Doctor Who: The Crystal Bucephalus

Doctor Who: Missing Adventures #4

by Craig Hinton

‘I’m a Time Lord, not a bank manager. When I invested in this place I had no idea that it would succeed. I mean - a time traveling restaurant?’

The Crystal Bucephalus: a restaurant patronized by the highest echelons of society in the 10th millennium. The guests are projected back in time to sample the food and drink of a bygone age.

When the galaxy’s most notorious crime boss is murdered in the Bucephalus, the Doctor, Tegan and Turlough are immediately arrested for the killing. To prove their innocence, they must track down the perpetrators of slaughter and sabotage, and uncover a conspiracy which has been 5,000 years in the making.

Genres: Doctor Who, Science Fiction, Fiction, Ebooks, Speculative Fiction, Media Tie In, Fantasy

296 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1994

About the author

Craig Paul Alexander Hinton was a British writer best known for his work on spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who. He also wrote articles for science fiction magazines and was the Coordinator of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society. He taught mathematics in London, where he was found dead in his home on 3 December 2006. The cause of death was given as a heart attack.

Hinton first was known for his articles about science fiction television programmes, including Doctor Who and Star Trek. These brought him to the attention of the editor of Marvel UK's Doctor Who Magazine, who offered him the job of reviewing merchandise for the magazine's Shelf Life section. Whilst writing for the magazine, Hinton had his first novel published. The Crystal Bucephalus was part of Virgin Publishing's Missing Adventures range. The book - which Hinton often jokingly referred to as "The Crystal Bucket" - was originally submitted for Virgin's New Adventures, and 50,000 words of this version were written before the change was made.

This novel was followed by a further Missing Adventure, Millennial Rites in 1995, and then by Hinton's only New Adventure in 1996, GodEngine, which features the Ice Warriors as well as oblique appearances by the Daleks.

Following Virgin's loss of their licence for Doctor Who merchandise, Hinton began submitting proposals to BBC Books. In 2001 they published his novel The Quantum Archangel as part of their BBC Past Doctor Adventures range. This was followed in 2004 by Synthespians™. This had started life as a proposal for the Eighth Doctor before being adapted to a previous Doctor. An image of the television show Dynasty was used on the cover: the cover's creators had arranged for permission to use the copyrighted image, but had neglected to get permission to alter it. At the last minute a replacement cover had to be produced. It is this that appears on the cover.

Hinton's Doctor Who novels often contain references to or explanations of elements of past continuity. He claimed to have been the originator of the term "fanwank", which he applied to his own work.

Hinton continued to work with Virgin, writing pseudonymously under the name Paul C. Alexander for their Idol range. He wrote three books in the range: Chains of Deceit, The Final Restraint and Code of Submission. These titles were a major departure from his science fiction. They explored aspects of his sexuality only suggested in his other works.

Hinton wrote for Big Finish Productions' Audio Adventures. The play Excelis Decays was produced in 2002 for their Doctor Who range and The Lords of Forever in 2005 for their The Tomorrow People range. Hinton also wrote short stories for their short fiction collections.

Outside of the science fiction world Hinton was a noted IT journalist in the UK. He edited magazines in the mid-1990s for VNU Business Publications in London and moved on to ITNetwork.com shortly afterwards.

Reviews

[Ken · Rating 3 out of 5]

A futuristic restaurant that’s able to transport guest back to various time periods felt very Hitchhikers.

The plot was completely baffling and I’m not completely sure that I fully understood it all, this book is so full of references which did help the reading experience.

I really liked the depiction of this TARDIS team, especially Davison’s Fifth Doctor.
It was great to see Kamelion having something to do too.
It also fitted in seamlessly between The King’s Demons and The Five Doctor, including a couple of nice touches to this era of the show aswell.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

In humanity's 10th millennium the Crystal Bucephalus is a technological marvel: a restaurant that transports its elite patrons back in time and space so as to allow them to dine in the most culinarily famous places in history. When the head of the galaxy's main criminal syndicate is assassinated while eating there, the Doctor, Tegan, and Turlough are wrenched from the past and accused as his murderers. As they are drawn into the investigation, they find themselves in the middle of a conspiracy involving the kidnapping of a religious leader, dueling temporal scientists, and the efforts of a megalomaniac to cheat death and take over the universe in one fell swoop.

