BBC Books The Way Through the Woods

Author	Una McCormack
ISBN	1 849 90237 2
Published	2011

Synopsis: With Rory missing, the Doctor and Amy investigate anancient force in the woods.

• A Review by Leslie McMurtry

A Review by Leslie McMurtry 1/6/14

I make no secret of the fact that I want to promote female Who writers wherever I find them, and Una McCormack makes my job very easy by being good. Her command of the Eleventh Doctor, Amy and Rory is entertaining and spot-on. In her previous book, The King's Dragon, we got taken to a fantasy alien world; in The Way Through the Woods, she gets to show her skills at both recreating Earth's historical past and the contemporary that New Who is very keen on.

There have been Doctor Who books about mysterious woods before: Martin Day's somewhat confused Wooden Heart and one of my favorite Doctor Who novels, Jacqueline Rayner's Wolfsbane. The latter in particular seems to anticipate some of the enforced separations that go on in TWTTW; in that novel, it was the Eighth Doctor and a disappeared Harry Sullivan crossing paths with the Fourth Doctor and Sarah Jane. Here, it's wonderfully daft Rory - whom McCormack captures so well - finding himself somewhat on the back foot in 1917 with a "feisty" heroine named Emily (though, surely, Rory, you should know what conchie is?!).

McCormack's (young, female) characters who get lost in the woods are likeable and believable, comparing favorably with the smart-aleck sassy Gothamite from my favorite Batman fan fics. Alas, both the Doctor and Rory both need to take lessons on how to react when being kissed without provocation, as Rory's shocked and unthinking response to Emily - friendly, compassionate, curious, and somewhat innocent Emily - is "Yes! No! I'm married!" Rory seems constitutionally in danger of losing himself, as, in this novel, in addition to his previous erasure from history, death, subsumation by Auton, Angel-energy-food, etc, he goes down with an extreme case of amnesia. Shell shock or a comment on the contemporary British person's ability to "disappear" into the background?

All of the characters get to do something, and Amy and Rory are at least as active as any of the supporting cast. As in her last book, McCormack captures these characters brilliantly and with enviable ease; furthermore, Amy - never a favorite companion of mine - acts logically, proactively and compassionately, making her quite a good role model for the younger women around her; seldom could that be said, frankly, when she's on-screen. Interestingly, this means the Doctor is effectively sidelined for much of the book (and when he does get out of jail, I'm not sure I completely buy that he cons a police officer even if it is a village). We know that McCormack can write Eleven really well, so I guess the omission serves the narrative purpose instead.

I think it's fair to say that the Eleventh Doctor's entire era has been about things lurking at the corner of your eye; this story, then, about a wood that all the local residents avoid though they don't know why, fits in perfectly. In fact, with some minor trimming, I think it could easily translate into a New Who 45-minute episode.

But let's not get carried away. It makes a very enjoyable, breezy read. Given that the author has probably enjoyed a time travel book that visibly jumps back and forth in the narrative while still maintaining a forward progression, Amy's explanation of time "meddling" is instructive, or at least illuminating for this particular era of Doctor Who:

'Don't you worry you'll get something wrong? Break things somehow so that they can't be put right?' 'You can't think that way,' Amy said. 'You'd be paralysed if you did. If I've learned anything from the Doctor, it's that it's always better to act. It's always better to do something. OK, and then it's true you have to accept the consequences. But if you think about it, nobody's guaranteed a happy ending, are they? Not in the grand scheme of things. And you never know in advance what ending is best.'