Elizabeth Sandifer

I’ll Explain Later

Lungbarrow is the final New Adventure featuring the Seventh Doctor, and ostensibly leads straight into the TV Movie. It dusts off the script that Marc Platt had to revise into Ghost Light, which was originally a bevy of revelations about the Doctor’s past and the nature of Gallifrey. As a book it becomes even more sprawling, finally rendering explicit the whole of the not-actually-Cartmel Masterplan, establishing at long last the relationship between the Doctor and the mysterious Other. The Doctor is the Other reincarnated. So that’s a thrilling shock. At the time Dave Owen wasn’t thrilled, calling it “rather more frustrating than rewarding” and saying that “it’s weird and wunderful – but, unfortunately, never simultaneously.” Lars Pearson, more recently, went with calling it “one of the most ambitious ‘Who’ novels ever, worthy of considerable praise.” Pearson’s view carries the day: it comes in fourth in Sullivan’s rankings with an 83.6%, which is good for a tie with fifth place. DWRG Summary. Whoniverse Discontinuity Guide entry.

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It’s March of 1997. No Doubt remain silent at the top of the charts. After two weeks the Spice Girls have a single out – “Mama/Who Do You Think You Are.” That’s not one that charted in the US, but it goes straight to number one and stays there for the rest of the month. The Bee Gees, En Vogue, Bush, Ant & Dec, Boyzone, the Fugees, R. Kelly, the Backstreet Boys, Madonna, and the Pet Shop Boys also chart.

In real news, one of the most famous UFO sightings ever, the Phoenix Lights, takes place. Yes, The X-Files was tremendously popular around now, why do you ask? Hale-Bopp makes its closest approach to Earth, the Tamil Tigers kill over two hundred people in Sri Lanka, and the mass suicide of the Heaven’s Gate cultists takes place in San Diego. While in the UK, John Major calls his doomed election, and The Sun promptly endorses Blair. And Teletubbies debuts!

While in fine literature, Marc Platt’s Lungbarrow. The book’s existence is an oddity. On the one hand, it was inevitable. The simple reality of Doctor Who fandom was that all of Virgin’s playing around with the Cartmel Masterplan had to be paid off. Never mind that there wasn’t actually all that much playing around with it – the Death/Time/Pain set of Eternals feature far more heavily than the mythology of the Other. It had to be done. Whatever one might think of Lungbarrow, the idea that the Virgin line could end without doing this story is unthinkable.

Which is largely a pity, because it’s rubbish. Every revelation in this book is complete rubbish. Neil Gaiman relates the story of how in an early draft of The Doctor’s Wife he had a line about how the Corsair was an inspiration for the Doctor leaving Gallifrey, and Moffat told him to take it out because the Doctor “does what he does for reasons too vast and terrible to relate.” Which is pretty much the problem – a problem we first noticed way back around Season Twenty and Longleat.…

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I’ll Explain Later

We’ve actually legitimately skipped Bad Therapy, which tries to fix up the whole Peri thing, and Eternity Weeps, which casually kills off Liz Shaw and less casually divorces Jason and Benny. It’s not well liked.

The Room With No Doors properly begins the winding up of the New Adventures, and also ties Kate Orman with Paul Cornell for number of books in the range, with So Vile a Sin putting her over the top two months later. Note that the majority of her books came out in the last year. And they were all good to boot. 16th century Japan and a lot of angst on the part of the Doctor and Chris. Dave Owen deems it “a humorous book that is never dull, and frequently delightful,” which I’m not entirely sure is actually a description of this novel. Lars Pearson goes with “a much needed epilogue to the Virgin New Adventures,” which is notable as an actually plausible review. The Sullivan rankings put it at thirteenth, with a 78% rating, making it Orman’s second most liked book. DWRG Summary. Whoniverse Discontinuity Guide Entry.

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It’s February of 1997. Blur are at number one with “Beetlebum.” A week later it’s LL Cool J with “Ain’t Nobody,” then U2 with “Discotheque,” and finally No Doubt with “Don’t Speak.” George Michael, Placebo, Tori Amos, En Vogue, Depeche Mode, the Eels, and Daft Punk also chart, which is actually quite a good little list, if a preposterously late 80s/early 90s throwback chart.

In news, the Hubble Space Telescope begins repairs so that it actually works. Dolly the sheep is actually unveiled to the public, prompting Bill Clinton to ban federal funding for human cloning in a beautiful moment of crass pandering. And the Conservative Party actually becomes a minority government, actually for the second time, having previously gone four days without a majority in January.

While in books it’s The Room With No Doors. The New Adventures proper, as an era with a distinct viewpoint distinct from everything that had come before in Doctor Who, began with Timewyrm: Revelation. But more significant, in many ways, is the two book sequence that continues into Time’s Crucible. These two books, in hindsight, establish the bulk of the New Adventures’ mythology, with Cornell establishing the mythology of the Doctor’s interior landscape and Platt establishing the larger mythology of Gallifrey and the Time Lords. And so as the Seventh Doctor’s period in the New Adventures winds down we symbolically repeat this pair with one more novel dealing with the ideas of Timewyrm: Revelation followed by Platt’s other New Adventure, the final revelation of the “Cartmel” Masterplan.

