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Dreamstone

Moon

MAY 1998

Last month’s Legacy of the Daleks had a markedly Target feel to it; there was almost something infantile about it. This month’s offering, on the other hand, is a much more mature novel in many respects, yet somehow it still manages to carry over the children’s storybook feel. Clocking in at just two hundred and fifty pages and with chapters seldom lasting for any longer than ten pages, Paul Leonard’s Dreamstone Moon is a quick read

that an adult can breeze through in about ninety minutes.

Leonard’s story is for the most part pretty routine. Set in roughly the same period as Legacy of the Daleks – the aftermath of the Dalek invasion - the plot of Dreamstone Moon is built around some magical stones that have the potential to enhance and capture dreams, and

of course these stones are being mined by a disreputable mining conglomerate – the Drea-mstone Mining Corporation.

The most notable thing about this novel is that the Doctor and Sam are separated through-out. Dreamstone Moon picks up Sam’s story shortly after leaving Hirath in Longest Day, and the Doctor’s shortly after Legacy of the Daleks. One thing I feel Leonard does capture very well here is the Doctor’s ambiguity about whether or not he should even bother looking for Sam – perhaps she’ll be better off without him? And better still, the events of the story only exacerbate his doubts. Suffice it to say that by the end of this book, the Doctor is still travelling alone.

For Sam’s part, her chunk of the

plot is banal but Leonard handles

her character very well in any event.

I particularly enjoyed reading about

her friendship with Aloisse, who

from reading Leonard’s vibrant

descriptions I gather looks like a

barnacled version of Alpha Centauri from the Peladon stories. Say what you will about Paul Leonard, his gift for realising inimitable alien creatures is second to none.

On the whole though I was rather let down by this one, much as I was with the preceding few novels if truth be told. I can’t really point to anything dreadful about it, but particularly from today’s perspective there is little here to get excited about.

Copyright © E.G. Wolverson 2010

E.G. Wolverson has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

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