To accompany our Book Club reading I thought it might be fun to discuss the wider writings of The Clockwise Man’s author, Justin Richards.
What are your favourite Justin Richards books? As a writer he has spanned both the Virgin and BBC book eras and is often seen as one of the more traditional authors of those ranges. He was also the BBC ranges consultant and has written the Monster Files webcasts and numerous BF and BBC audios.
Some of Justin’s bibliography:
- Theatre of War
- System Shock
- The Sands of Time
- Option Lock
- Demontage
- The Banquo Legacy
- The Burning
- Time Zero
- Sometime Never…
- Dreams of Empire
- Millennium Shock
- Grave Matter
- The Shadow in the Glass
- The Clockwise Man
- The Deviant Strain
- The Resurrection Casket
- Martha in the Mirror
- Code of the Krillitanes
- Apollo 23
- The Angel’s Kiss
- Devil in the Smoke
- Plague of the Cybermen
- Silhouette
I swing back and forth with Richards’ writing. Some of his books I’ve really enjoyed and some I have really disliked.
The Banquo Legacy and The Burning are both excellent but I really did not enjoy The Deviant Strain or Dreams of Empire.
A good one if you enjoy a lot of fanwank is The Sands of Time - a sequel to Pyramids of Mars.
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Sands of Time is good. So is The Shadow in the Glass. Haven’t read Theatre of War, but quite enjoyed the Big Finish novel adaptation.
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He’s also written a lot for Big Finish as well.
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Interesting - I think I remember quite enjoying The Deviant Strain but it was a while ago since I read it. I did used to keep an eye out for his New Who novels when I was following them more closely, I think in general I tend to get on with his writing pretty well (certainly better than some other big names in the novels world, anyway)
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Indeed he has but I thought I’d restrict it to his books for this thread simply because the sheer number of Jago and Litefoot alone could have crashed the forum 
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Should Author Talk get its own tag, or should it be part of book club?
I actually really enjoy his work! My favourite is probably Theatre of War (his debut) because of how different it was (and still is, in my opinion) to anything else. He also created Braxiatel, a favourite character of mine, so I’m probably a little biased here. At worst, his stories run by and you forget them; he’s a very solid writer and editor, able to come up with Doctor Who stories quickly and get them on the page with meaning. He seems to just know how to do a standard Doctor Who story. Perhaps the consequence is that his stories aren’t always the most emotional or moving, but they’re certainly always fun - Demontage is one of the quickest books I’ve ever read. Whenever I see a Richards book coming up in my book binge, I know I’ll be in safe hands.
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It’s recently been revealed that Justin Richards has retired from writing.
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I’ve only read one story from him and that was Silhouette. It’s a good novel with a good plot and characters.
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Looking through Justin Richards and his Story Output doesn’t bring much Confidence. Most of his Short Stories are some of the weakest that I remember reading, sure you have The Glass Princess, which I thought was a nice Read, but beyond that, there isn’t much.
His Audio Stories are much better compared to that, Whisper of Terror is quite excellent. Red Dawn is perfectly fine. Time of the Daleks is a lot of wasted Potential.
And there are of course his Gallifrey Entries. Pandora and Inquiry are both very enjoyable, but on the weaker Side from the Gallifrey Stories that I listened to. But there are also the exceptional Mindbomb and there is also the superb Disassembled, both I rate 5 Stars easily.
If you even look at the Audiobooks he did, I thought his ‘War’-Trilogy for the BBC Audios was more than magnificent!
But enough about all the Talk of his other EU Work, let’s focus on his Book Output, shall we? Admittedly I haven’t read as much as I would like to, only 4 exactly, which is nothing by the amount of Books he did, but enough to at least somewhat comment on his Work.
Most of them aren’t much of my favorites.
Option Lock is great for Sam and very competent, but not one that stuck with me as much.
The Burning was excellent on the other Hand and much more like it!
Dreams of Empire was actually one of my first Doctor Who Novels and the very first for the second Doctor! It’s been a while, but I remember liking it fair enough, but not enough for me to remember it too well.
And there is also his NSA The Clockwise Man, which while it has Aspects that I liked, still was a very rocky Start for the NSA.
As a Writer, he strikes me as somebody who is very competent. Most if not all of his Stories are easy to follow. His Proses are very solid, and often he will get the Characters spot-on with. And yet.. he never sticks out for me. He did write some excellent Stories throughout his Time in the EU, and I am sure the more I read, the more I will find myself liking more of his Books and Stories. But so far? Yeah, he’s kinda the Definition of ‘very okay’ to me and I really don’t mean it as an Insult at all, he’s not bad at all. If anything, whenever I see his Name on a Story, I at least know I will get a few Aspects that I really enjoy, hardly any of his Stories are Bottom spots for me.
I hope he enjoys his Retirement from Writing 
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An interesting writer. While I loved The Sands of Time enough to reread it, something which never happens, I also bounced off hard from “The Time of the Daleks”. In any case, the breadth of his contributions to the Whoniverse—the Virgin books, Big Finish, the many reference books and compilations, stuff for the website, and yet more—can’t go unmentioned.
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Very sad to hear, enjoyed many of his stories xx
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Been meaning to read The Sands of Time for a while now and think I will start it today x
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I started re-reading The Sands of Time last week. Of the books by Justin Richards I’ve read, it is my favourite, so I’m glad to be reading it now as a little way of thinking about this author who contributed a lot to Who prose.
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This news prompted me into buying this book. I think it was the first ever ‘reference’ book I bought when I discovered the show, and I remember pouring over the pages, looking through so much stuff I was yet to discover as the classic DVDs slowly trickled out.
RIP.
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Just to say RIP Justin Richards. He will be missed. A true servant to the show. I really enjoyed so much of his output. He cared about DW. His passion shone through in his work. There are those more skilled in their craft with words, but he knew how to write a cracking good story that was true to the show.
Thank you, Justin, for your work and dedication. Thank you for being one of those who helped keep DW alive during the wilderness years. Your novels made me smile and your audios showcased some of your very finest work.
May the vortex take you on your way to new adventures.
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