Category: The New Adventures

Story: Near the end of the 20th century, Bernice visits the Doctor’s house on Allen Road, a residence he maintains in seclusion on Earth, where they have arranged to meet. But things have changed for the Doctor in the intervening months/years – he has regenerated. After convincing Benny that he is the same Time Lord she once knew, sinister events literally land on top of them as a man – whom the government has declared to be a dangerously unstable fugitive – escapes on the eve of a British manned landing on Mars. (Presumably this story takes place in the same alternate history in which Britain landed on Mars in 1970 in the Pertwee story The Ambassadors Of Death.) But the mission goes very wrong – the astronauts stumble into the burial crypts of the Martian natives, whom the Doctor knows as the Ice Warriors. Immediately an Ice Warrior invasion seizes Britain, deposing the monarchy and establishing a Martian foothold on Earth. The Doctor, with his centuries of experience with both the Ice Warriors and despotic would-be rulers such as the man who claims a place as the Martian liaison to the British people, tries to intervene, finding help in unlikely places. The aging Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and his young successor Bambera (a fondly remembered character from the 1989 Battlefield episode) have gone underground, preparing to wage a guerilla war on the Ice Warriors (and the greedy humans who are trying to achieve their own status by becoming the aliens’ collaborators), and Benny, who has a great deal of experience with the Ice Warriors herself.

Review: This is the first and only eighth Doctor novel published by Virgin Books prior to surrendering the Doctor Who license to BBC Books in the summer of 1997. One thing to consider when judging any eighth Doctor book is that there were a mere 90 minutes of Paul McGann’s performance as the revitalized Time Lord from which to extrapolate the entirety of the character. It’s been interesting to see how different authors (and their editors) have interpreted that performance and that character. For the most part, “The Dying Days” does it rather well. … Read more

Story: The Doctor returns to his homeworld of Gallifrey. But by the worst luck of the draw, the TARDIS has brought him to the forgotten and buried, but not abandoned, House of Lungbarrow – the ancestral home of the Doctor’s Time Lord family, most of whom are trapped there, doomed to spend their remaining regenerations trying to eke out a barren existence until they finally die.

Review: This penultimate entry in the New Adventures series of original Doctor Who novels marks the final literary appearance – well, sort of – of the seventh incarnation of the Doctor (as played on TV and briefly in the 1996 movie by Sylvester McCoy). It’s a long-awaited and legendary storyline, which was briefly considered for inclusion in the final year of Doctor Who’s life as a BBC television series which evolved (appropriately enough) into the broadcast episode Ghost Light. … Read more

Story: 2157 AD, planet Earth. To a Doctor Who fan, this means only one thing…the Dalek Invasion of Earth. But thanks to Craig Hinton, there’s now more. Due to a “sub-space infarction,” which coincidentally occurs at the same time as a “vortex rupture” (this is all tecno-babble deluxe!), the TARDIS gets “destroyed.” The Doctor, along with Roz and Chris, jump into the temporal life boats just in time to escape this cataclysm, only to be separated and spread across our Solar System. The Doctor and Roz end up on Mars, and they’re not alone. A spaceship crashes near to where they arrive, and on board they find a group of random travellers all with seemingly seperate agendas. As night begins to fall, the Doctor and Roz, along with the survivors of the doomed ship, head towards an entrance to the extensive underground cave system built thousands of years ago by the indigenous Martians. Little do they know, they are being followed. Chris, seperated from his crewmates, arrives in a subterranean research facility 50 kilometers beneath the surface of Pluto’s moon Charon. Out here in the farthest reaches of the Solar System are the sole surviving members of a doomed subspace tunnel research station. They are destined to be destroyed by the Daleks, or “invaders,” as they are frequently called…

Review: I enjoyed this book, but boy, is it ever chockablock with continuity! Daleks and Ice Warriors and Sutekh. Oh my! But it has been woven together quite well. … Read more

Story: The Doctor is once again manipulating events, plotting and planning – but this time, he’s planning Bernice Summerfield’s wedding. Friends and acquaintances – ranging from Ace to Kadiatu to the Brigadier himself – are gathering in the quaint Earth village of Cheldon Bonniface. But other forces are at work here – evil, hatred, and perhaps just enough lust to derail Bernice’s wedding before she’s even had a chance to walk down the aisle. Can singing Silurians salvage the situation? Can Jason keep it in his pants – at least until after his wedding? Will the Timewyrm unleash her mighty powers again…upon her new boyfriend, Chris Cwej? And will the Brigadier survive one final encounter with the Master?

