Rating: 
Summary: Forget the Nay-Sayers - I Loved It
Review: I have read many bad reviews of this book. And given that I couldn't put it down, I feel compelled to share a positive review.First off, I believe a person has unreasonable expectations if they expect a book titled "The Eight Doctors" to have a single, cohesive story where all eight Doctors have something interesting to do. It's difficult, if not impossible, to achieve such a tight-knit story with so many main characters vying for attention. I'm glad that Dicks chose to make the story more of a retrospective, visiting one Past Doctor at a time, and I wasn't expecting the storyline to be any stronger in its cohesion than the "Key to Time" storyline. I enjoyed how the book answered so many unanswered questions, such as: What was the deal with the multiple TARDISes taking off at the end of "The Five Doctors"? Why was the Trial of a Timelord not held on Gallifrey? How did the Master gain all the new abilities that he demonstrated in the Television Movie? I also enjoyed many of the events shown in this book that were previously behind the scenes. Okay, the Fourth and Fifth Doctor bits weren't the most exciting choices I could imagine. (I would have preferred to see bits explaining why Romana chose to regenerate in "Destiny of the Daleks" or why the Doctor left Tegan at Heathrow in "Timeflight".) But I didn't think they were bad. Finally, I liked the scenes with Sam. I can't defend this beyond personal preference, but I did enjoy them. So, I imagine that the purists who want all eight Doctors joining together to vanquish some "ultimate evil" will be disappointed. Those of us who are content with a retrospective will probably be more likely to enjoy it.
Rating:
Summary: Whoever said this book was bad was WRONG!!!
Review: I loved this book. Yes, Sam was not well developed and 1 dimensional. But this book was outstanding. The 8th Doctor going back in time and meeting his former selves due to a trap set by the Master was an interesting way to do it. While some may be disappointed that there was no big eight doctor team up, this novel makes up for it with thoughtful and adventurous scenarios with previous Doctors (the 4th and 6th Doctors particularly stand out). BBC could not have started the series out any better. "Celestial Investigation Agency"...C.I.A... very funny. This book is a KEEPER!!!
Rating: 
Summary: Re: the review "Call and response"
Review: I wish to amend my review of last October. When I wrote it I hadn't read any other Doctor Who novels and had only recently reawakened my interest in the setting. On a second read after re-acquainting myself with the backstory, I find this novel sorely lacking. It's disproportionately uneven -- Terrence Dicks obviously is more interested in the third, fourth, and sixth Doctors than any others, and the treatment of the seventh Doctor is badly deficient -- and little is revealed, either about the eighth Doctor or about his companion, Sam, who seems a stock character pulled out of a hat. Later eighth Doctor books have been alternately good and bad, at least as far as I've read, and both characters have been fleshed out, but as an introduction to the characters, this one proves a disappointment.
Rating:
Summary: Re: the review "Call and response"
Review: I wish to amend my review of last October. When I wrote it I hadn't read any other Doctor Who novels and had only recently reawakened my interest in the setting. On a second read after re-acquainting myself with the backstory, I find this novel sorely lacking. It's disproportionately uneven -- Terrence Dicks obviously is more interested in the third, fourth, and sixth Doctors than any others, and the treatment of the seventh Doctor is badly deficient -- and little is revealed, either about the eighth Doctor or about his companion, Sam, who seems a stock character pulled out of a hat. Later eighth Doctor books have been alternately good and bad, at least as far as I've read, and both characters have been fleshed out, but as an introduction to the characters, this one proves a disappointment.
Rating:
Summary: If you buy one who book
Review: If you saw the 1996 Telemovie with Paul McGann and wanted more, this book is for you. I don't want to spoil it for you, but the 8th Doctor is taken to all his other 7 selves to discover who he is after loosing his memory. It was a walk down memory lane, the book itself played out like an old Doctor Who episode. All Eight Doctors in one book, could life get any better for a Whovian? I don't think so.
Rating: 
Summary: It's FUN to read all Eight Doctors!
