Doctor Who: The Virgin Novels #51 – Original Sin by Andy Lane

Doctor Who: The New Adventures
#39
Original Sin
By Andy Lane

Well that was a stone cold belter, wasn’t it?

Forgive the haste.  Sometimes I like to build up to that – since it’s a rare-ish occurrence, maybe it’s worth a bit of ceremony – but it can be such a relief to sit back and enjoy reading that I just want to get on with it.  So: yep.  Original Sin is One Of The Good Ones.  Thanks for reading!

Perhaps it’s not surprising, as Andy Lane is hardly new to all this.  There’s a confident spring in his step that no doubt comes with experience.  Yes, there’s a Prologue – it’s the law! – but you can forget any wiffly metaphysical guff.  Lane begins breathlessly with the tail-end of another adventure, one that leads directly into Original Sin.  I love stories that forgo the obvious “Arrive, ask questions, investigate” rigmarole, and this is a great way to circumvent it.

The prologue also displays some of the book’s overall strengths, things it generally shares with Lucifer Rising (co-written by Lane): world building and plot, working together.  Writers often get bogged down in one or the other, and both create their own challenges all by themselves.  The Menagerie came up with an interesting setting filled with lots of different life forms, but it couldn’t quite carve them out from each other or make them live.  Original Sin introduces us right away to the Hith, a lizard-like species with unusually poetic names like Homeless Forsaken Betrayed And Alone, a permanent reminder to other species of what happened to them.  This one has been shot, and whispers (Hitchcock-style) a gloomy pronouncement to Bernice about the fate of Earth.  Right away we’ve got an unusual species (whom we’ll see a lot more of) and something pressing to attend to on Earth.  Both these things get progressively more interesting.

The Earth Empire is prospering, but that really depends what species you are.  Lane takes a pessimistic (though perhaps not Transit pessimistic) view of our future, where humans have “offered assistance” to countless planets including Hithis, so in other words taken over, turfed them out and stolen their technology.  A current of xenophobia runs through humanity, even among the “nice” ones, as they regard displaced aliens (e.g. the Hith) as lowly or disgusting.  A Hith named Powerless Friendless allows us to explore this idea further, particularly as he lives in the Undertown.  Earth is divided into the prosperous and everyone else, which in itself isn’t a very original concept, but it mixes with Lane’s climate of speciesism to make something new.  The humans, ever self-loathing, have taken to “body beppling”: a means of transforming into anything they can think of, which is all the cosmetic rage.  This adds yet another dimension to the strange, sad cloud of conflict that surrounds this story, all of which explodes because of the plot, which involves a series of random and unprovoked murders that snowball into riots.  There it is again: a rich seam of world-building which you could almost take for granted, since it’s colourful and interesting, only the plot then finds a use for all of it.

Admittedly it’s a simple-ish plot, but there’s nothing wrong with that so long as it’s well executed.  A good murder mystery can be as satisfyingly simple or complicated as you make it, and the trail of death is not just unpleasantly memorable (as Lane must find new ways for people to dispose of each other) but also poignant, as the deaths have consequences, both personal and on a larger scale.  We do not, admittedly, see the full effect of the Earth Empire tearing itself to pieces – though there are newscasts that give a flavour of it at the start of each chapter – but this is ultimately one story that impacts on those wider issues, and it makes sense to keep our focus there.  Focus is another of those things that shouldn’t be taken for granted.

