The best Bond novel I have read in years. Higson manages to successfully transplant Fleming's character of Bond into a modern world setting, without a slavish adherence to the original series continuity (though there are some amusing injokes in there if you can spot them)...

1970 shows sci-fi developing way beyond its pulp roots, with barely a spaceship or alien in sight, and many of these tales could be read as mainstream fiction. Stories deal with social trends, racial tensions, war, faith, the dangers of uncontrolled scientific advances. There are satires on ...

Solar flares have caused intense climate change, the ice caps have melted, and the cities of the world lie underwater. This has all the trappings of post-apocalypse fiction: military expeditions trying to evacuate survivors to the cooler regions at the poles, a piratical warlord looting cities ...

A nuclear thing projects a man from the present day into the future, where Earth has become a backwater - a half forgotten corner of the massive galactic empire, the people of Earth treated as second class citizens. A leading archaeologist wants to prove that Earth is the forgotten original home ...

An interesting collection of short stories. Asimov's theme here is basically how advances in technology will affect the lives of people in the future. Technology is imagined through the lens of the 1950s, but the problems seem relevant to life today, as characters deal with the implications of ...

The Circuit Breaker sequence has probably been the best of these multi-media stories. This novel gives an interesting insight into the Fugitive Doctor, and indeed into how Jo Martin sees the character...

I'm fascinated by the way tv was made especially in the videotaped era, so the insane level of detail in this book recounting the day-to-day minutiae of producing the show is really made for me. Doctor Who is probably the most documented show ever, but I'm still learning new stuff here.

A silly but engaging comic novel. An alien ship crashes on Earth, carrying the larval form of an alien prince. The President's cousin, who holds the useless post of ambassador to the galaxy through nepotism, seeks to escort the worm back to his home planet and demand an apology. A daft journey ...

A trio of planetary explorers navigate their own complex interpersonal relationships, at the same time forming a bond with the Manta, an intelligent fungal-based lifeform. Anthony explores the difficulties of establishing communication with a vastly different creature. The dangers to the Earth's...

A race to exploit the resources of a previously unknown rogue planet reveals the presence of another aggressive civilization posing a threat to the League. Nick Van Rijn deals in politics and high finance while David Falkayn dodges alien ships and tries to rescue his friends. Fast-moving and fun.

I've generally enjoyed these Doctor Who spin-offs, but I did worry that doing yet another sequel to "The Invasion" (the second time Vaughn has come back from the dead in four books!) meant the well was running a bit dry. Nevertheless, this was a brisk page-turner, neatly picking up threads from ...

I loved Alien Nation far more than the film that spawned it. It ended on a cliffhanger. This book novelises the season finale and the intended opening episode for the cancelled second season. It's a great story and shows the series still had legs! Familiar characters are well-drawn as their ...

A wonderful collection of essays looking at how Doctor Who has engaged with political issues during its long history, sometimes successfully, sometimes poorly. The perfect illustration of how the show has always been political. Engagingly written and well-argued. Recommended.

This anthology tells stories of those Faction Paradox have shut away in a temporal prison - which for a transgressive time-travelling voodoo cult means they must have done something really awful! Intriguing tales full of mad ideas, including clever parodies of kids comics and choose your fate books.

Dave Gorman undertakes another of his daft adventures, in this case travelling around the UK to meet new people and play a variety of games and sports. Ultimately the story is less about the games and more about the people he meets along the way; and there are some strange moments...

This spin-off from the UNIT series sees the two characters teaming up to form an unlikely detective duo. I suppose this is in the "cosy crime" genre - not really my cup of tea - mixed with a bit of sci-fi and the supernatural. Fairly undemanding stuff, but a pleasant enough read.

Alien Nation is a fairly entertaining movie, and Foster does his usual good job of keeping the plot rolling along while fleshing out the characters thoughts and motivations. Essentially a buddy cops story about mismatched partners, it uses the fact of one cop being an alien to address issues of...

Charity anthology celebrating the original eighth Doctor novels from BBC Books: further adventures of the Doctor, Sam, Fitz, Compassion and Anji and contributions from several of the series's authors. A great tribute to a series that meant a lot to me at the time; a collection of enjoyable stories.

I thought this would be just another story guide, but it turned out to be a lively history of the creation of the eighth Doctor's many stories across the various media, as well as fan reaction to these - and examines Paul McGann's enduring popularity among the fan base. Celebratory and informative.

Foster takes great pains to try and make sense of the "science" in this story, with the result that the book is far denser than I might expect. Not a bad read once things get moving about half-way through, but I was disappointed that he changed the ending, losing the literal descent into hell...

This second anniversary volume is a stronger collection than the first - even the Lucy Wilson story is more complex and grown-up than usual for that series! The stories are mostly epilogues to various past Lethbridge Stewart novels, with engaging characterisation and intriguing scenarios.

The Lethbridge Stewart range can be variable in quality, but generally I have enjoyed the novels, which exist in their own reality at a sort of tangent to other Who fiction. Compared to the official Doctor Who releases of recent years, they are one of the best spin-off series. This volume of...

Jubilee still stands as one of the finest Doctor Who stories ever told, and this novelisation is a well-paced and gripping version of it.

This charity anthology contains various stories of Sarah Jane's adventures over the years since leaving the Doctor. Not every tale was to my taste - and some were quite daft - but generally they were well told and entertaining. The final story, in which the grown-up cast of Sarah Jane Adventures...

Movie novelisations can be interesting, especially as they're often based on early draft scripts, and contain differences to the finished film. Alien has the famous cut cocoon scene, and Alien 3 is basically the Assembly Cut, with the oxen on the beach and all the deleted scenes with Golic...

In these adventures we meet David Falkayn, a young apprentice merchant in Van Rijn's company, and see how he deals with indigenous customs, local politics and military threats - progressing in his career by learning how to twist local trouble to his advantage.

Many of Anderson's works form part of a sprawling future history, and the tales here concern the early days when Earth and her colonies are members of a league with various alien worlds. Traders move among the stars, selling to the indigenous peoples of less advanced planets and trying to exploit...

Like many people my age, I was supposed to read this at school and never got further than the first few chapters. I would think it a difficult book for a child; for an adult, it is absolutely fantastic. The rabbits are not anthropomorphised; other than the giving them speech and an oral tradition...

An impossibly distant future; the sun has expanded and the Earth has been taken over by incredible plant species that have adapted to the new conditions. The few remaining animal species include intelligent insects; and the final evolution of humankind, a small green-skinned race of tree dwellers...

What a weird book. Everyone has a device fitted to their foreheads which instantly show when one feels sexual attraction. A sort of satire on Britain's (stereotyped) repressed attitude to sex, and the effects on society when it's removed. Written just before the "swinging sixties" happened, which...