Corpse Marker of Death

This novel is a sequel to the 1977 Doctor Who serial, Robots of Death. Corpse Marker is very well written by Chrish Boucher (the original writer of Robots of Death) and very well read by David Collings (one of the actors from that serial), though it will make much more sense of you have actually seen Robots of Death.
Once again there is a robot uprising, and once again the fourth Doctor and Leela are drawn in to the fray!
Well worth a listen for classic Doctor Who fans, or indeed people wanting high concept science fiction.

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Enjoyable but flawed.

Would you listen to Doctor Who: Corpse Marker again? Why?

I did enjoy Corpse Marker as it was an entirely engaging story - even if it did feel like most instances of swear words were put in solely to try and make the book sound more adult than it was - but it did feel sometimes that the Doctor was a secondary character compared to the returning characters from The Robots Of Death and Leela. As such I would be unlikely to relisten to the story.

What did you like best about this story?

One of my favourite story elements was the inclusion late in the book of the Tarranists as this showed just how quickly people could be deified even if they were horrendous people in actuality.

I was also a big fan of Leela's characterisation as it showed her thought process in a way that was original to my understanding although this could be expected as the author of Corpse Marker was Leela's original creator.

Any additional comments?

I recommend this book overall - roughly a 7.5 out of 10 - however I would state that this book is not a sequel for ROD in the sense that it has a similar plot but in the sense that the atmosphere is something akin to a slightly more adult or intense sequel with engaging political games. If you are aware of this I believe you have a larger chance of enjoying the story.

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Killer robots on an unpleasant world

Pretty obvious, but before reading this you need to read or see the Fourth Doctor Who series Robots of Death in order for this book to make much sense.

This book expands on the frankly unpleasant world of Kaldor (The Doctor and Leela landed on previously), only it is now some (unspecified) years later. The three survivors of the previous story have moved on, for better or worse, and we find them once again seemingly being the target of killer robots.

There was a hint of ‘Dune’ in Robots of Death (giant mining machines working in the desert) and there is similar here in regards to odious politics and oneupmanship - like in the Dune books, everyone is utterly unpleasant to one another for their own gain. Reading it was a little like being in an office full of colleagues who truly dislike one another.

It’s quite humourless; if the Doctor tries to crack a joke he gets threatened with a stun weapon, and everyone is always bitching at someone else. Quite why he and Leela didn’t get straight back in the Tardis to find some nicer company I don’t know. Also, they’re both not really in it that much, which is a shame.

I’d have liked it to have been set on a desert mining machine again, if only in part, but the story instead is placed in the city on the edge of the desert.

One disappointment was the lack of stylised, smock-wearing robots from the first story - although they are there, there is more emphasis on a new, human-looking cyborg variant (so the book’s cover art is a bit deceptive).

There’s also a small amount of slightly adult subject matter here and there - a decadent party, a reference to sex toys, sex workers and the like. Not really kid’s stuff.

The name Taren Capel (the previous story’s villain) must have been repeated at least 1,000 times throughout and this gets woefully tedious. You’ll see what I mean.

I like the audiobook’s background sound effects - reminded me of the background sounds on the Alien audiobook. Interesting and abstract but not too intrusive.

As with all audiobooks I recommend slowing the playback speed down to 6.5.

That’s about it, really. All in all it is a worthwhile-enough effort, despite the annoyances I have mentioned.

My favourite Fourth Doctor books are Scratchman and Shada, and I recommend those.

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1 person found this helpful

Where oh Where is D84?

Has Doctor Who: Corpse Marker put you off other books in this genre?

Dyed in the wool Whovian...If "Time Lash" or "Greatest Show in the Galaxy" didn't put me off, then this damned well won't

Which character – as performed by David Collings – was your favourite?

errrmmmm all much of a muchness

Any additional comments?

My biggest problems with this book are that it doesn't feel like a Doctor Who book. And for all the fact it is a sequel to Robots of Death it could actually have taken place anywhere. Toos, Poole and Uvanov are the only links to the past story, the robots, as far as I can see the only reason to revisit the planet at all, are so evolved past the originals its equivalent to leaping from Sputnik to Hubble without going through any of the technological revolutions required to actually get there.Where oh Where is D84 when you need him?

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Disappointing Robots of Death sequel

Chris Boucher’s interesting sequel expands on the aftermath and world of Robots of Death but doesn’t really add anything as exciting and chilling as the original. Whilst a novel exercise in a having the same TARDIS crew revisit characters a few years later it doesn’t work as much as I’d hoped. Despite a niche Blake’s 7 crossover there is some unexpected and out of place violence and perversity which felt out of place. David Collings’ lacklustre reading doesn’t make much effort to capture the characters very well, particularly Tom Baker’s fourth Doctor or Leela. Bit disappointing

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Roberts

loved this story; confusion abounds with intreague around every corner. definitely Dr who on top form with several twists.

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Doctor Who and the Robots of Duff

Oh dear: this really does not capture the feel of Doctor Who generally and definitely not the Fourth Doctor. I would not be at all surprised if this was not originally written in the Whoniverse at all but had the Doctor retro-fitted into it.

Practically the first thing the story did was dispense with the original Voc Robots etc. in favour of a new, less robotic, breed so that says a lot. The canonical characters do not ring true and could be anybody.

As well as discordant notes (The Doctor convincing someone they would be killed as a joke/incentive was particularly jarring) the Doctor is often sidelined for great chunks of the story. There are very few examples of particularly Doctor-like attributes being displayed (rather than being dispatched in any clever way arguably the main villain is removed by brute force) and it misses the broader dramatic appeal of the series and instead is SCI-FI in all-caps.

There is an attempt at world-building but it is pretty uninspired and quite painful for those who have not built up an immunity to the language of three-volume sci-fi mega-sagas. No good-natured 'reversing the polarity of the neutron flow' here. The most excruciating parts are the philosophical ramblings of an artificial mind in a Yoda-esque argot exploring the time-after-its-not-being-become-the-is-that-is-no-longer-the-was or some such agony: I was past caring. I think there was an explanation of why everything happened but - even if only because it failed to engage me - by the end I had no idea what had gone on.

The voice performance was fine but - and I could be projecting here - he did not seem to be enjoying himself. I cannot blame him.

If you are hoping for a cosy return to 70s: you will be disappointed. It must be the Blinovitch Limitation Effect at work.

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5 people found this helpful