Maius Intra Qua Extra

Sometime I will post a picture of it, when I get it set up.
Waiting! ;)

I see your point about River. On the other hand, I don't remember she has never actually showed any morals in thw show; she'd shoot everyone who was in her way, she'd destroy a thousend years piece to send the Doctor a message... She obviously cared about the Doctor and her parents, and her crew in the Library and that episode with Angels in season 5, but the reat of the world was just her playground. I'm not that surprised she'd kill for money then. But yes, there was no sign she would actually do something like that previously.

I just thought the Doctor knew the rules and he was aware since the beginning he couldn't take the mark of Clara. As you say, it doesn't make sense if he didn't.

The adventures haven't been very inspired, and in general, the Doctor's been a jerk. Instead of portraying him as alien and therefore thinking too quickly and not fitting into the social norms, like he is in the show, he's sarcastic and mean to everyone.
I'm sorry to hear that. To be honest, I feel he's been a jerk in the show a couple of times and I don't like it. There's a difference between Nine's "Put her on a slow heat and let it simmer" about Jackie and Twelve's repeated "Your face is too wide!", the first one is just alien but the second one is rude.

With the TV show, the showrunner keeps a tight rein on what goes into the scripts, to keep them all in line with his vision of the show, but I wonder if they have such a system for the novels, or if they just contract a person to write a novel and don't do much more than the usual editing and making sure the Doctor doesn't shoot someone.
I don't know if anyone has said anything about that, but I think it might be just it; there probably is some control about the novel's topic, to mantain the continuity, but no one cares if the characters behave in character, as long as it's not something really bad.

Thanks for the answer! I have "Beautiful Chaos" and I hope I'll like it in the end.