Review: This pleasant little novel by Paul Cornell, surely the most gifted of the NA authors, breaks with the “seasons” theme utilized in his four previous books and plays Benny’s wedding for the stand-alone event that it has to be. Even if you haven’t read the previous book (and I haven’t), Jason Kane comes across as an interesting and well-rounded character – and Cornell wisely makes use of the fact that Jason had only appeared in the previous novel to keep the reader guessing about whether or not Jason and Benny are headed for wedded bliss, or the usual mayhem that seems to consume the lives of everyone in the Doctor’s immediate vicinity. … Read more

Story: The planet Moriel is of great tactical interest to three races: The Czahns, the Saloi, and the Dakharri. An impromptu summit of these three great empires has been called by the Hollow Gods in order to apparently settle the sabre rattling over this seemingly important planet. The Doctor has been designated as the mediator of this meeting and, even though he doesn’t know how he got there, or the whereabouts of his companions, he seems in total control of the situation.

Bernice, who has been snatched from the safety of the TARDIS, has ended up on some backwater gambling spaceport world, and inadvertantly gets mixed up with a displaced human named Jason Kane. All forms of hijinks and adventures befall these two, leading them right into the proverbial sack with each other. This leads to more hijinks, which I will spare all of you the pain of reading about. Roz and Chris, also seperated from the Doctor, have wound up on the military, slave-driven world of the Czahns. Being as clever as they are, they join up with the Soldier Caste (by beating two of them up and stealing their uniforms…) only to find themselves shipped out on the next troop transport on the way to invade the poor old world of Moriel.

Review: So, I know what you are asking. What do the desires of these Hollow Gods have to do with all this typical weirdness? And what stake does Jason Kane’s “pet” have in the summit meeting on Moriel? Most of all, why is the Doctor wearing his old brown coat? I can tell you that 2 of these 3 questions are answered. Are the answers sufficient? You be the judge. … Read more

Story: So, this time, our time traveling gang of sleuths in their mystery machine land on a frontier world in the far future. The settlers have contracted a virus which gives them all manner of psychic powers. You know…telekenesis, pyro-kinesis, telepathy, and I believe one of them can predict fashion trends a decade in advance. And so, the Doctor manages to catch this “disease,” but after some work, he is cured. The rest of the population, however, is not so lucky. Not only do they aquire these “powers” (I wish I had the power of mind-over-sci-fi-clichè) but they also have a compelling drive to run into the forest. They have this voice in their heads telling them to do… nobody’s sure what, exactly.

Review: Warning: the contents of this book DO NOT cause drowsiness. … Read more

Story: 15 years after the events of “Warlock”, all around the world, there are seemingly telekenetic/telepathic children being spied on by some mysterious Agency who are out to use these kids for, of course, evil and nefarious schemes of World conquest / domination / power / destruction / control, etc. The Doctor, being the sly chess player that he is, has figured everything out ahead of time, and has placed his operatives in key positions to allow events to come to a well-orchestrated conclusion.

Review: This book is third in a trilogy of books about much the same characters. “Cat’s Cradle: Warhead”, “Warlock”, and “Warchild” being the third. The first one I can’t remember due to adolescence-induced short term memory loss. The second book was good (you can read my review here). And this final book was, for lack of a better word, good. I do have to say, it’s not very Who-ish. The events in this story could happen just as well without the Doctor & company, but the added bonus of their presence is much appreciated. … Read more

Story: One of the many reasons the Time Lords have a strict non-intervention policy is that by interacting with primitive cultures, you run the risk of messing with their natural evolution. Now, when the Doctor interferes, we usually don’t see the effects of his visits after the 4 or 6 episodes, and for the most part, he does enough good that we figure everything is going to be okay. But what if an innocent slip of the tongue could affect the outcome of World War II?

