Review: Bernice Summerfield and the Doomsday Manuscript, by Justin Richards

The Doomsday Manuscript by Justin Richards

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I can't quite decide whether I think the Fifth Axis stuff in the Benny universe is a lazy way of telling World War II stories in space, or a clever shorthand for telling stories about the battle against evil in terms that readers can relate to. It's probably a bit of both. I think I prefer stories with more alien antagonists, but that might just say something about me.



It's also a bit odd coming back to this novel after being familiar with so many of the later Benny audios. So many of the twists and turns in these characters' relationships have yet to arrive. Indeed, some very important characters have yet to arrive.



But it's a fun book. The lost tomb and the pseudo-Nazi's give it a very Indiana Jones-ish feel. There are some nice plot twists, and a spectacular set-piece action sequence in which Benny and another character are pursued through the mansion of an aging former movie star by cameras firing deadly laser beams, in order to produce action movie footage into which a computer-generated image of their host in his prime can be digitally spliced.



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