Scratchman

Not many Doctor Who books could say they are written by the Doctor himself, but here we are, with a book by a former Doctor.

And simply put, it's just brilliant. Tom Baker effortlessly captures the voices of the Fourth Doctor, Sarah and Harry from the very start, and delivers a book that is creepy one minute, stark raving bonkers the next.

Which feels like a perfect description of Tom Baker's era really. It had these brilliant dark moments, but also these totally barmy ideas that suited his Doctor like a tea.

There are some nice surprises from some, shall we say, familiar faces (including one from the Doctor's future), and a wildly inventive pinball game, but my favourite moment without a doubt was reading about the scarecrows terrorising the village, in 'Book One'. It feels so authentically 'Doctor Who', and like something that would slot with ease into Philip Hinchcliffe's time as producer, that I wish we had got to see this scarecrow horror onscreen (although we did get something similar with Series 3's Human Nature/Family of Blood).