The Germans have a secret weapon. A weapon so cunning that not only could you brush your teeth with it, but it could single handedly win the war for their side. But what is it? The Doctor has dispatched his crack time travel team to investigate! Roz has no idea what this weapon is. Bernice isn’t really sure why she was sent where she was sent, or, for that matter, what to be looking for. Chris thinks the secret weapon is a flying saucer. And the Doctor? He, for once, has no idea what is happening. The only clues they have are, a scientist named Emil Hartung has designed some type of super weapon that will allow the Germans to win WWII.

Review: The whole way through this book you are anticipating aliens, or spaceships, or that Hartung is the Master. But instead you get air raids, secret bases, and SS officers. It is a refreshing change from the norm, and Lance Parkin has expertly blended the TARDIS crew into an historic setting. After the abysmal “Downtime”, it was so satisfying to read a good Who book again. … Read more

Story: In “Lords Of The Storm”, a Rutan spy infiltrated the Sontaran ranks. He became aware of the fact that the Sontarans had cracked the Rutan Military codebank and had retrieved information that could turn the tides of the war so much in the Sontarans favor, that the Rutans could be utterly defeated. After a book-long chase, the Rutan spy managed to escape with its life and began its long trek back to the Rutan homeworld in order to warn the Host of the imminent Sontaran attack. Unfortunately, this Rutan spy became trapped in a decompressed spacecraft, thereby freezing it into a dormant state and delaying the delivery of this information, giving the Sontarans time to bring their plans closer to completion.

The Doctor, who, of course, knows about this spy from his encounters with it on Rudra, has heard of a number of strange deaths on various planets. These deaths match with the way a Rutan shapeshifts into another form, by probing into the bodily depths of the creature to be copied, gleaning all information needed to make an almost-perfect duplicate. This is a messy business, and it leaves a severely mutilated corpse as a side effect of the transmogrification. The Doctor sends in his companions, and ex-Adjudicators, Roz and Chris to find this Rutan and help it get back to its homeworld. The Doctor doesn’t know exactly what the great “secret” information is, but by allowing the Rutan to complete its mission, the war will continue, and the Universe will remain as it is. If the Rutans are defeated totally, the Sontarans, knowing only war, will inevitably set their sights on the rest of the Galaxy. By aiding the Rutan, the Doctor will keep both races busy with each other, and out of everyone elses’ hair (or scales, or shells, or whatever).

Review: I really could go on, but the Godfather of Doctor Who, Terrance Dicks, does such a great job of conveying this story to the reader that I’m just lessening his great prose by condensing it. Now, although this book is a broadend version of the video Shakedown: Return Of The Sontarans, only a small portion of this book is taken up with the events in the video. … Read more

Story: The Doctor has taken his companions here for a break after the events in “Head Games”, finding the place to be very relaxing, and the people to be very neighborly. Now, when I say “people,” I don’t just mean humans. There are humanoids who resemble regular “people,” but there are also robots who are self aware that call themselves people. These robots come in all shapes and sizes, from small marble sized, to giant ship sized, but they don’t look like human people, as the human people find it unnerving talking to a robot “person” who looks like a human person. In this world, tables are robots, but only sometimes “people.” There is a controlling influence inside this sphere – a giant computer, who is a “person,” that is known as “God.” It isn’t called God because it is omnipitant, it’s merely a term of endearment used by the locals. God creates the weather, manages the night and day cycles, and watches over the goings on inside the sphere. But, unlike the real God, he doesn’t see and know all. You see, there has been a murder, and it is a robot “person” who is the victim. God is not sure how it happened, so the Doctor takes charge of the investigation.

Review: Now, this was not the best book in the world. Lately my standards have gone way up, thanks to the brilliant “Millennial Rites”. I’m not in favor of an author messing about with Doctor Who mythos, or adding ridiculous characteristics to the Time Lord civilization, unless, of course, it is done properly. Here, it is not. … Read more