Who Reviews Nuclear Time by DJ Forrest

Written by Oli Smith

For BBC Books

Published 2010

‘My Watch is running backwards’

Colorado, 1981. The Doctor, Rory and Amy, land just outside a 1950s style village out in the desert, called Appletown, where the neighbours have a touch of the Stepford Wives about them and just as the Doctor and his companions begin to figure it all out, a big nuclear bomb is heading their way.

You’ve heard me mention before, how certain books I’ve read have been absolutely brilliant, and I doubt a book can top the one I’m raving about, but Oli Smith’s Nuclear Time just did. There’s a lot of to-ing and fro-ing in this story, which keeps up the momentum. It begins with a scientist, (doesn’t it always) who creates a robot and promptly falls in love with her, who then sees his work go up in flames, is offered a new position within the military, creates more robots, but still favours his first creation over the others. So basically, it’s about a lot of robots who when reprogrammed cause a lot of mayhem for the military – but then, that’s what they were programmed for, but of course, now that they’ve caused the mayhem, costly mayhem, it’s what to do with them now they’re no longer of any use.

Nuclear Time for me, has to be one of the best Doctor Who stories for the Eleventh, because, for once, it doesn’t really require the help of the companions. Sure, they’re in their own little predicament, stuck in Appletown with a bunch of crazed killer robots, but it’s the Doctor who comes to the fore and causes a lot of disruption to time itself, when he captures within the Tardis, a nuclear bomb destined for Appletown.

Now I’m not going to give away too much from this story, and believe me, the bomb is only a small portion of the novel – there is way more story than that to keep you focused.

The story flicks from one year to another and back again, building on the relationship between the scientist and the soldier in charge of the new agenda.

The Doctor has his work cut out in this story because when he alters time, by trapping the bomb in a stasis field, life for him revolves around walking backwards everywhere, and talking backwards, because, let’s face it, his watch is going backwards too.

It’s an ingenious idea and works so fluidly that, this is my new No.1 favourite Who novel.

Thank you Oli Smith for the bicycle ride of my life, albeit backwards.