As is usually the case with the New Adventures, the retrospective emphasis gets put in all the wrong places. Lungbarrow may be the book where all the big mythic revelations about the Doctor are made, but this is the novel where the actual meat of the New Adventures and their take on the Doctor is resolved. The central innovation of Timewyrm: Revelation, of course, was the decision to treat the Doctor’s mind and memories as a landscape such that the history and mythology of the program acquires its own mythos.…

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I’ll Explain Later

Well, technically we’ve skipped the rest of the line.

So Vile a Sin, the fifty-sixth and final of the sixty-one New Adventures, concludes the Psi-Powers arc. The novel was infamously delayed when Aaronovitch suffered a hard drive crash and was unable to face the prospect of rewriting large swaths from scratch and in an ultra-compressed timeframe. Accordingly, Kate Orman stepped in to finish the job from what chapters remained and Aaronovitch’s outline, and the book was put out five months late, more or less the day that Virgin’s license to publish Doctor Who books expired. It has tons of big plot points, most notably the death of Roz Forrester. It’s once again quite acclaimed (noticing a pattern in the latter New Adventures?). Dave Owen says that “Ben Aaronovitch and Kate Orman utterly typify the very best of the New Adventures.” Lars Pearson praises how it “makes Roz one of the most determined and self-actualized companions ever.” Sullivan’s rankings lodge it in with the rest of the Kate Orman books at fifteenth, with a 77.5% rating. DWRG Summary. Whoniverse Discontinuity Guide Entry.

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It’s November of 1996. The Spice Girls are, unsurprisingly, still at number one with “Say You’ll Be There.” More surprisingly, they’re unseated after a week, giving them only a two week run, as Robson & Jerome take number one with “What Becomes of the Broken Hearted.” That lasts two weeks, then Prodigy come in with “Breathe,” which finishes out the month. Tony Braxton, Michael Jackson,  the Fugees, the Backstreet Boys, and Madonna also chart, the latter with Evita’s weird zombie bonus track composed by Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber for the movie version.

In news, the Tories narrow the gap between them and Labour to a mere seventeen points. The Channel Tunnel catches a bit of fire, and the Stone of Scone is installed in Edinburgh Castle after seven hundred years of being in England, which is largely symbolic, but a very important symbol. Outside of the UK, President Clinton wins re-election and Benazir Bhutto is tossed out of power in Pakistan. And, because it’s fun to say, Tony Silva is sentenced to seven years in prison for an illegal parrot smuggling operation.

While in literature… nothing. No New Adventure comes out. There was supposed to be one, but, well, you know the story. This book forms the single weirdest whorl of chronology the blog will ever cover. Not only does it form part of the tail end of the New Adventures where they were still publishing Seventh Doctor novels after the TV Movie, it was released out of sequence even within the Virgin line. The usual line about this is that this ordering blunted the book’s major moment, the death of Roz Forrester, which was, inevitably, revealed in Bad Therapy the month after So Vile a Sin was meant to come out. Two problems present themselves here. First, the idea that Roz was marked for death was going around fandom for months prior to it being officially revealed.…

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We’ve skipped the largely panned but relatively plot-important The Death of Art.

Damaged Goods is by some chap named Russell T Davies, which by most accounts is the most important thing about it. Ancient Gallifreyan horrors on a 1980s council estate, with no shortage of gay culture, it would be exactly what you expected Russell T Davies in the Virgin era to be if it weren’t for all the cocaine. Very much liked, though. Dave Owen at the time declared it to be “currently [his] favorite New Adventure.” Lars Pearson, more recently, but still well before the new series was announced, said that like the definite article, it is “sometimes forgotten in Virgin New Adventures tidal wave,” although it is “one of the most mature” Doctor Who stories ever. Shannon Sullivan’s rankings, which it should be noted are mostly pre-new series, puts it as the seventh best New Adventure with an 80.7% rating. DWRG Summary. Whoniverse Discontinuity Guide entry.

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It’s October of 1996. Deep Blue Something are being one hit wonders with “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” That unsurprisingly doesn’t list as the Chemical Brothers take over with “Setting Sun.” That also doesn’t last, with Boyzone’s “Words” going to number one. Which, of course, can’t possibly hold up to the Spice Girls’ second single “Say You’ll Be There.” Celine Dion, Donna Lewis, Blackstreet, the Manic Street Preachers, the Fugees, Phil Collins, and LL Cool J also chart, so it’s exactly as bad a month as you think it is.

