Plague of the Cybermen

"All over the graveyard, metal hands and arms thrust upwards like grotesque trees erupting from the grass."

Writer: Justin Richards
Format: Novel
Released: April 2013
Series: NSA 51

Featuring: Eleventh Doctor

Synopsis

'They like the shadows. You know them as Plague Warriors.'

When the Doctor arrives in the 19th-century village of Klimtenburg, he discovers the residents suffering from some kind of plague - a 'wasting disease'. The victims face a horrible death - but what's worse, the dead seem to be leaving their graves. The Plague Warriors have returned...

The Doctor is confident he knows what's really happening; he understands where the dead go, and he's sure the Plague Warriors are just a myth. But as some of the Doctor's oldest and most terrible enemies start to awaken he realises that maybe - just maybe - he's misjudged the situation.

Verdict

Plague of the Cybermen was an excellent novel! I really enjoyed a bonus meeting between the Eleventh Doctor and the Cybermen and I was delighted that they finally got a New Series Adventures book. I really liked the story told by Justin Richards and I thought a generic 19th century setting was really good. I probably would have preferred a more common place for the story to take place in and a specific year but it wasn't really important and it still worked wonderfully well. Klimtenburg became a very intriguing and eery place and I think its intimacy was what allowed it to work without the specific detail. Olga was a lovely character and she more than made up for the lack of the companion. She got on terrifically with the Doctor and I thought the writing of this incarnation was decent throughout with a very good likeness of Matt Smith portrayed on the page. There was the right level of humour and '... are cool' references and he really did seem like the clueless yet intelligent buffoon that we all love. The prologue with the Cyberman rising from the grave to kill Stefan really set the scene and it immediately made the Cybermen threatening and deadly which was a huge positive. I liked how the idea of them being scavengers was played out here and they were desperate following their spaceship crashing long ago. The stories that had come from that crash in the village were good and I also liked the central focus of the castle. The tunnels running to and from it provided a creepy element to the setting and I also liked how the Doctor mentioned that the Cybermen enjoyed the shadows. Their history in the village as Plague Warriors was superb and I really liked that once the Doctor arrived, the stories started to come true. Both Lord and Lady Ernhardt were fantastic characters and I found the revelation of the latter not being real quite a surprise. I probably shouldn't have though given how she was able to overpower a Cyberman with apparent ease. Her not knowing it was quite heartbreaking though, and the Doctor felt quite bad about himself. Her death was a horrific moment and Victor, her son, realising that she was gone was very saddening. His role as a partially-converted Cyberman was very interesting and him being converted from the neck down provided the Doctor with the ammunition to shut down the Cybermen for good. Their inability to act as we know they can due to power shortages was good and I loved the appearance of tombs - they were a colonising faction. The cliffhangers to some of the chapters were really nicely done and I have to say the pace of the story was brilliant. I read it incredibly quickly and that's obviously a great sign. The ending was good with Victor being part of the Cyber-network and the Doctor using him to convert the stored energy of the Cybermen back into them causing them to be obliterated. Victor wouldn't survive, but he knew that was a possibility thanks to the Doctor's honesty. I was quite surprised he didn't say goodbye to Olga and Kraus but I liked that they were together by the end of the novel. Overall, a wonderful read!

Rating: 9/10