By Terrance Dicks

BBC Books, out now

Almost two years to the day that he passed away, we remember Terrance Dicks in this fan-curated selection of his ‘best’ Target Doctor Who novelisations, split across two hardbacks.

Nostalgia is the key here. For a certain segment of people, holding a Terrance Dicks hardback in your hands during the summer holidays is a treasured memory, said book typically borrowed from a library. The paperbacks were the affordable way to extend your collection, but a hardback was seen as the gold standard, and I proudly displayed my hardback Book Club Associates treasury of three Target novels as the jewel of my own personal haul.

Forty-something years later and it’s still thrilling to marvel over the works of ‘Uncle Terrance’ (as he latterly was referred to), collected now in two handsome volumes with five stories apiece. They’re described as ‘Essential’ though you may raise an eyebrow at some of the choices.

The final ten were whittled down from the 60-plus entries in his back catalogue of Target Doctor Who novelisations via public voting on Twitter in November 2019. In true World Cup style, the top two entries in each group proceeded to the next round. Whether or not people went for the best novelisations in the group or the actual televised story became a discussion point, and The Wheel in Space was surely strategically pushed because of its rarity rather than literary merit. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because every one of these stories has enough of the Dicks sparkle to justify its inclusion.

The stories are published in televised chronological order, as opposed to when they were written, with Vol. 1 including Doctor Who and the Dalek Invasion of Earth, …Abominable Snowmen, …Wheel in Space, …Auton Invasion and …Day of the Daleks. There’s a compelling introduction by author (and writer of episodes In the Forest of the Night and Smile) Frank Cottrell-Boyce, arguing why the books should still be read, though I would suggest that he’s preaching to the converted here.

Vol. 2 is Fourth Doctor heavy (four of the five stories) with such classics as Doctor Who and the Genesis of the Daleks, …Pyramids of Mars, …Talons of Weng Chiang, …Horror of Fang Rock and …The Five Doctors. The introduction by comedian Robert Webb – and I never knew he was a Doctor Who fan – is a lovely anecdote that many of us can testify to, namely that Dicks’ novelisations fired up an interest in reading that other classics hadn’t been able to, and as a way to get up to speed with old stories while waiting for a new serial on TV.

On the downside, it’s a shame that the original line drawings used to illustrate the older books have not been included, and it would have been nice to have a page showing the original book jackets. But these are minor complaints, as a lot of us probably already have the battered, well-thumbed originals to hand.

Verdict: Hopefully enough of these volumes will be bought to justify further releases – I’d find room on my bookshelf for a further 11! – but even if this small sample is all we get, how lucky we are that these two weighty tomes exist. An essential purchase. 9/10

Nick Joy

NB The covers are corrected from the versions shown here

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