Struggling with a Dr Who book

[KatyMac]

I read hundreds of 'old' Dr Who books as a child/teenager and I totally love the new Dr Who books

But I picked up some older Dr Who books from the 2nd hand shop & I am really struggling with them - I am only on my second but it is very dark/depressing

Has anyone else had this problem?

[QueenBhannae]

OOOOoooohh yes!!

I have also found some of them a bit solemn!
I have some eighth Dr ones here that are a bit advanced and overdone in prose and have unnecessarily complex sentance structure. Also the content is quite dark imo.
The most recent Dr books were quite simplistic and my eight year old enjoyed them very much.
Am off to find some torchwood ones now for me. lol

[Rhian82]

Ooh, I'm a longstanding Who geek with many hundreds of Who books - hope I can help!

There are several different types of Doctor Who book. The original Target novelisations were children's books, as are the new ones. (Not to say adults can't enjoy them, I certainly do, but they're fairly straightforward, more similar to the TV series and can be enjoyed by kids). However, the books that got published while the series was off the air are adult books, as most of fandom had grown up by then. And they used the 'adult book' thing to make them quite a bit more dark, depressing, serious etc. Sometimes a good thing, sometimes they get a bit 'up themselves' and try too hard, leaving you with something no one would really want to read!

I love all of them - I grew up on the Target novelisations, then was in my teens for the adult books and loved having something while the show wasn't being made. But they're not necessarily for everyone.

What series of books are they a part of KatyMac? Virgin Publishing did seventh Doctor 'New Adventures' and previous Doctor 'Missing Adventures' for years, then the BBC took the licence back and did the Eighth Doc books and their own Missing Adventures. I've only read the first few years worth of BBC books, and at first they weren't as adult in themes as the Virgin books, but then they seemed to get a bit self-involved and confusing with Faction Paradox and all sorts of stuff.

[KatyMac]

They are BBC books

(sorry for the dealy - I only just renenbered I started this)