I must confess that I approached this book with a degree of ambivalence, as the idea of reading a Doctor Who novel that was premised on a minor gimmick adapted from Douglas Adams wasn't appealing to me. Yet while the idea of time traveling diners is one that can seem excessively ridiculous, Craig Hinton uses it to build one of the most breathtakingly ambitious novels in the Virgin Missing Adventures series. Key to this is his integration of time travel into the plot, which instead of being employed simply to transport the Doctor and his companions to some exotic locale is used as the main driver of events. These unfold over the course of the book to reveal a story of impressive complexity, albeit one dependent on hiding key details until late in the book in order to maintain a sense of mystery. This is a minor complaint, though, when weighed against Hinton's success in providing a multilayered adventure that comes together in an exciting conclusion to rank as among the best Doctor Who novels that I have read so far.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

I guess answering the question of “Where was Kamelion between The King’s Demons and Planet of Fire?” with “Unfortunately the silver-nippled fool was just too gullible for his own good” is one option.

[James Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I started reading this novel, I did not think I would finish it, giving it a 5-star rating. Before buying this book last year I had looked into it to see if it was worth buying and what I saw wasn't a great vote of confidence as to whether this book was worth my time and money. Either way, I took a chance on it as the premise of a time-travelling restaurant that The Doctor invested in sounded very intriguing. Also, this story features the 5th Doctor, Tegan and Turlough. In all of Doctor Who this is my favourite TARDIS Team and at the end of the day, any chance I get to spend time with these characters is one I can only fail at trying to avoid.

I found the TARDIS Team here characterised rather well. Tegan and Turlough were spectacular and were the main driving force for the plot as they became separated from the Doctor—and each other—for the vast majority of the story and follow the supporting characters through time and space. The Doctor also has a lot to do but he mostly spends his time at the Bucephalus helping the Maître d' and his brother, Professor Alexhendri Lassiter with the operations of the restaurant.

You see, the Doctor is the sole investor of The Crystal Bucephalus and the reason for its existence. Apparently throughout this life after leaving Gallifrey, The Doctor has amassed an extraordinarily large bank account and siphoned off his money into "ridiculous business ventures" and also the British Film Industry it seems. The Crystal Bucephalus has since gone on to become an absolute staple in the galaxy as thousands use it to experience other cultures and have business meetings among other things.

The plot of this story revolves around this religion, The Lazarus Intent, and how the Bucephalus is connected to it by those there as customers, and its staff. I absolutely loved this aspect of the story and I found myself wanting to learn everything I could about it as I read. The gist of the religion is that it was founded as a way to find some form of time travel which would enable them to rescue their saviour, Lazarus, from being killed by the Sontarans. However, in the years since this religion has become a beacon of faith and comfort to the people of this galaxy and its main purpose has been neglected by its followers. This is an ingenious idea for a fictitious religion in my eyes and the worldbuilding brought forward through it was so interesting. What also happens throughout the novel with Lazarus his his followers' belief in him was fascinating to read.

I was also quite surprised to see that the Time Lords played a rather sizable role in the story as being an almost everpresent threat to the Bucephalus due to just how close Professor Lassiter was to making a time machine of equal powers to that of a TARDIS. The way the Bucephalus works is that customers are sent back in time through a time bubble and whilst there they have a "reality quotient of 0.4" which means they're just unreal enough that they won't affect history and once they leave, reality adjusts itself to make it so they were never there at all. This was an incredible way to use time travel in a story and it completely avoids the issue of "what if someone changes time?". It also made for events later on where customers start to become too real and nearly bring about the end of existence altogether.

The people of this galaxy are all too familiar with the power Time Lords possess due to their sentencing of the entire species of the Legions who are creatures that can travel through the time vortex and in the past abused their powers for their gain. It's quite refreshing to have a story where the Time Lords are feared again, it harkens back to their depiction in The War Games. The Doctor also hides the fact that he is also a timelord from the supporting characters, which leads to a rather nasty revelation on their part as to the true nature of The Doctor, though they are wrong. Considering just how close Lassiter is to achieving true time travel, having this element as part of the story is brilliant as it adds a conflict between the Doctor and those of this galaxy that you know will surface sooner or later.

Kamelion is also in this story. Kamelion is a weird footnote in Doctor Who history and it fascinates me. To those who don't know, Kamelion is a companion of the 5th Doctor in the loosest term imaginable. He joined the team in the story set before this novel, "The King's Demons", at the end of Season 20 of the classic show. Kamelion is a shapeshifting android with psychic abilities who tends to be influenced by external forces, leading him to come under the control of the Master for example.

