Touched By An Angel

I finished reading Touched By An Angel last night. It's a Doctor Who book (if I haven't mentioned it before, I'm a huge huge HUGE Doctor Who fan), and I enjoyed it.

It's one of the New Series Adventure books, or NSA for short. The NSAs are stories starring the 'current' Doctor and his companions - so the most recent ones star the 11th Doctor, Amy and Rory. Touched By An Angel is one of the newest in the line, as it only came out a few days ago. I bought it in WHSmith on Saturday whilst I was out shopping. The basic premise (sorry, this isn't going to make sense to any non-Doctor Who fans) is that Mark Whitaker - an ordinary guy, who lost his wife in a car accident eight years ago - receives a letter, posted eight years ago, in his own handwriting, with the message 'YOU CAN SAVE HER' inside. Shortly after, Mark gets zapped back through time to 1994, where he must wait nine years so he can save his wife in 2003. The Doctor, Amy and Rory, meanwhile, are in charge of making sure Mark doesn't mess up time or alter history while he's stuck in the past.

The villains in the book are the Weeping Angels, which is odd as the NSAs tend to feature new monsters, not returning enemies, but I suppose it can't hurt to bring back the Angels, and they fit the story well. They're the ones responsible for zapping Mark back through time, and the eventual reason for them doing so is an excellent reveal. In fact, the book is full of excellent reveals; the Angels, and what they're up to, are brilliantly plotted throughout, so you never guess what their plan is before the proper time.

I don't really want to get into a full review, but I will say that it's probably the best 11th Doctor book I've read. The writing is all great; the Doctor gets a lot to do and is very well rounded in the balance between comedy and seriousness, and there are some fantastic scenes for Rory as well. The writer, Johnathan Morris, pulls off the timey-wimeyness of the story with aplomb, altering history, creating paradoxes and moving people through time with ease. The story holds together well on first read, though I don't know if rereading will unmask any plot holes, and the Angels - who, due to their 'living statue' persona's, are very much a visual enemy - work surprisingly well in novel format, though this is partly due to them not being the central focus for much of the novel. The best part of the book is Mark, who is a really likable character and very fun to read, which makes the climax of his journey in the story even more moving. You really can sympathise with Mark and his actions within the book.

Touched By An Angel wasn't the only book I bought on Saturday; I also got The Coming Of The Terraphiles, by Micheal Moorcock. It's another Doctor Who book, but not one from the NSA range, and I'll give you a full review once I've read it. That's all for now.