DOCTOR WHO TARGET BOOKS



Introduction

This page is dedicated to one of the obsessions of my early years, the Doctor Who novelisations put out by Target (and W. H. Allen in hardback). Many a Saturday morning was spent checking all the local bookshops for potential additions to my collection, and W H Smith was always the first destination on any shopping trip. I can still remember the thrill of finding The Web of Fear at Smiths in Croydon — a book I’d longed for, just because of the title. It’s still one of my favourite covers.

In those pre-video days, the Target books were the only way to relive the TV adventures, and the best way to find out about all those I’d missed (through no fault of my own, of course — I got into Doctor Who with Tom Baker’s first episode, “Robot”, at the impressionable age of 3). The best thing about them, though, was that many of them were short enough to be read in a day — a great virtue in these days of blockbuster doorstoppers.

Although the writing may, with the years, have proven to be of variable quality, the covers still stand up to scrutiny. Chris Achilleos’ cover to The Ice Warriors is simply stunning. And, of course, there are the blurbs, which you will also find in these pages. Over-capitalised and sensationalistic they may have been, but they can be appreciated as an art form on their own right.

Enjoy!


Target links