A Flavour of the Book: “YOU SHALL
BE DESTROYED!” roared the ter-moo-nator, and both Bo and Pat took a step
backwards in alarm. “I shall turn
you into beef-flavoured mush!”
The Authortrek View:
This is a disappointment from the
usually very reliable Steve Cole. The
Ter-Moo-Nators is very derivative: Professor McMoo and his Time Shed are
not that far removed from Doctor Who and his TARDIS, and the Ter-Moo-Nators
themselves are obviously named after Arnold Schwarzenegger’s famous film role,
which the parents will get if not the kids. The Doctor Who theme continues with the appropriation
of the CIA to mean something other than ‘Central Intelligence Agency’, the nose
rings that allow the cows to blend in with their surroundings and to speak any
language, and the Prime Moovers’ reluctance to intervene is very reminiscent to
that of the Time Lords. Woody
Fox’s illustrations inside are very poor, and I guess these are meant to resemble
the style used in the Horrible Histories. However, Andy Parker’s cover illustrations are superb. Steve Cole laces puns throughout the
book that aren’t, for want of a better word, very punny. Having written that, one of Steve
Cole’s jokes did make me laugh out loud.
I’m sure that the Cows in Action series will sell many copies due
to the splendid marketing campaign that is promoting them, so it is a great
shame that the actual story is not all that great. The Ter-Moo-Nators is a long way from being the best
children’s book by a Doctor Who author: that honour must go to the late
great Terry Nation, who wrote Rebecca’s World. Terry Nation also nicked elements from other people’s
fictions, but he did it with so much more style than Steve Cole manages to
achieve here.
To find out more about the author, please visit our Stephen Cole page.
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