Revelation of the Daleks by: Eric Saward

 

Revelation of the Daleks was written by Eric Saward from his television story of the same name.  It was the 173^rd story to be novelized by BBC Books.

 

Those following my reviews as I write them may have noticed that Resurrection of the Daleks was a novel which I called the worst book I had read so far in 2022.  Commissioned and published to finally complete the classic series Doctor Who novelizations, Revelation of the Daleks is a book where Eric Saward shows that he at least has the potential to grow as an author, though not enough to make this an enjoyable reading experience.  Many of the problems with the former are still present in Revelation of the Daleks, especially when the slaughter of the characters begins in the second half of the story.  Saward also introduces another body to be slaughtered which doesn’t need to even exist and is given his own backstory.  There’s just so much time dedicated to this character who is essentially a redshirt.  He is a character who doesn’t need to be there and doesn’t add anything, which is a thread to every aspect that Saward adds to the story bar the opening scenes in the TARDIS.  The opening scenes in the TARDIS is this small piece between the Doctor and Peri where they are actually allowed to be decent friends which makes a change from the television series’ bickering to a more light hearted friendly ribbing.  Sure, the bickering was toned down by Revelation of the Daleks but it wouldn’t have evolved into something like this until The Trial of a Time Lord.

 

There is something quite punchy to the pace of the first half of Revelation of the Daleks.  While it does take up the first half of the novel, Saward does explore the Doctor and Peri as characters which are fun while tightening some of the events of that first episode.  Just giving the characters the time to interact and be people is enough to make it feel as if the first episode is worth anything.  This is undercut by the end as there is added worldbuilding which doesn’t actually need to be there as it undercuts the Soylent Green-esque plot which doesn’t really get wrapped up in the novel while it does on television.  By the time things get to Part Two, Saward’s issue with cluttering every scene with asides and characters who shouldn’t be there at that time yet somehow taking the attention away from what is usually the focus of the scene in the television version of the story.  There also isn’t anything done to really establish scene or location after a certain point in the novel making it feel as if Saward got bored with writing the book after a while and just wrapped things up as quickly as he could.  This is somehow a shorter book than Resurrection of the Daleks and it’s something that makes the story have even less time to tell its story.

 

Overall, Revelation of the Daleks is a conclusion in its first half but quickly goes back into the weird, Douglas Adams style of writing which doesn’t mesh with the tone of the original television story.  There is at least some time spent on making the Doctor feel like the Doctor and Peri feel like Peri with Davors as a villain, however, this is undercut by not really following the witty dialogue and timing.  The Robert Holmes-esque double acts from television are also called double acts which makes things even more self-aware in a story that shouldn’t be self-aware.  4/10.