Cover image for The Devil Goblins from Neptune

Reviews for The Devil Goblins from Neptune

There are 8 reviews so far. To add a review of your own for this item, visit the voting page.



Good old Pertwee

By:Adrian Sherlock, Melbourne, Australia
Date:Sunday 9 June 2002
Rating:   8

I liked this book a lot.In fact, I am glad I found a copy because before I read it, I thought the books that were being written about the Who series were all bloody awfull.This book changed my mind. I think Pertwee and Davison are the best Doctors, along with the rather over rated Tom Baker, the 15 years between Spearhead from Space and Caves of Androzani were the series greatest popular success and the highest quality. This book recaptures the feel of Pertwee's 70s Earth stories very well indeed, the flavor is just right, if a bit too retro flower power hippy in places. The plot on the whole is a washout. The first hundred pages is a huge preamble with the Russians trying and failing to kidnap the Doc. The next hundred is a huge red herring, a wild goose chase to Siberia to discover nothing much. Finally, we get the last 80 pages and its a dud rewrite of Independance Day, not a good idea! But who the Hell cares? The good old dandy Doctor, intelligent liberated Liz, sex crazed loser Mike Yates,dopey but lovable Benton and the hilariously unflappable Brigadier "they're aliens, by the way" are all perfectly presented. The UNIT setting seems to make for better books than other eras of the show, its a strong foundation for a book. Its a triumph of characters and atmposphere over thin plot. Hardly a masterpiece, it remains one of the most entertaining books so far. And best of all,it hasn't got that bloody awful Sylvester McCoy tosser in it!



Doctor Who Goes X-Files

By:David Layton, Los Angeles, United States
Date:Saturday 6 September 2003
Rating:   6

This one is fast-paced, exciting, and gory as a teen slasher film.



Excellent book!

By:Gordon, Oldham, Lancs. UK
Date:Monday 10 January 2005
Rating:   9

This is a very good third Doctor story. One can almost imagine it being a lost TV story albeit with a bigger budget. It also serves to develop the supporting characters; particularly Liz & Mike Yates. A very good read



Classic

By:Chris Blenkin, Spennymoor
Date:Tuesday 25 January 2005
Rating:   8

Re-creates the feel of the Pertwee era exactly.



Caricatured at best

By:simon, Bristol
Date:Friday 9 February 2007
Rating:   4

The basic idea of this book, contrasting the UN idealism of UNIT with the harder realities of the Cold War, is superb. However the writing and characterisation are dreadful.

This is an awful pastiche of a book. It's as if Topping and Day once read a general (and inaccurate) article about the Pertwee era in a fanzine and reproduced it in a novel. Consequently, the Doctor is so stilted he topples over on more than one occasion, and Liz has none of the strength of character seen on screen in Inferno (which precedes this book in setting). Mike Yates seems to feature only as a means of shoehorning swearing and sex into the novel (a Torchwood agent, perhaps?). I won't begin to discuss how terrible are the stereotypes of hippies and landed gentry.

All of this is a real shame given the strength of the plot idea, and more so because it's the first of the BBC PDAs. Fortunately, there are better ones later in the series.



....And I throught Paul Cornel was bad

By:C G Harwood, Dunedin, NZ, New Zealand
Date:Saturday 15 December 2007
Rating:   2

I don't like books with two auhors and i have to say that this book toke that hatred to a new level. In fact between this book and the great work he is doing on the series now ie Fathers Day and Human Nature, i now have new faith in Paul Cornel. Its like one wrote a chapter then sent it to the other where he wrote one, then visa-versa, and it shows in the writing styles.
I had just finished The Eight Doctors(Which I love, and you can read my review there.), and i was realy looking forward to the first of the past Doctor series. This book almost made me forget about the whole series (but i'll take Simons word for it that they get better, they sure as well can't get much worse). this is the first ever Doctor Who book i had failed to finish (I hated Love and War by Cornel but i still finished it, maybe i should read it again.).
The idea was sound and reading the back cover i was entriged. Corruption in UNIT was a great concept as the Doctor doesn't care for Earth politics so him working for a goverment like the USSR was mouth watering. but it amounted to nothing.
The charecteriation was terrible. The only one they got even remotly right was the Brig. Topping and Day obviously didn't do there reasurch and screwed up the Doctor and Liz completly. AND DONT GET ME STARTED ON MIKE YATES, loved his charecter in the 70's now I'm not sure if I even like him now.
I will probably put this book down to these two autors just had a bad day, and i'll probably read something else of theres that they wrote by them selfs, but if i dont like that eather then i will probably just block these two from my mind.
3 out of ten and im being genirous here... No... on second thorts 2 out of ten



Classic 70s Who action with some monster

By:Clive T Wright, St Lawrence, United Kingdom
Date:Sunday 23 October 2011
Rating:   8

Devil goblins is like a B movie, with a dash of James Bonds. Sticking to the typical 3rd Doctor plot but with some welcome character development for the UNIT team. Whilst nothing challenging about the goblins the real monster again is man. At times moments of action felt rushed or simply skipped possibly due to the shear amount of it.

All in all it's a great light read.



I'm your Venus

By:Trevor Smith, Nottingham, United Kingdom
Date:Saturday 16 March 2013
Rating:   9

Despite the clunky & awful title, this is a pretty good book that updates season 7 to a more modern era though of course this was first published in 1997.
The story has several strands which all pull together nicely at the end.
Quite adult in places & contains the line "Corporal Bell with her knickers round her ankles" !
I loved it.



Go back