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Somebody's interfering with time. The Doctor, Rose and Captain
Jack arrive on modern-day Earth to find the culprit - but
discover a Neanderthal man, 28,000 years after his race became
extinct. Only a trip back to the primeval dawn of humanity
can solve the mystery. Who are the mysterious humans from
the distant future now living in that distant past...?
Even
more so than Jacqueline Rayner's Winner
Takes All, this novel captures the fun aspects
of the new Doctor Who television series.
As
one might expect from Gareth Roberts, author of the splendid
Fourth Doctor novels The Romance of Crime, The English
Way of Death and The Well-mannered War, and writer
of episodes of Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased) and Swiss
Toni, the comedy quotient is high. Prehistoric humans
seem, to Rose's ears, to speak with London accents (thanks
to the TARDIS' translation systems), the Doctor quotes the
Gerald the Gorilla sketch from Not the Nine O'clock News,
Rose dons a fur bikini, and Captain Jack gets naked in order
to cause a big distraction. "Nah, that's not the biggest distraction
I've ever seen," the Doctor comments. Just as in the TV series,
Jack's sexuality prompts several light-hearted moments, such
as when he dons a sailor suit from the TARDIS wardrobe (having
lost his coat in Justin Richards' The
Deviant Strain.)
Roberts
continues the exploration of Jack's settling-in period as
a member of the TARDIS crew between the television episodes
The Doctor Dances
and Boom
Town. He and the Doctor seem to be getting
on quite well, but the Time Lord chooses to leave Jack rather
than Rose behind in the 21st century to rehabilitate an anachronistic
Neanderthal called Das. As a result, Jack is unfortunately
absent during most of the final three-quarters of the book,
as the Doctor and Rose travel back to the year 26,185 BC,
though the author does provide intermittent cutaways in the
form of amusing data records conveyed from Jack's point of
view.
Despite
its silliness, the novel uses some of the latest research
into the lives of prehistoric peoples. For example, Das speaks
with a surprisingly high-pitched voice (due to the Neanderthal
larynx being positioned higher in the throat than our own)
and is not the unintelligent dullard that his species is traditionally
assumed to be.
Roberts' future humans are almost as fascinating. Hailing
from a point in time in which all technology is analogue-based,
following the catastrophic destruction of all digital devices
and data, these people have also conquered all aliments of
the body and mind. Drugs instantly deliver relief from fear,
anger, grief, doubt and any other "negative" emotions. The
result is a dehumanised populace that is as creepy as it is
comical.
Only Human never quite recaptures the easy-going readability
of its opening quarter, due to the absence of Jack and Das.
Still, the author is only human too, and this is my only real
criticism of what is otherwise a very entertaining book.
Richard
McGinlay
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