State of Change

"The Romans have been learning how to build an atomic bomb!"

Writer: Christopher Bulis

Format: Novel

Released: December 1994

Series: The Missing Adventures 05

Featuring: Sixth Doctor, Peri

Synopsis

"In less than 25 years the Romans have invented electricity generation, airships, radio and who knows what else. Is that reasonable?"

Ancient Egypt, 41 BC. The Doctor and Peri watch as Cleopatra's pleasure barge glides up the Nile in preparation for her fateful meeting with Mark Antony. And an alien presence observes the TARDIS, waits for it to dematerialise, then pounces. 

When the time ship lands, the Doctor and Peri find themselves in Ancient Rome, in the tomb of Cleopatra. But something is very wrong. The tomb walls depict steam-driven galleys and other disturbing anachronisms. The Roman Empire is preparing for a devastating war – using weapons from the future capable of destroying the entire world.

Verdict

State of Change was a very good novel and served as a great addition to the tales of the Sixth Doctor and Peri. Any novel featuring the pair just seems to be perfect to fit between Revelation of the Daleks and The Trial of a Time Lord as there is so much room there and this filled in well whilst looking back on a few episodes in their first televised series together. The connections with Vengeance on Varos were not a huge surprise given the appearance of Peri on the book's front cover, but the idea of reverting back to a past incarnation if you like was fantastic. It worked well with Peri in how the mental impact that the transformation on Varos had on her was so powerful that it was what she reverted to without the protection of the TARDIS from the energy flux tube that sent things into turmoil. The Doctor though reverted back to his fifth incarnation in an outstanding chapter cliffhanger relatively early on. I really did think that was magnificent and really peaked my interest after a slightly slow and muddled start. The idea of Ancient Rome as a setting worked terrifically and was very well suited to a Doctor Who adventure, but then throw in that the Romans have modern technology because of a mysterious Oracle and you have the makings of a very enjoyable read. Finding out that the Oracle was actually an exact copy of the Doctor's TARDIS console was definitely a good surprise as I really didn't expect that to be the giver of future knowledge to Roman society. It definitely made sense though! The Doctor's reaction was very good. I thought the characterisation of Colin Baker's Sixth Doctor was brilliant throughout the book and they did a very good job of capturing his relationship with Peri. That was definitely a strong point of the novel for sue. Finding out how things had got copied, including the entire setting, was very intriguing and certainly a point of fascination. I thought the return of the Rani was handled pretty well and I love that she returned chronologically in a story prior to Time and the Rani. The description of how she escaped the clutches of the Master and her TARDIS was very good and I'm glad that it was addressed rather than have her apparent demise dismissed. Her taking on the persona of Cleopatra Selene was very good and I loved the moment where the Doctor named her and revealed the culprit behind all that was going on. In fact, she hadn't actually concocted everything that was going, but more so had taken advantage. The prologue featuring her, along with a number of intermittent paragraphs, whilst nameless worked well and probably should have continued more frequently given that the Rani's reveal came after page 200. That's a long time to wait for the identity of your villain! The Doctor's planned fight with Gandos was terrific and the battle itself was actually great. I loved how confident he was and being able to utilise his surroundings and let the personality of his third incarnation take over was wonderful, even if it didn't make a huge amount of sense. It was a lot of fun to play with. Peri undergoing the transformation she endured on Varos was intriguing, but this time she was in control and was able to utilise her abilities. She was getting a bit too comfortable in feathers and wings and having Peri actually fly to save the Doctor as he retro-regenerated back to his first incarnation was just incredible. Getting a brief moment with what was technically the First Doctor and Peri was delightful. The shining character in the book was without doubt Ptolemy as he was just pretty marvellous. His shock at finding out what had happened to his world was good and he seemed to accept quite easily all that happened. The politics that was on show throughout between the triumvirate of him, Cleopatra and Alexander was excellent and the latter stages of the novel focusing on getting Ptolemy the support of the people to gain power was terrific. I really did enjoy that and the pacing of him getting the support required worked very well. I was a big fan of that aspect of the book. The conclusion itself could have probably been a tad clearer, but the fate of the Rani after being ousted by the Doctor was decent whilst being both final and ambiguous. Iam was a good character and it was nice for the Doctor to be able to let it know that instead of adhering to the Rani's wishes and maintaining the copy world here, he could build them there own world where he could then go and never be alone. That was a nice thought. As a whole, this was a very enjoyable read and definitely managed to take my mind off troubling times. Overall, a great book!

Rating: 8/10