Review: It is not easy bringing the many voices of a Time Lord, known as THE DOCTOR, together. However, Terrance Dicks is one of the writers in the DOCTOR WHO UNIVERSE that seems up to the task. There are those in DOCTOR WHO FANDOM who feel that multi-DOCTOR stories are trite, and too cute. I believe that if this particular native of Galifrey is to be viewed as a renegade on the run from his own people, then criss-crossing the time-stream and meeting himself seems like a natural occurrence. Dick's story allows one to go into one's own memory matrix and conjure up the prior doctors, while maintaining the EIGHTH's own persona. This is also the first meeting with the EIGHT's newest companion, SAM JONES. It also helps clear up some of the incontinuities of the 1996 tele-film.
Rating:
Summary: Nostalgia Galore
Review: Lets leave the worries behind and take a walk down the memory lane. Nothing serious, a little bit this, a little bit of that, a melting pot of doctor's 8 regenerations. The brief meetings with all the 8 doctors are brought together in a way ony Terrance Dicks can write making the reader miss those earlier doctors and also looking forward to more adventures of recent regeneration. Take it, enjoy it, smile with it, move with it. HAVE FUN.
Rating: 
Summary: Eight Doctors, and 284 pages of fluff!!!
Review: Remember when Terrance Dicks wrote wonderful stories for the BBC television series "Dr Who". Good!!! Don't spoil that memory by reading this piece of rubblish. The characters that we fans love so much are depicted with all the depth of a thimble. The meaty descriptions of alien beings and worlds are given just enough substance to fill the bottom of an ash tray, while still not touching the sides. The only justification for this novel, would have to be if poor Terrance was heavily medicated, after a series of severe blows to the head, during the time that he was writing this. Hopefully his prozac perscription will run out before he puts pen to paper again. I know that you will more than likely buy this book too, just based on the fact that it is a multi-Doctor story...but you have been warned.
Rating:
Summary: The Doctor's self-search sprint medly
Review: Terrance Dick's familarity with the Jon Pertwee's Doctor and Tom Baker's Doctor made their apperances in the book gems. The small cameos for the first, second and seventh Doctors dissapointed me. The sixth Doctor, Colin Baker's, relied too heavily on over-the-top slapstick violence and jokes about that Doctor's weight. The story tends to get bogged down in Gallifriean politics. That distracts from the interaction between the Doctors. On the whole, the scene involving the fourth Doctor was uncessarily violent. Still, Dicks pulls of the Doctors' reuinon of all time. A reader can almost hear the voices of Tom Baker, Jon Pertwee and the lot calling from Saturday evenings past.
Rating: 
Summary: Review of Eight Doctors
Review: The characters in the story eight doctors are fleshed out very well or very badly. The Doctor is not written very well and the reader will find that his character is not even mature. The reader can see this when he drinks in the Shobogan tavern and when he pleads to Rassilon to release Borusa from imprisonment. Sam Jones is hardly heard from in the story but the side story with her and the drug dealers at school defines what she believes but the reader does not find out what her character is really like until Vampire Science. The Agency is severly underutilized in the story and Terrence Dicks could have written a better storyline regarding them. The link between the Agency and the Doctor's trial was very poorly written. The viewpoint of Eight Doctors is effective especially when the Doctor talks to his previous selves. The Eight Doctors structure does support most of the story. The only part in the story where it failed was when the Doctor left Gallifrey and met his 7th self. The reader will find that this causes a disruption in an otherwise fluid structure. There was enough tension in the beginning of the Eight Doctors to keep the story moving but that tension ended when the Doctor came into contact with his 7th self. From that point onward the tension is hardly existant and can quickly bore the reader. The settings throughout the story were very descriptive, especially Gallifrey. There is no one setting in this story that is permanent but the constant change of scenery and time does add to the Eight Doctors' tension and vivid description. There is no particular theme to Eight Doctors except that he was and is a man in a constant state of change. The style and tone of Eight Doctors is effective and does keep the reader's attention. It is only towards the end that it fails to keep the reader involved. The beginning of the story was very subtle but it does attract the reader's attention even though it is not violent or vulgar. Eight Doctors did have a perfect balance of character dialogue and narration. The Eight Doctors was too dramatic when the Doctor pleaded with Rassilon to let Borusa go and when he was in the police headquarters being questioned. The weak characterization of the Doctor does attribute to the story's poor ending.
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