The Sensorites - Nigel Robinson

The Sensorites was a Target I read as a child, one of the many stories that would only see the light of day on VHS after I had practically grown up and had other things to worry about. The serial is not well loved I gather. But the book, I adored.

Nigel Robinson has turned in a book of two halves. The first part, set aboard the spaceship, is positively dripping with anticipation and claustrophobic dread as the unseen Sensorite assailants move in on the Tardis Crew who are at their mercy. The Sensorites even succeed where Dalek, Cyberman and Sontaran have failed in harming the Tardis by cutting out the lock.

The second part, by the nature of the Serial, is very different as the Doctor engages in making peace with this race and solving the mystery of the poisoned water, it's far more open and action orientated and again Robinson does an effective job in describing the planet and especially the action in the water tunnels.

The serial obviously suffered from the problem that The Sensorites, beings of power and mystery in the first half, turn into perfectly ordinary and not very distinct aliens in the second, the book is so well written that this does not intrude, however, it does have a problem that the serial did not have, The Sensorites do not have names. Poor Nigel Robinson has to spend the entire second half of the book delineating one character as "The Evil Sensorite" and a second as "The Sensorite's Senior Scientist". But it's The Evil Sensorite which causes the problem, as, despite being Evil, he is never given a motive and after a while this becomes very wearying. It's hardly Robinson's fault and he does his best to overcome this with an excellent narrative, to no avail, this single problem drags the story which is a huge pity. But if you can overcome it, there are some great riches to uncover here. The Sensorites is, for the most part, very enjoyable.

7/10