Dr Who: Silhouette by Justin Richards

This is my maiden voyage with a novel based on Dr Who. The show is a big hit in my family, where three generations all consider themselves Whovians. I was curious to see how the characters translated to book format, knowing that usually, I am one of those "liked the book better than the movie" types. While the story, itself, was fine, it didn't thrill me with the same sort of delight that a well written Dr Who script does. I found the portrayals of the five "regular" characters rather flat, and, at times, had trouble remembering this was supposed to be the Capaldi Doctor, and not some ambiguous time traveller. There were a few moments when Strax seemed like Strax, and Jenny showed spunk, but for the most part, I wasn't wowed. Perhaps the fault is mine, though, as I expected the book to paint a picture in my mind that would match up to what I see on the telly each Saturday night.

I'm giving this book a 3 out of 5 stars, though, because even though I love the television series, sometimes the writers have an off time, and I moan and groan about how poorly the script was written, not giving the actors a chance to really strut their stuff. This plot-line was no worse than some of those scripts that I thought weak, perhaps even better than one or two. It could just be that my imagination is not trained to translate a story visually from a book to match what I know on the screen. After all, this adapting from a series is a new sort of read for  me. So, just like me giving the writers of episodes I'm not keen on the benefit of the doubt, so I'll give the book series the benefit, too, and a three-star rating. It also strikes me that this would be a good YA type read.

This is something like the 53rd book in the series, so apparently, others have no problem translating from television to text.  As I said, the fault is probably in me. Please don't bash me because our tastes are different. But if writers continue to have Madame Vastra refer to her wife, Jenny, as her maid, make Strax dull, Clara a bit of an imbecile, and the Doctor somehow enigmatic and dull at the same time, I'll cross future books off my wish list.

Many thanks to Blogging for Books and the publisher for sending this copy my way.

Tags: blogging-for-books, color-me-disappointed,great-cover, ok-but-not-great, part-start-of-a-series, read, thought-i-was-gonna-like