In real life, Kamelion was a proper robot. He wasn't an actor in a suit or controlled like K-9 was. He was a fully functioning robot. For 1982 this would've been mighty impressive however I lied. The Kamelion prop was rarely ever fully functioning and was a horrible thing to work with according to those who did work with Kamelion. It was sort of doomed to begin with as once the filming of "The King's Demons" had wrapped, the creator and sole operator of Kamelion, Mike Power, died tragically in a boating accident. This meant that, as no one could operate Kamelion, he was pretty much abandoned by the writers and the show altogether until "Planet of Fire" in the following season where Kamelion is killed off after begging the Doctor to kill him after falling under the influence of the Master yet again.

In this novel, however (back to that now), Kamelion doesn't do a whole lot—just follows the orders of whoever is around—but I appreciate him being written into the story by the writer as it's a character that never really gets any sort of recognition and Craig Hinton here at least tried to do something with the character, it's just that that character is still Kamelion at the end of the day.

Something I did find odd was how The Doctor believed Turlough to be dead throughout the majority of this story, as well as Tegan for a time. It's par for the course with the 5th Doctor that he locks away any guilt or grief he holds for losing people. Adric for example, who died at the hands of the Cybermen, is never brought up again until The Doctor's regeneration where it's the last thing he says.

The Doctor is very reserved here when it comes to his companions. Later in the story the Doctor ends up having to return to the Crystal Bucephalus the long way round and spends 5 years on a planet starting up a restaurant with the intent of it becoming so popular that it becomes part of the Bucephalus' array of restaurants people can visit. This alone I think is a great idea and I wish we spent more time with The Doctor during these 5 years (all we get are 3 paragraphs). However, once the Doctor does arrive back at the Bucephalus, he doesn't really react in any way to seeing Tegan and Turlough again. Maybe he doesn't want them to know where he's been but after 5 years of doing nothing but trying to get back to them, you'd think there'd be some sort of happy reunion on the Doctor's part to two very confused friends.

That slight detriment aside, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with The Crystal Bucephalus and I'm incredibly glad I decided to take a chance on it. I hope one day this novel gets an audio adaptation by Big Finish, similar to how Goth Opera (another novel in this "Virgin Publishing: Missing Adventures" range) did in 2024.

I'd also like to just add here the, honestly quite bizarre, similarities that this novel shares with the 2024 Doctor Who Christmas special, "Joy to the World". That story features the Time Hotel which is a hotel that offers guests the opportunity to stay across a range of periods in Earth's history. During the story, The Doctor is separated from the time hotel and has to return the long way around by spending time in the location he was left in for a long period until the means to return are available to him. Both these aspects sound very familiar. Now, I don't think Steven Moffat read this novel and stole the idea (even though Modern Who writers are prone to stealing ideas from this era of DW content) but it's just something I realised as I was reading that I wanted to mention. Both stories can certainly co-exist and do certain things better than others. Joy to the World has that lovely part with the Doctor and Anita and The Crystal Bucephalus literally does every single other thing better.

[David Layton · Rating 2 out of 5]

As I have said elsewhere in these pages, Craig Hinton is my least favorite of the Who novelists, and that this is probably his best novel indicates just how bad the others are. Hinton's problem is trying to write too big. In this, he is the opposite of John Peel, whose limitation is trying to hard to write like others. Hinton is an everything and the kitchen sink writer. The title refers to a restaurant at the end of the universe (almost, but the inspiration is obvious) in which patrons pay huge sums to be able to dine in specified historical settings. Such a place is just too tempting to those who see the possibility of using it to dominate the universe (surprisingly, the Master is not in this story, though the setting would be right for him). So, the reader gets whiplash from the multiple changes in scene. All the various factions and groups vying for control are pretty much comic-book quality creations, poorly characterized and simplistically motivated. The Doctor's companions are mostly relegated to the sidelines. In sum, the book may be good for thirteen-year-old boys, but older readers will perhaps be irritated by it, feeling that another thorough go through the draft could have brought it some missing focus.

[Daniel Kukwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's been ages since I first read this book, but picking it up after all these years for a re-read has surprised me. The story takes Craig Hinton's usual obsession with fanwank and turns it into something far more interesting and less like continuity porn. The mind wrenching, timey-wimey nature of the story also predates much of the bonkers time-manipulation shenanigans of 21st century "Doctor Who" by two decades. I'd probably rate it closer to 3.5 stars if I could, as the second half of the book isn't as powerful as the first half...but the ambition and writing style allows me bump this up to 4 stars with a clear conscience.

