartmel immediately transports the reader to a future Earth very similar to our current world: polluted, technologically advanced, with corrupt corporations, and on the brink of collapse. It must have felt scary thirty years ago, and it feels dishearteningly realistic today.

I struggled immensely with this novel. It took me eight days to finish this novel, and I usually finish DW novels in two or three days. My biggest problem is that there are too many characters I don’t care about, a needlessly convoluted plot, and not enough of the Doctor or Ace to make this one interesting or rewarding. I simply found it dull and dragging, and I could only read a couple of chapters at a time before I found myself annoyed by the book and my mind wandering.

It’s not all bad, though.

Cartmel has a very rich writing style, and his worldbuilding and themes are superb. He also writes a very believable Doctor and Ace when they actually do appear. The last third of the book is actually pretty interesting. This novel has some violence, nudity, and bizarreness we would never see on TV, but unlike John Peel and Timewyrm: Genesys, Cartmel actually writes it much more tastefully.

While Timewyrm: Revelation and Cat’s Cradle: Time’s Crucible are confusing, convoluted, and weird at times, at least they haver strong ideas, intriguing characters, and an effortless flow. This one simply doesn’t work for me, despite some of its very scary and very palpable ideas and themes.

I might need to reread this one to fully appreciate it, but as it stands, it's not one of my favourites.