Thursday 9 June 2011

DW: Hunter's Moon

Third book in the current set is Hunter's Moon by Paul Finch.

Hey, an actual story not on Earth! For the most part at least. There's a hunt going on, and guess who's on the running block? If you said 'random humans', you'd be correct. And it's up to the Doctor, Rory and Amy to stop them from dying. You know, after Rory joins them to run away from the hunters, and Amy is captured, and the Doctor is threatening to shoot them all... same old, same old.

While the basic concept isn't that original, Paul Finch does do a lot of work setting up a new civilisation and creates a decent atmosphere, and has a lot of action set pieces, so thumbs up for that. However, there is one disastrous things he does. Ahem...

Krauzzen, Krelbin, Konzalar...
Xaaael, Xorax, Xelos...
Zarbotan, Zubedai, Zalu...

Yep, all the alien names begin with K, X or Z. Which makes keeping track of who's whom near impossible. Certainly there were many times I didn't know which random collection of letters was talking. Now, we can recognise and differentiate English names, but even so having a Chester, Charles and Chuckie is just begging for trouble. Make 'em weird, but make 'em unique!

Aside from that, it's a decent enough book, that I rate higher than Dead of Winter, and lower than The Way Through The Woods.

[END]

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