Under Review

 

As well as the official release date on Monday, there has been another exciting development with The Long Game this week - reviews of the book have begun to appear! Three over the past three days, in fact, and I'm pleased to say that they have all been positive ones.

So let's take a look at them, shall we...? Well, it's my blog, and my book, and I'm showing off, so yes - we shall!

The first review appeared on Tuesday, on the website of the venerable old science-fiction magazine Starburst, which was first published back in 1977. Written by Paul Mount, it's an exceptionally positive review with which I am very pleased, particularly as he picked up on the fact that I really wanted to get across the background and context of what was going on at the BBC at that time, and how it then related to the story of Doctor Who coming to be recommissioned. A five-star review, no less, too!

You can read the piece on Starburst's website by clicking here.

"Astonishingly interesting and page-turning... Brilliantly collated and written with precision... An essential book for anyone interested in the arcane world of British television production."

Then yesterday, Wednesday, came the first review of the book in print. This was in the pages of another long-running and well-respected British science-fiction magazine, in this case SFX. I've often been a buyer of SFX down the years and have of course frequently perused their review pages, so it was an interesting experience to see a book of my own in there!

This review, by Calvin Baxter, was another positive one. In this case, I like that the fact that he realised that much of the point of the book was to try and collect together all those disparate elements which might have been chronicled in various other places before, but never all brought together into one whole story.

You can read Calvin's review in the current edition of SFX, issue 346, which should be available for the next month at Smith's and other good newsagents.

"The interviewee list is impressive... Future TV historians will be grateful."

Then today came the view from the website Sci-Fi Bulletin. This review by Nick Joy is fairly short, but again delivers a positive verdict. Nick picks up on an element which was another of my intentions, the fact that many of these stories will have been experienced by fans around at the time as news items in Doctor Who Magazine and the like back in the day, and The Long Game gets under the skin of them and explains what was actually happening in more detail.

Nick's review of the book is available to read on scifibulletin.com by clicking here.

"Filling a gap in the behind-the-scenes development of Doctor Who's return, you’re bound to discover a few new facts in this well-researched history."

So, all-in-all, a very positive set of reviews! I am of course keeping my eagle eye out for any more, but do let me know if you spot any! Or, of course, if you're involved with a publication or a website which might be interested in reviewing The Long Game.

And if any of this has whetted your appetite for the book but you don't yet have a copy, you can of course order one direct from my publishers Ten Acre by clicking here.