I happened to see this book in the library and thought that the blurb sounded quite amusing so I gave it a try. As the title indicates, it's a spoof of Doctor Who with a grammatical twist, the idea being that the Doctor travels through time correcting people's grammar - although it generally seems to be errors in punctuation more than grammar. It's not a very long book, just 176 pages but it took me about 6 weeks to read which gives you a good indication of what it's like. It was published in January 2006 and it seems obvious that it was written to cash in on the new popularity of the show, rather than because the author was a fan and it was a labour of love.

In keeping with the travelling through time theme, the chapters do not follow each other chronologically but I wasn't sure if this meant it was supposed to be read straight through in that disjointed way or if I was supposed to move back and forth through the book to get to the next chapter. I tried it the first way but I'm not sure it really made any difference.

The book itself is very disappointing. The author admits in the appendix that he's not a Doctor Who fan at all which does explain why a lot of the references seem to be based solely on the original run and therefore seem rather dated. The Doctor character certainly comes across as more of the typical Four (Tom Baker) persona, although I actually thought it was more like Rowan Atkinson's version. The two companions baffled me completely and were just totally bizarre. The book is full of bad puns, unimaginative jokes, and cheap shots, and any slightly amusing bits are either repeated ad nauseum or written really badly. It is a shame because there are some parts that would be funny if they were written better but I suppose the fact that the entire thing is based on a very old and tired joke in the first place go against it from the start.

Avoid this book, even if you are a HUGE Doctor Who fan or the most fastidious grammarian. Actually, especially if you are a HUGE Doctor Who fan. ( )