Seeing I
Jon Blum & Kate Orman
Summary: 9.5/10 Sam grows up and gets a life. One of the more unique and ambitious Doctor Who novels to date.
I am going to start this review spoiler-free, and we will have some spoiler discussion later in the review.
Several months ago, I said that we needed a novel for Sam Jones; one that really focuses on the character, giving her greater depth and fufilling the potential that I thought was in the character, despite many people's apparent distaste for her.
Seeing I is that novel. And thankfully, it isn't her last novel.
Sam has, in my opinion, always had a degree of a bad rap -- barely introduced in the Terrance Dicks Greatest Hits book The Eight Doctors, she's usually managed to be a fairly workable Generic Companion -- but she's still largely a blank slate as an individual, which is let down in a book companion, especially after Benny, Chris, and Roz. In the other excellent Eight Doctor novel Alien Bodies, she's much more along for the ride than anything else.
It is difficult to discuss this book without getting into spoilers. So I'm going to jump right to them -- I will be here when you are done with the novel. And you really should read it.
In Seeing I, the Doctor and Sam are separated -- for three years. The obvious first reaction to this is "Didn't I read that in Love & War and Deceit"? This might work somewhat -- Love & War is one of my favorite New Adventures, but Deceit sits at the opposite end of the range. And the difference here is you didn't read Ace growing up -- it all appeared off stage, when she rapidly changed from the teenage troublemaker of the TV series to the more controversial (and in my mind, often unsucessful) New Ace. In Seeing I, we follow Sam through some of the most important years of her life -- most people make important discoveries about themselves in the period between 17 and 21, as they become more independent.
A recent on-line discussion mentioned when we found scenes and situations in various novels that associate with our real lives -- unusual in escapist fantasy fiction like Doctor Who, and perhaps this is why it had more impact when it is there instead of more "realistic" fiction. I've had days where I've "gone through another entire day without talking to anyone.", and I know how that can be -- and while I didn't make the radical career change that Sam did, I'm certainly sympathetic with her situation in the novel. (As an interesting side note, my own interest in Doctor Who was at its low during that same age range.)
As you might expect from a book that focuses on the years where most people really start to form their identity, Seeing I pulls that theme to apply again throughout the entire book. Sam learns more about herself -- as she moves from a homeless shelter to a soul-crushing job to working at Livingspace, a Habitat-for-Sentient Being type organization.
But this search for identity is not just focusing on Sam -- the Doctor is arrested (legally) for attempting to steal information about Sam. And as the prison isn't a completely nasty one -- it is somewhat reminisent of the Prisoner's Village, except even nicer. The Doctor struggles with his own identity when there don't appear to be any monsters on Ha'olam, and when the only elements of disaster happen because of what the Doctor does -- not because the camp is being terribly violent towards him. His identity becomes wrapped up in external things -- his bear, his paintings, and occasionally, his single-minded need to escape, a one-shot alias that he gets stuck with.
The AI program DOCTOR is all about discovering the Doctor's identity as well. Created as a method to predict the Doctor's behavior, it learns how the Doctor thinks, and tries to emulate (with remarkable success) his thought processes. DOCTOR is certainly out there for a return appearance -- either causing trouble on its own, or who knows what sort of unpredictable route it might take.
Almost all of the other characters are involved with their identity as well -- the identity of all of the corporate drones, with a badge identifying their corporate association (I want an INC pin!) Sam's abandonded roomate Shoshana has her identity -- wrapped up in their job, as are many others. The Livingspace community wasn't a fancy place -- but many of the people there had their identity wrapped up in a community that would eventually be bought out by INC.
And of course, the two entities at the end of the book -- the I and the Ubernet, both took any identity away from any individual organisism, and placed it at a collective level; spread out across many beings.
As far as the pacing of the book goes, there's already been much discussion about how the last thirty pages of the book -- after the I arrive -- is of a radically different tone than the rest of the book. I agree, but I find that this shift in perspective helps, rather than hurts the book -- throughout most of the book, the Doctor isn't in control; he's not in his element at all. He can't escape from prison with a wink and a twist of the sonic screwdriver. But when "there are monsters", he's able to completely take control of the situation -- and his previous master, Dr. Akalu and ends up in a state similar to where the Doctor was at the end of his imprisonment. And Sam -- as the bridge between our "real" world and the Doctor's fantasy -- is able to survive (and triumph!) in both.
There is only one point where I really want to mark Seeing I down -- it is the illusions to Life's Champion as a cat following around the Doctor. I am not at all fond of the Gods of Gallifrey concept; finding it to be counter to my intuition of how Gallifrey works -- and it never quite clicks for me. It comes closer to working this time than in any previous novel, perhaps because it has to be played down because of the change to BBC Books.
There are probably other things I could go on about in Seeing I, and I am sure I will as the weeks and months go on. Seeing I is going to be tough to beat as the best Doctor Who novel of 1998.