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Publisher:
Telos Publishing Ltd |
Release
Date: 10 July 2003 |
ISBN:
1903889189 (Standard HB)
1903889197 (Deluxe HB) |
Awards:
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Format
Reviewed: Hardback (Two Editions) |
Buy
it at Amazon US
|| UK |
Read
an Excerpt |
Genre:
SF/TV Tie-in (Dr Who) [1949, London] |
Reviewed:
2003 |
Reviewer:
Rachel A Hyde |
Reviewer
Notes: Obtainable from Telos Publishing Ltd, 61 Elgar
Avenue, Tolworth, Surrey, KT5 9JP
Standard edition £10, Deluxe edition £25
Visit the website http://www.telos.co.uk |
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The
Cabinet of Light
Dr.
Who
By Daniel
O’Mahoney
This is the ninth Dr Who novella
from Telos Publishing (why not check out the other eight reviews,
as they are all on this site). The TV show may be history, but it
is still alive and kicking in these collectable novellas and this
one in particular has taken off with a life of its own. For one
thing, it doesn’t specify which incarnation of the Doctor
is being featured, so readers can make up their own minds. Normally,
too, Dr Who stories are told from the perspective (at least partly)
of the inhabitants of the TARDIS, but this series has been weaning
us away from this traditional view. Here we see the Doctor, minus
any assistants and I wondered if he may even be a version we haven’t
actually seen on TV. This would be, in a way, rather wonderful and
proof that he is still “alive” as a fictional character,
rather than as a part played by an actor.
So
what is it about? Primarily it concerns one Honoré Lechasseur,
who lives in the grim, shattered London of 1949 after fighting in
the war. He is an exotic Creole from Louisiana, adrift in a milieu
of gray Brits and rather fancying himself as a spiv, or a “fixer.”
In best Dashiell Hammett style, he is hired by the mysterious Emily
Blandish to find her husband, a man simply called “The Doctor.”
On hearing that this mystery man has been present at various moments
throughout history, he almost abandons his search but then the chase
heats up and he finds himself in a shadowy demi-monde of neo-Nazi
clubs, black magic and the villainous Mestizer with her gigantic
cyborg companion.
This is certainly not the stuff
of Saturday teatimes, but with this series you can have the Doctor
any way you will. If the TV series was still going, maybe this would
be the sort of episodes viewers would be treated to – can’t
you just imagine this sort of thing going out at prime time on the
Sci-Fi Channel - and this is certainly a book that will appeal to
a modern audience: a heady mixture of hardboiled 1940s detective
fiction, SF magazine stories of the golden era and a dash of Dennis
Wheatley. I look forward to finding out more about the reluctant
and introspective Honoré and his pink-pajama-clad assistant
Emily, surely a Bond girl if ever there was one. Hopefully, Emily
will go on to do more than merely be rescued and act as a cipher
to her male companion (she’d better) but at least we have
the tantalizing villainess Mestizer, who apparently takes off her
skin in order to bathe. There is much to conjure with. Watch this
site for a review of their next adventures (presumably without the
Doctor) Time Hunter: The Winning Side by Lance Parkin.
Watch this space.
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