After the dull The Death of Art, Damaged Goods focuses on an action packed plot which is a nice
blend of traditional Doctor Who plotting and the Virgin New Adventures style of
storytelling. The change in style is
refreshing and it really lends to the Earth like feel of the novel. The drama comes from the characters and the
fear comes from the invasion of an entity.
The plot is as complex as The
Death of Art, but complexity is required with this story. As this is the case this review will contain more
spoilers than my reviews normally do, so you have been warned. We open on Christmas Eve, 1977 where Bev
Tyler sees her mother Winnie make some sort of a deal with a mysterious Tall
Man. She follows her mother outside
where she sees the Doctor. The way
Davies describes the scene sets the tone for the rest of the novel and sets up
our main human characters. The tone is
bleak and sad and is best exemplified in the way Davies describes the Doctor:
He
must have edged forward a fraction, ambient light revealing a smudged
impression of his clothing: a cream jacket, splattered with mud, and a battered
white hat…despite the dark and the distance, Bev could see his eyes. They were
looking at her…She thought he smiled at her, just a small smile, but one which gave
no comfort…Bev always imagined that these old, wise, terrible men must have
long white beards and flowing robes, but now she realized that they looked like
this: small and crumpled and so very, very sad.
The novel then cuts to
introduce us to our villain, Simon Jenkins aka the Capper. Jenkins is a drug dealer and notorious around
the Quadrant, the housing complex the novel is set at. We are introduced to him with flowing prose
about who he is and why he’s feared.
Davies then gives us a shock with the villain of the story committing
suicide. He douses himself in gasoline
and sets himself on fire.
The sense of foreboding
present in these early scenes doesn’t let up as we cut to ten years later where
Harry Harvey, a man struggling with his own sexuality, is mugged in a
graveyard, but is saved by the dead Capper who rises from a grave in this
terrifying scene depicted on the front cover of the novel. This first chapter is the only real
exposition we get for the novel as we learn most of our principle characters
and things are set in motion. A small
mistake Davies makes is that he tries to lighten the mood by cutting to New
York and introducing a waitress to get the Doctor into the plot. This waitress is set up as if she will be
important to the plot later on, but she doesn’t appear outside of this chapter.
The story is now set up
and we can get on into the real meat of the story. The Doctor, Chris, and Roz move into the
Quadrant due to a trail of grisly deaths from the cocaine outbreak in the
1980s. The novel consists of two plots,
first is the tracking down of the cocaine and the second is dealing with the
psychic powers of Gabriel Tyler, Bev Tyler’s younger brother, who seems to be a
source of relief to the people of the Quadrant.
They intertwine as the twist of the novel is that Gabriel Tyler is
actually a twin to Steven Jericho who is slowly dying in a hospital bed. That Christmas Eve, Winnie Tyler gave away
one of her children for 30,000 pounds payment in an act of desperation and ever
since Gabriel has been like a vampire to Steven. The psychic powers of Gabriel have attracted
an N-form to the Quadrant. An N-form is
a Gallifreyean weapon created to fight in the war against the Vampires and
Davies would use them as soldiers in the Time War of the new series. The N-Form wishes to bring others into the
world through the infected cocaine and take back Gallifrey. It has overtaken the Capper’s body and is now
distributing the drug amongst the world.
The climax is a bloody battle where the Doctor has to take cocaine to
defeat the N-Form leading to the deaths of everyone in the novel except for
Gabriel who is put into a coma.
The cocaine plot is
pontificated with a large cast of varying characters including the main
cast. Roz does her usual job of being
the standard companion to the Doctor as she is always by his side, but she gets
to have her motherly side shine through as she does care for the Tyler
children. She doesn’t believe in
coincidence, not since she stepped foot into the TARDIS and she knows exactly
what’s at stake if the Doctor has been meddling again. Her portions of the plot are really the least
interesting in the novel as Chris gets a much longer time in the spotlight. Chris is the one searching for the cocaine,
so the Doctor can hopefully destroy it.
He does this with his new lover, David Daniels. Chris and David hook up in this novel. Chris is there to give David comfort that his
lifestyle will not always be discriminated against as well as to be the butt of
several jokes. Chris is the comic
relief, or at least the closest equivalent of comic relief in this dark
novel. David and Harry also have an
interesting relationship as David only lives with Harry because Harry’s late
life let him move in to their front room.
Harry of course is questioning his own sexuality which in and of itself
is an interesting plot to delve into.
Gabriel Tyler is also an interesting character as he is almost
omnipotent yet comes across as a normal child which is something that really
works in the novel. The other character
of note is Eva Jericho who is the madwoman who takes over as villain and wishes
to take Gabriel in exchange for her own son, the damaged goods of the
title. She’s a completely sadistic woman
and you really don’t know if you’re going to survive if you met her in the
street. The ending is extremely bleak as
nobody survives which is really hard to finish a book with.
To summarize, Damaged Goods is a novel that shows an
interesting glimpse of what could have been when Russell T. Davies was in
charge of Doctor Who. Dark and
captivating the novel does not disappoint with twists and turns that keep you
guessing as to how this is going to end at every moment. 95/100
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