On Target with Season 24

[SiHart]

What are your thoughts/ memories of the Season 24 Target books?





Si xx

[Zbigniev Hamson]

I think I own two of them, but I've never read either. Those are my memories

[SiHart]

I've been re-reading them. Or two of them anyway.

Paradise Towers was fine. It suffers from a lack of character description (as do many Target books down the years) as if the author knows the only people reading the boomk will know what the characters look like from the telly.
Despite that, it's rather good. There's some nice little additions throughout and a little bit of character motivation explained that didn't quite come off on screen.

Dragonfire os probably better written but I'm not so sure the story is quite as strong. The little girl wandering around Svartos is even more irritating in print than she is on screen!

Si xx

[Rob McCow]

Paradise Towers has a pretty good cover, although Dragonfire is streets ahead of the competition, even without using the dragon!

The cover for Time and the Rani could not be any duller. A badly lit photo of some murky creatures, it's not only boring but also completely unrepresentative of the story.

Delta and the Bannermen might have been OK if they hadn't make McCoy look like so much of a drunken tramp.

As far as I can remember, these were all solid adaptations, if rather perfunctory. Nothing special!

[SiHart]

I love the Paradise Towers cover. It's one of my favourites from the whole range.

Si xx

[Andrew Curnow]

Time and the Rani was (I think) the last hardback released, and I know I got it for Christmas 1987. I've only read it the once, and I don't recall enjoying it as much as the TV show - the Tetraps' own language is used, but is just backwards English which seems very random indeed. There's a nice prologue, though, which at least gives the sixth Doctor a few lines.

Paradise Towers and Delta I picked up in Barnstaple WH Smiths when they came out - or PT may have been the old book shop on the corner which is now a trendy wine bar. Either way, they were both fairly fun I think, with the Delta one making it pretty clear that the Doctor fancies Ray (IMHO!!). And according to AP, if you turn it upside down the three circles on the Delta cover remind you of Mickey Mouse, in homage to the bus's original destination... or something.

And Dragonfire I picked up some time after it came out, during a holiday in St Ives. It's probably very well-written (I seem to recall DWM giving it a glowing review) but I found it a real struggle to get through, and was thus surprised to find that actually there was something more wretched than the TV version!!