Tim, Defender of the Earth

In London the government has developed qualms about a top secret defence strategy that it has initiated. In future, funds are to be directed to a different project. But there is a problem with the cancelled strategy: it is Tim, an enormous tyrannosaurus style monster, grown to defend the realm from all comers. Efforts to destroy him lead instead to his escape into the Thames. Meanwhile the new project’s nanoscale development is startling; Professor Mallahide can call up his nanobots to transform anyone or anything while keeping the transformed object’s memory intact so that the changes can be reversed.

Predictably, these two forces, the unthinkably enormous and the unimaginably small, are lined up against each other as London, their battleground, falls into rubble. Caught in the middle is Mallahide’s daughter, Anna, and her school friend, Chris, who has become the wearer of a bracelet that has a powerful link to Tim. Between them they may be able to save Britain and much of northern Europe from extinction, but will they be able to combat the forces of Tim, Mallahide and world governments?

Enthoven keeps the action going at a mighty pace; no sooner is one dramatic scene over than another begins. Readers will certainly get value in terms of action, and a fair bit of humour too, in a second novel from an author who seems to have no end of excitement to offer. And of course, it is all just fantasy – isn’t it?