[Pietro Rossi · Rating 1 out of 5]

Starts off well, evoking the feel of Douglas Adams's Restaurant at the End of the Universe, although here the Crystal Bucephalus is a time traveling restaurant where each eating booth will bring you to a time period of any of the planets aligned to the restaurant. Crime Lord Maximilian Arrestis is poisoned and the TARDIS crew are scooped out of time as they happen to be where Arrestis was.

In the first twist we discover during the interrogation that the Doctor owns the restaurant which gives them leeway, although Tegan, naturally, escaped the Maitre D and is on the run in the restaurant and then through the time periods of the restaurant; Turlough ends up with a priest of a religious sect.

Stripped of its science fiction cloak, this is a good old fashioned murder mystery. And an intriguing one at that.

At 20% or so we've got the TARDIS crew split and it seems to be meandering along, rather aimlessly. The book equivalent of the TV show's 'running down the corridor' padding. Oh dear, does the story have enough material for the rest? Fear not as author Craig Hinton manages to skilfully reset the story. Indeed, when Tegan and Turlough meet it's another reset. At this point I realised that apart from Tegan and Turlough, all the characters have changed their MO from when we first met them and how they introduced each other. This includes the Doctor who didn't reveal himself to be the owner nor a Time Lord upon first introductions.

In lesser hands this resetting would have me throwing the book away - if you can't sustain the scenario you should've picked another. But not this time as it is interwoven beautifully.

And then we get to the last third of the book. Based on the Virgin books I've read they all start off well with a good structured story and then finish off with gobbledegook to justify the book's length. As mentioned, the story wasn't strong enough for a full novel. Hinton managed to restructure it during the storytelling from whodunnit to runaround, to philosophical discussion, but couldn't maintain it. As with most Virgin books I found myself just skim reading the last third without caring about the who, what, why and how. And this is a real shame as there's a cracking story to be told with this setup, but ultimately I didn't finish the book as interest waned. 2/10.


Scoring: 0 bad; 1-3 poor; 4-6 average; 7-9 good; 10 excellent.

[Saoki · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is one seriously badly crafted book. The convoluted plot? Actually pretty straight-forward, but told in an overly complex way and with way too many weird sentences (also, Not Worth It). The comedic approach? Didn't really land with me, but is also lost midway through the book. The idea? Actually pretty good, but not so big as to merit a whole book. The plot holes? You could maneuver the Tardis through them.

As you see, any comment I could make about what I disliked about this book says more about how I'd go about telling this story than anything else, so I'll make a single comment about something that anyone reading Doctor Who novels would be interested in knowing beforehand: the author fails to make use of every single companion in this adventure, unless you count the excessive amount of damseling as some sort of use. Actually, I could make a case for him having failed at using the Doctor, but it's more like he failed at displaying the 5th Doctor's essential trait, his honest decency.

Honestly, read something else. Even if you've already bought it. Take it from me.

[Jonathan King · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is definitely not an easy read; the plot is pretty convoluted and there’s a ton of sci-fi mumbo-jumbo, but there’s also a lot good about this book. I love the concept of a time-traveling restaurant that the Doctor accidentally owns, I love several moments with the Doctor (“I demand some answers!” “And I demand some questions!”), and there’s an escape from being stuck in the past that I think is pretty brilliant. The stakes are high, and for the most part, even though these aren’t my favorite Doctor Who characters, I was still fairly invested in them the whole time (even though some characters sometimes got called the wrong name or briefly disappeared). It’s a flawed but intriguing book, and I’m glad I read it. If you’re a diehard Whovian, you probably will be too.

[Ianto Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took me a long long time to read. I started it a number of years ago and got halfway and couldn’t make it to the end, now I have come back to it and finished.
It’s not as bad as I make out, I think the thing which put me off was all the names of the characters, all uncommon alien names but spelt very similarly. Made it very hard to know who was who, if you don’t mind that sort of thing then you will have no issues but it did confuse me and put me off. The plot itself was good, fun and original. I especially liked how kamelion was utilised. Tegan just seemed to have gags, but that seems true to her screen character too. Overall an enjoyable read once you get past the confusing character names.

