NA #37 Sanctuary

Sanctuary by David A. McIntee

In Brief: Forced to flee the Tardis, The Doctor and Bernice find themselves in 13th-century France. There they find a beseiged fortress, religious zealots, an amorous mercenary and no aliens or monsters.

Going into Sanctuary I expected the worst. Considering the pain I felt while reading McIntee's earlier First Frontier (Nevada Desert. The Master.) I was expecting another 250 pages of poor characterisation, languid plotting and giant impenetrable blocks of descriptive text. I'd *like* to be able to say that I was pleasantly surprised and that suddenly McIntee has become a good and enjoyable author. Unfortunately the best I can say is that he's gotten better, he's at least seeming competent but needs a much better editor.

While I still have the problem with his books (going back to White Darkness) of not being able to tell some of the characters apart at least here he's decided to work with a smaller group so it's a bit easier to tell who is who. I also find that I tend to not be able to keep track of the various motivations at play so always feel at a disadvantage with some of the parts of the book, particularly if The Doctor or Bernice aren't involved.

However McIntee has managed at least one decent character in Guy DeCarnac, a mercenary who gets a warm tingly feeling for Bernice by the end of the book. While at times not much more than a medieval cliche at least he's memorable enough to remember from chapter to chapter. But otherwise no one character other than The Doctor or Bernice manages to feel like more than if they were part of a not very good medieval Knights & Castles film.

Probably starring Nicholas Cage.

Thankfully the setting is a good one, with the Catholic Inquisitions offering a fairly dramatic threat in the book. And McIntee has done his research, although sometimes it can slow things down a bit as we get a bit of a descriptive history-lesson rather than an important part of the narrative.

The last section of the novel, as the refugees sanctuary of The Roc is pillaged is definitely a stand-out as McIntee doesn't pull his punches in describing what are some very horrific, and historically accurate, atrocities. Unfortunately (there's that word again) the build-up lets the book down, as there's really not much of a story, as a lot of the characters meander around and occasionally get into sword-fights. The tone seems to be set by The Doctor and Bernice, who never really feel like active participants in the narrative as they're really just waiting around until the Tardis repairs itself and returns for them.

I'd say the best aspect of Sanctuary is that it holds a unique place in the New Adventures series in having no extra-terrestrial element other than the regular characters. No Timewyrm, no Pyrovilles, no Tereleptils, just the Tardis and the locals. While I have some problems with the book I still think that "pure" historical stories have a place in Doctor Who, and yet we've not seen it in the show itself since 1967's "The Highlanders".

I realise I'm missing 1982's "Black Orchid" but I'm not counting that story since it's crap. and dancing.

So I won't say that Sanctuary was a bad book, it was just that all of the problems I've mentioned meant that it was uninvolving (which explains why it took me so long to finish the thing). I can put up with a lame story if the characters are interesting and vice versa, but I can't live on setting alone.

Which probably explains why I'll never get through the Lord of the Rings books.