Paper Moon

"Those trees can think. Maybe they can feel pain too."

Writer: Louie Stowell

Format: Novel

Released: March 2021

Series: Team TARDIS Diaries 01

Featuring: Thirteenth Doctor, Yaz, Ryan, Graham

Synopsis

The Doctor and her friends travel to a psychic forest on a distant moon where they find themselves in terrible jeopardy. 

But rampaging robots and perilous pirates will turn out to be the least of their worries...

Verdict

Paper Moon was a great story! This is actually the debut instalment of the Team TARDIS diaries double that I actually started in back to front style with Ghost Town – and even directly leads into it rather brilliantly with Graham logging in the psychic diary the same day twice – but this serves as another very good read! I think it's great to be able to get a new story featuring the Thirteenth Doctor's first TARDIS team and the name of the series certainly seems apt. The fam altogether again for a very intriguing psychic paper origin story! I think the concept behind the trees on Boda was tremendous and I love that we learn how the Doctor came to be in possession of the psychic paper. It's a fun little story of how she was gifted it after saving the planet of Boda from a barking wasp, and now we learn how she came to be in possession of the physic diary too! That was a neat touch. I thought the format was strong and I like the concept of different users and changing the perspective of the story from each of the companions, but the little sticky notes from the Doctor throughout were fantastic. Although her joke about the anti-gravity book was so bad that it was good. I could definitely see this incarnation revelling in that kind of humour. The Doctor being happy to be invited to a funeral seemed odd, but then we learned more about the trees and how they were already at peace with their own deaths because they saw their entire existence. And they knew what they became in how they were turned into psychic paper. It was really interesting stuff and not something I was expecting for a story primarily aimed at younger children so I'm delighted to have had the chance to learn about this! It's really rather fascinating and kind of poetic. Of course, something like the psychic paper would be craved from many species far and wide and that's what happened here with the invasion and the attempted thievery. The Doctor being on hand to stop that was nicely done and it explained why she was gifted the psychic diary, and having her thoughts retroactively added was a unique style. She was telling us anecdotes from the future perspective of the story. I thought the addition of the hard hat as a caveat for her being in read only mode was good and also why the user could still transfer their thoughts into the diary whilst not being impacted by the raw paper. There were definitely some things in the story that felt like they were added in editing when it came to needing an explanation, but I can't fault them for being addressed! Even if it seems slightly obvious, it's better than to not address them at all. I thought the illustrations in the story were excellent and I really loved how the Thirteenth Doctor in particular was drawn. Her depiction was so on point and just authoritative whilst seeming fun at the same time. There was a strong energy. Graham definitely seemed the least interesting of the companions when it came to the different users and I think the author agreed as his segment certainly seemed a lot smaller than those of Yaz and Ryan, and when they were reunited he just handed it back to Yaz! I thought the little glimpse at the Doctor as a user was fun as she was just far too powerful and almost overwhelmed the entire thing! I thought the diary was a good way to make subtle references to Yaz's feelings towards the Doctor as well. She thought she was beautiful and just the most amazing woman. It's not hard to see why Yaz felt this way. The way the story ended with the Producers being saved was good and I liked the TARDIS tying in with the psychic nature of the trees to save Yaz. Overall, a terrific little read! 

Rating: 8/10