Map of the Stars

(1) Now We Have a Map of the Stars (Doctor Who)

By Zauberer Sirin
Reviewed by Kathryn A on 7th June 2008 (30)
Tags: Novel, AU Divergent Timeline, Adventure, Romance
Characters: Tenth Doctor, Martha Jones, ?Simm!Master
(659K)

Summary: Total AU: Martha never left and the Master was never killed. The Doctor keeps his promise of taking care of him. Sort of. Martha helps. Kind of. And then Dalek plot happens.

The prologue entices you in; vivid in the second person present tense, like a lucid dream.

The rest is mostly third-person (still present tense), but there is some lovely, lovely writing. Some typos, some PoV problems, and sometimes I've had to go back and re-read something to figure out who is saying what, but it's still worth it. Oh, the mind games the Master loves playing. And the way the Doctor and Martha hold their own, especially Martha. Then we get portents, and approaching menace, and the feeling that the very things they are doing to prevent it are actually bringing the menace closer.

Another thing I like about this is that, with such a long story, the character relationships have time to develop gradually, and thus, believably.

The Torchwood characters felt a bit off to me, but I think that was because I was expecting them to behave like Season 2 Torchwood, and they weren't.