Simon A.
Forward loves Russian literature and Doctor Who. I love Doctor Who and have not read
nearly enough Russian literature to consider myself a massive fan. Emotional Chemistry is a book that takes
its chapter titles from famous works of Russian literature from Chekov to Turgenev. The novel is split into three different time
periods in the history of Russia: the past, the relatively near future, and the
far future. It is also a story about
falling in love in ways that ultimately fall apart. Forward is attempting a tragedy with a TARDIS
team that is built upon tragedy. Fitz Kreiner
and the Doctor have both been through their own personal hells, arguably still
going through them while newcomer Trix MacMillan has her own traumas to work
through. It’s a shame then that Simon A.
Forward does not actually do much in terms of pushing these characters
forward. Emotional Chemistry is a
novel that reads closer to a stopgap in between bigger plot points. Timeless ended with Trix a new member
of the TARDIS team and the team realizing that Sabbath has some mysterious
bosses that have been behind apparently everything the Eighth Doctor Adventures
have been building towards. This is yet
another novel where there is a clear disconnect with the author writing and the
direction of the range, a problem that plagued much of the alternate universe
sequence that led to this point. There
is a feeling of distinct lack of communication between the writers as the range
is slowing down and reaching its eventual conclusion.
These things
would not be a terrible problem; however Simon A. Forward is an author whose
work seems to work better in short doses than in the form of a novel and even
than that is hit or miss. Emotional
Chemistry has an incredibly slow start, juggling three plotlines while
lacking a consistency in terms of pace.
Much of the first half of the novel would be considered a Doctor-lite
story which again is not necessarily an issue, there have been novels such as Birthright
that barely feature the doctor but his presence and influence is felt. For Emotional Chemistry, Forward
almost seems to have had a piece of original speculative fiction focused on
Russian history and future time travel experiments, but it was retrofitted into
the world of Doctor Who. The big Doctor
Who connection is the Zygma experiments featured in The Talons of
Weng-Chiang, with several mentions of the character of Magnus Greel, but as
this is written into a sequel it the references feel like a retrofitting. The supporting
characters are largely military characters, partially working for OGRON, the
Russian branch of UNIT, which is for whatever reason a reference to the Ogrons. This and the Greel references make me wonder
if it’s a tribute to the fact that some of the earlier VHS releases were The
Talons of Weng-Chiang and Day of the Daleks.
These are
the ideas with the most depth, the supporting characters feel all particularly
like stock characters once the TARDIS team becomes important to the plot. The most interesting side character is Aphrodite. Aphrodite metatextually is representative of
the relationships. She’s an alien who is
the result of her parents love in a society where having children were
forbidden and much of her characterization is about being empathic and someone’s
missing half. While she is given the
name of the Greek goddess of love, her story has its roots in Plato’s Symposium
in a dialogue with Aristophanes about the third sex of a hermaphrodite, split
in half by Zeus and searching for their other half to become whole again. This is a perfectly fine myth and piece of
philosophy to explore in a science fiction novel, but Emotional Chemistry
never really achieves what it sets out to do because it eventually has to
remember the Doctor, Fitz, and Trix are there.
Overall, Emotional
Chemistry is actually a really good idea for an original piece of
speculative fiction, but in pitching and writing it as a Doctor Who
novel it feels pointless. Simon A.
Forward feels more at home writing the novel as a series of connected short
stories instead of a continuing narrative, only really committing to that when
it becomes more focused on the Doctor. This
leaves it lacking in a direction and with Forward’s basic prose it becomes a
chore that only covers ground that’s been covered elsewhere in the range. 3/10.
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