[Andy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is hard to rate because, on one hand, I think the author did a good job with the characters, but on the other hand, I think the plot is complicated and confusing. There is A LOT that is going on throughout this book, and keeping it, all straight is difficult because the author will use ten words when a few would be better. Having said that, I enjoyed how he wrote the Doctor, Teagan, and Turlough. I do wish they hadn't been separated for most of the book, as I prefer the team together. Overall, it was entertaining.

[Kris · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was hopeful for this one but it turned out to be pretty boring. Trying to an Adams-seque story at the end of Season 20, but without any of the skill and far too much fannish-ness. I had to force myself to finish.

[Arthur B · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun central concept, though the conclusion to this novel gets a bit too involved in its own convoluted technobabble to my tastes. Full review: https://fakegeekboy.wordpress.com/202...

[John Barclay · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well that was overly long and pointless.

[Tim Trewartha · Rating 2 out of 5]

A good idea that doesn't really come off. Great title, but.

[Allen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite entertaining as much I can say about this, I do kind of wish that the Restaurant was, and the rest I can really just remember it's just a bunch of running around

[Jacqueline · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Crystal Bucephalus is one of several books in Virgin Publishing's Doctor Who the Missing Adventures series. It's actually the first book in the series I read many years ago about the time it was published. All I remember from the first time I read it was that it was a bit confusing.
Re-reading the book now, I was able to understand the novel, but I still thought the end was rushed.
The Crystal Bucephalus features the Fifth Doctor (as played by Peter Davison), Tegan, Turlough, and eventually, Kamelion. For once, the novel doesn't start with the TARDIS landing someplace and the Doctor and company getting involved in local affairs. The Doctor, Tegan, and Turlough are enjoying a fine meal in France when they are literally picked up, only to appear in The Crystal Bucephalus, an extremely exclusive tenth millennium time-traveling restaurant, where the movers and shakers of the galaxy make their deals to form the galaxy.
The Crystal Bucephalus is a unique restaurant, it consists of a series of cubicles which can be projected back in time to any restaurant or other exclusive recreational area. There, the customers of the restaurant can eat, drink, and be merry without affecting history because their "reality quotient" is .5 - and when they return to the restaurant's present, even their image is forgotten by those in in the time period they visited (time re-sets itself as if the time travellers were never there).
But one of the patrons has been murdered, and in the emergency retrieval of that patron, Arrestis, and his mistress - the Doctor and his companions are brought to the Bucephalus too.
There, the Doctor and Turlough are taken to the Maitre'D, while Tegan "escapes" with Arrestis's "girl" - actually an agent of the Intent (but more about that later).
The Doctor reveals to the Maitre'D, that he is the Benefactor - the person who endowed the money to build the restaurant. The Doctor also asks to see Alex Lassiter, the time scientist responsible for making the Bucephalus work.
Politically, the Galaxy in the Tenth Millennium is split between three groups - the Enclave, a group of mobsters who run all crime in the Galaxy, The Lazarus Intent - a religious group with considerable Political Power, several small Empires of Reptilian Races (Draconians, Earth Reptiles, Martians, etc.) who have been steadily losing power, influence and territory, and the remainder of the Earth Federation/Empire. But the real power players are the Lazarus Intent and the Enclave. And, as Arrestis was the leader of the Enclave, and his mistress an agent for the Intent - it could be a charged murder mystery right there.
However, the Doctor soon discovers Arrestis is a clone - in a time where all cloning technology and research had been banned so long most people don't even know what it is. (Tegan at one point explains what cloning is to someone.) The Lazarus Intent strictly forbids cloning and all research into cloning technology.
The Doctor also is intrigued by the technology of the Bucephalus because it's very close to a working, TARDIS-like, time machine.
Soon, though, other murders take place (it becomes confusing because most of the "murders" end-up with no one actually dead - just temporarily misplaced in time - such are the hazards of a time machine that's breaking down).
The Bucephalus uses Legions to pilot it's time bubbles in the Time Vortex, but one is attacked and barely saved by the Doctor, then another is killed (really).
However, the plot does still get confusing - people "dying" but who are alive and trapped in another time. Or on the time machine operated by Matisse, Lassiter's ex-wife and previous co-developer on the Bucephalus, now agent of the Enclave. Even the Doctor at one point is time-scooped by Matisse and dropped on a frozen planet of intelligent dog-like creatures, where, once rescued - the Doctor spends five years opening then building up the reputation of a restaurant so it will be included in the Carte d'Locales of the Bucephalus so he can find his way back.
The plot does eventually settle down into it's two many points: the tangled love life of Monroe, Matisse and Lassiter (Monroe and Matisse are both his ex-wives), and the plan of the head of the Enclave to also take over the Lazarus Intent. And a few truly bizarre time travel hijinks - that work, but are a bit strange.
Overall, though at times it was a bit confusing, there was an almost philosophical bent to The Crystal Bucephalus which was interesting and different. The characters were well-written and written like their television counterparts. Turlough, especially was well-written (he shows up in very few Past Doctor Adventures which focused on Davison's early TARDIS crew or Peri). It was also neat to see Kamelion, I really think this is the only novel I've read that features him.