Speaking of personal consequences, then: Powerless Friendless is as cheery as his name suggests, but we have no difficulty in getting inside his slug-like skin, or feeling the scorn of almost everyone around him.  Perhaps more familiar to passing readers are a couple of law-enforcing Adjudicators named Chris and Roz (or in the latter case, Forrester) who are not only investigating the murders, but growing more aware of deception in their peers.  Forrester (I don’t really feel right calling her Roz – mind you, I’m still sticking with “Bernice” over “Benny”, as I don’t like the automatic masculinisation of companion names) is fighting her own personal battles as she copes with a new partner, having lost her previous one and mentor in unhappy circumstances.  Again, this is not brand new territory – you can see Lane’s keenness for pop culture in his references, which go beyond Doctor Who into adamantium and planets named Riggs and Murtaugh! – but it’s executed cleverly, drip-feeding us information over the course of the book.  Forrester runs the risk of being a tough, no-nonsense cliché, but there’s enough self-loathing (to do with her privileged upbringing) and begrudging humour to make her more.  Her long-suffering dialogue with the enthusiastic and adorable Chris is worth the price of admission.  “Hey!” said Cwej suddenly.  Bernice turned back to face him and Forrester.  “I've got an idea!”  “Treat it gently,” Forrester murmured, “it's in a strange place.”  She’ll fit right in with Bernice.  I’ll wait and see with Chris: he’s sweet and funny, but he’s got “write as a moron” written all over him.  The joke about his surname, which looks like Cwej but should be pronounced Shvey but he sticks with Cwej because it’s easier for everyone, takes so long to explain that it isn’t particularly funny.

Surprisingly, for a story gagging to show off world-shaking ideas and grisly murders, it’s also got character development for the regulars.  Bernice, mostly in terms of sympathy.  There are some clever reflections on her life with the Doctor, and how she constantly wants to A) get back in the TARDIS and B) get out of the damn thing, which make us aware that for a box that’s bigger on the inside, it’s still a box.  In the main though, she’s mostly there to field the plight of Homeless Forsaken (whose death starts it all) and Powerless Friendless, to whom she obviously feels an obligation.  There’s still plenty of delightful Bernice stuff, and her scenes with the Doctor (until, inevitably, they take separate paths) only make me more confident that these two belong together, and any writer not revelling in that is on the wrong bus.

Much more thoughtful, and perhaps more disturbing, is what this says about the Doctor.  You might not expect another book to delve into his thoughts straight after Human Nature, which was surely the definitive book on the subject.  But Original Sin shows there’s still plenty to needle at.  The Doctor, for all his whimsy and heroism, is quick to scoop out the brain of a dead man to examine the cause of his insanity.  In his fearful moments, which the plot provides in abundance and without cheating, he thinks darkly of the Valeyard and when he’s close to death, his eighth incarnation “waiting to take over”.  It’s his conversations with a psychopath, Professor Pryce, that provide the most sobering look: Pryce believes there is no truly solid argument against murder other than we do not want to be murdered, and realising that people can easily condemn and rationalise murder in the same breath, the Doctor sees sense in that.  He must prevent it simply because it’s what he believes is right.  He applies the same logic to time travel nearer the end, when another villain holds a mirror up to him; he is Time’s Champion for no particular reason, it’s just his lot.  It can be cool to mythologise the Doctor, but it’s refreshing to peel it back and show a guy just doing what he can, and must.

If you don’t know who the villain is lurking in Original Sin, well done; I wasn’t able to avoid it.  Fortunately, knowing does not take much away from the book, although it’s surely more fun not to know.  There is simply reams of other stuff to enjoy, and plenty of story to follow, leaving the late reveal of [redacted] more a treat than a vital ingredient.  The handling of said character (oh, all right, it’s wee Jimmy Krankie) is relished and doesn’t trample on the previous stuff, although a good deal of retcon is involved, turning them into a shadowy menace behind numerous other stories as well.  If you are a fan of their earlier appearance(s), I doubt you’ll be disappointed.  If you do know it’s them, be aware it’s not the all-singing, all-dancing Wee Jimmy Krankie Show as the reveal is a last-act thing.

On top of all the other spectacular (and yet focused, plot-driven) stuff going on, this is of course an introduction for new companions.  The Doctor pats the TARDIS and says it’ll be just like old times.  I have no idea how this will affect the dynamic, but they’re interesting and fun, and it doesn’t appear they’ll get in Bernice’s way, so I’m all for it.  Original Sin doesn’t read like a typical introductory story, with the twosome barely meeting the Doctor throughout, but there’s a lot to be said for doing things differently.  Whether or not they were always intended to depart in the TARDIS, they arrive in a rich story you’re likely to read compulsively.  It’s not as dazzlingly unusual as something like Human Nature, but what it does, it does in relentless style.

8/10