http://nhw.livejournal.com/1022168.ht...
Doctor Who and the Crusaders is the only one of the 1960s Who novels to have been drawn from a four-part rather than seven-part story, and Whitaker makes full use of the extra space this gives him to expand on his own original material. His opening paragraph is pretty memorable:

As swiftly and as silently as a shadow, Doctor Who’s Space and Time ship, Tardis, appeared on a succession of planets each as different as the pebbles on a beach, stayed awhile and then vanished, as mysteriously as it had come. And whatever alien world it was that received him and his fellow travellers, and however well or badly they were treated, the Doctor always set things to rights, put down injustice, encouraged dignity, fair treatment and respect.

Despite the solecisms of 'Doctor Who' and 'the Tardis' (which are fortunately not repeated later in the text), it's a good start, and the whole story fees more embedded in an ongoing narrative than does Doctor Who and the Zarbi. This is partly because Whitaker makes the Ian/Barbara relationship even more explicitly romantic than in his previous book. But it's also because there is a good sense of geography, of this Palestine, despite its rather implausible woodlands, being a place with real towns filled with merchants, robbers and warlords.
The biggest loss from the TV version is the rhythmic, indeed iambic, structure of some of the set pieces; but I guess that would not read as well as it sounded. However, Ian's humanistic discussion with Saladin, and the decency and chivalry of the Saracen leaders, remain high points of the story. Well worth hunting down if you can find it. ( )