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| By: | EDL Foster, Invercargill, New Zealand |
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| Date: | Saturday 13 September 2003 |
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| Rating: |  10 |
A story worthy of the "Cold Fusion" tradition, where fate and circumstance bring together a past and future Doctor and various companions - and as before, the two incarnations chosen are perfectly matched due to current events. And the Eighth Doctor gets a decent bite of the action (no pun intended!).
Thoroughly recommended for both multi-Doctor and Loup Garoux fans, overall.
| By: | Trevor Smith, Nottingham, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Saturday 16 June 2012 |
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| Rating: |  6 |
A book that is full of good ideas but doesn't really follow them and ends in a bit of a mish-mash.
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 | Mostly good, but a poor ending! |
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| By: | Alex Wadey, Petworth, United Kingdom |
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| Date: | Friday 11 July 2014 |
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| Rating: | 7 |
A solid read, nice to have a focus on Harry, a character who I really liked. My only criticism, not enough 4th doctor in the book and the ending was very rushed.
| By: | David Layton, Los Angeles, United States |
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| Date: | Friday 6 November 2015 |
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| Rating: | 4 |
This novel is a split story so that we can get two Doctors in one book without having them meet. Set in Somerset, 1936, the novel starts with Harry Sullivan inexplicably getting left behind when the TARDIS takes off without him. Seemingly stranded, Harry finds himself tangled up with the goings on of a local werewolf. Meanwhile, Doctor 4 and Sarah try to get back to Harry, but arrive three weeks after they left him. They discover his grave and become determined to piece together what happened. It's an interesting enough start. The rest of the novel is the problem. First, Harry meets a handsome stranger called the Doctor, but this Doctor is seemingly not "the" Doctor, though there are tantalizing clues that he might be. The reader will learn that this Doctor is the amnesiac Doctor 8 from the BBC main series of 2000. Of course, if one hasn't read any of those one is none the wiser. The novel switches back and forth between the two stories - Harry and Doctor 8, Sarah and Doctor 4.
The main problem is that this story is pure British fantasy. In the ordinary scheme of Doctor Who, one expects that the werewolf is only apparently a legendary beast and that magic is really an alternative or superior technology. Raynor has not even bothered trying to make a science fiction connection. Instead, we have both Doctors simply accepting that werewolves exist and follow all the legendary characteristics attached to them, that forests can "come alive," that sorceresses can cast spells, that dryads are real, and that King Arthur's court was real. It all runs so counter to Doctor Who that it makes the two Doctors, Sarah, and Harry all seem as if they are occupying the wrong story. Further damage to the story comes from Raynor's "everything including the kitchen sink" approach to storytelling. In addition to all that was just mentioned, we also get a mad English minor aristocrat who believes he is Mordred reincarnated, local villagers with pitchforks (in 1936!), Nazi plans to use werewolves as weapons, oh and the holy grail thrown in for good measure. The explanations for all these things amount to "just because." Finally, as if realizing the problematic nature of the story within the Who universe, Raynor gives a multiple realities denouement.
It is safe to conclude that I really didn't enjoy this one at all.