[James Barnard · Rating 3 out of 5]

Craig Hinton wrote my favourite Missing Adventure – a tale which saw an under-used Doctor take the lead in his own adventure, and gave a largely unloved companion pride of place on the front cover and a genuine depth and likeability within the book’s covers, in an outstanding plot. I’m talking about ‘Millennial Rites’ here. ‘The Crystal Bucephalus’ isn’t quite the resounding success Hinton’s second novel would prove to be, but, having been unsure whether to bother with this one, I am very glad I did.

It isn’t quite as accomplished as some of its early Missing Adventures stablemates. But it makes up for that in sheer enthusiasm. Legend has it that Virgin hadn’t intended to bring out a Fifth Doctor book quite so soon after the inaugural ‘Goth Opera’, but were persuaded to put this one out because they were so impressed. 20 years on, I agree, actually – it’s a rollicking read, with a great central idea, a strong plot and – with a very obvious exception – strong characterisation. There’s such a sense of fun about this, which, by necessity, the more po-faced books that surrounded it rather lacked. It is difficult not to like it.

It isn’t perfect, though, and while I’d be inclined to overlook it, when the novel’s key fault is emblazoned on the front cover, it’s very hard to ignore. Kamelion proves to be as cumbersome and pointless in print as he did on screen, and serves precisely no purpose within the plot. His presence is an irritant, and spoils the relatively short section he appears in.

Still, it’s a good read, and I’d be churlish to keep picking holes in a work of such enthusiasm. The idea of a time-travelling restaurant is a great ‘hook’, and it’s a real pleasure to see the Fifth Doctor, who tended to be under-used on screen, get the chance to shine.

This was rather better than I’d remembered.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

October 2020
I read this more in bits than I'd like, which might affect my rating and my general feeling that the plot was a bit convoluted. However, I did like its treatment of the TARDIS team (as well as providing a reason for Kamelion to disappear until Planet of Fire). Plus it was nice that the Lazarus Intent and everything to do with that wasn't super dismissive of religion, as it could easily have ended up being.

March 2025
3.5/5
I really like this one conceptually; it does, however, suffer from a few moments of clunky emotional exposition where something that we should really have fleshed out and be able to sit with gets glossed over: one of the characters being in love with another, and the Doctor setting up a restaurant and making a home on another planet. The result is a story that I still like but which I feel slightly less involved with than I'd like. Also, while I appreciate the attempt to incorporate Kamelion and explain his subsequent absence, it does feel like he's here just to explain that absence, since I'm not sure he really adds much to the story.

[Nicholas Whyte · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1555430.html

I had been puzzling over the title of this Fifth Doctor novel since I first heard of it; what gadget could conceivably be made of crystal and also named for Alexander the Great's horse? As it transpires there is a double explanation: there is a crystal statue of the horse, which turns out to have extra powers, but also the statue is located in a restaurant named after it. Rather oddly the Doctor turns out to be the owner of both statue and restaurant. Lots of similarly wacky (or wackier) nomenclature in the book, not all of which completely gels, though enough does to keep one going; I loved the idea of the Lazarus Intent, a religion combining a garbled Christianity with the monsters of the Whoniverse, and am impressed that Hilton found something useful to do with Kamelion.

[Phillip · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, this was fairly terrible. The Star Trek references, as much as I appreciated them, were not very subtle. Also, the story is just a mess ... too many things going on, lots of technobabble, multiple storylines being juggled, and the story just is too complicated. Also, it has Turlough and Kamelion ... so ugh.

[Travis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A time traveling restaurant, some cool aliens, a cameo by an old Who monster and some of my favorite companions.
Just wish they'd done more with Kamelion. I liked him and he got a raw deal on the TV show.

[Simon Curtis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great great fun. And I learnt what a Maitre'D is.

[Gevera Piedmont]

I didn't much like it, didn't finish it, hence no stars.