BBC Books The Nightmare of Black Island

Author	Mike Tucker
ISBN	0 563 58650 3
Published	2006

Synopsis: On a lonely stretch of Welsh coastline, a fisherman is killed by a hideous creature from beneath the waves. When the Doctor and Rose arrive, they discover a village where the children are plagued by nightmares, and the nights are ruled by monsters. Bronwyn Ceredig, the old woman of the village, suspects that ailing industrialist Nathaniel Morton is to blame, but the Doctor has suspicions of his own.

• A Review by John Seavey

A Review by John Seavey 18/9/07

I did some catching up on my Doctor Who reading over the last week or so, and thus have insights and opinions (well, mostly opinions) on the latest batch or two of Doctor Who novels.

By this point, just Mike Tucker's name on the spine of a Doctor Who book fills my soul with existential dread, the sort of feeling a comic book fan gets when they see "Art by Rob Liefeld" or a movie fan gets when they see "Directed by Uwe Boll". So it's pretty safe to say that a big chunk of my enjoyment of this book came from plain and simple lowered expectations.

But, that said, it's not bad. Freed from a need to be "literary", Tucker can just concentrate on writing an enjoyable action-horror mystery featuring the Doctor and Rose, and include plenty of spooky monsters, evil aliens, and mysterious mansions. It's nothing but an entertaining run-around, but after getting several non-entertaining run-arounds from Tucker, it's a serious step up. (And I did get a chuckle from the "guard duck" bit. But maybe I was just in a goofy mood.)