In news, the former prime minister of Bulgaria is assassinated. The second OJ Simpson trial begins, because once just wasn’t enough. New Zealand agrees to pay $130 million in compensation for the 150-year-old treatment of the Maori population. And Laurent Kabilia makes significant progress towards his eventual takeover of what is still Zaire at the time. And the Conservative government’s majority manages to fall to a single seat as Peter Thurnham defects to the Lib-Dems.

While in books, it’s Damaged Goods. Like Human Nature, the perspective on Damaged Goods has shifted fundamentally since its release. Upon release it was well-liked, but sandwiched in amongst the final year of New Adventures it was, if we’re being honest, forgettable. It didn’t brutally kill off Liz Shaw, come out months late and by a different author, have Benny schtupping the Eighth Doctor, reveal the secret origins of the Doctor, or add to Kate Orman’s terrifying tally of books in a relatively short period of time. It was just a very good novel by a moderately successful television writer. Russell T Davies was still years from Queer as Folk and from becoming Russell T Davies, and he was nearly a decade from being the one who brought Doctor Who back. It was still quite acclaimed – Sullivan’s rankings shut down not long after the series returned, due in part to a lack of people submitting ratings, so its high rating there can’t be entirely chalked up to a surge of new series fans – indeed, it has by some margin the fewest votes of any novel in the top ten, and the third lowest number of any New Adventure.…

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I’ll Explain Later

Return of the Living Dad, Orman’s second novel in five months and one of a staggering three-and-a-half novels she releases in a one year period (with another half coming out four months later, and another full one coming eight after that), features the return of Bernice Summerfield to the New Adventures after a… three month absence. So not really that big a gap, actually. It squares away the old plotline of what happened to her father during the Dalek wars. The answer is that he got time warped to 1983. So that’s unexpected. It’s a Kate Orman book, so everyone loves it. With Paul Cornell providing plotting assistance to boot, so, you know, even better. Lars Pearson goes with “one of Orman’s masterpieces,” Dave Owen at the time said that Orman provides “many profound insights into the lives of her characters, and indeed, people in general.” It’s eighteenth on Sullivan’s rankings, squarely in the narrow range Orman’s books all occupy.

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It’s August of 1996. The Spice Girls are at number one with “Wannabe.” Manic Street Preachers, the Fugees, Los Del Rio, Alanis Morissette, Robbie Williams, Bone Thugs-N-Harmony, Underworld, Backstreet Boys, IMC, Pet Shop Boys, Jamiroquai, R.E.M., George Michael, Bryan Adams, and Ant & Dec all fail to unseat them despite making it into the top ten. Alanis Morissette at least manages to dominate the album chart for the entire month. In news, NASA tentatively answers David Bowie with “yes.” Bob Dole wins the Republican nomination for President. Prince Charles and Princess Diana are officially divorced. Osama bin Laden declares a jihad against the United States.

While in books, Return of the Living Dad. But let’s jump forward a bit. Let’s have a look at last month’s Doctor Who Magazine – issue #453 if you’re reading this from the future. In it is a four page feature commemorating the twentieth anniversary of Love and War and thus of the creation of Professor Bernice Summerfield. This is, to say the least, extraordinary. It is, of course, too soon to know for certain, but it is unlikely that Chris Cwej and Roz Forrester are going to get a four-page feature in a 2015 issue of Doctor Who Magazine. Even the Eighth Doctor Adventures’ major companion, Fitz, whose six-year tenure as a companion is second only to Ace in sheer length, is unlikely to be so honored. There is, in other words, something extraordinary about Benny.

Part of it is simply that she is an enduring character. From 1992 to 1996 she was a regular companion. Even after her “departure” in Happy Endings she made three  major appearances in the eleven subsequent books, plus a brief one in So Vile a Sin. Then came a two-and-a-half year run as the lead character in the Doctorless New Adventures line from 1997-1999. Concurrent with the tail end of these were Big Finish’s audio adaptations, which were where they proved their credentials and managed to get the Doctor Who license in 1999. The Bernice Summerfield audio line continues to this day.…

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Speaking of Christmas, and the general season of gift-giving it implies, have you considered just how much all of your friends and family want copies of the first two volumes of TARDIS Eruditorum in book form? You should probably make their dreams come true.

Unless, of course, you don’t think they’d want a copy. Then you should think about just how good family or friends they are, and whether they deserve to have their dreams come true. Then you should get them copies anyway.

Volume 1 (William Hartnell): (US) (UK). Volume 2 (Patrick Troughton): (US) (UK).

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I’ll Explain Later

We skipped GodEngine, to someone’s sorrow, I’m sure. It had Ice Warriors and lots of continuity references.

Christmas on a Rational Planet is the debut book of Lawrence Miles, which is almost certainly the most important thing about it. It features the intrusion of the raw forces of chaos into our universe and Chris making the decision as to what the fundamental nature of the universe should be, albeit manipulated by the TARDIS. It also introduces the idea of Eighth Man Bound, a Time Lord game about previewing your future regenerations. Lars Pearson, still a number of years away from employing Lawrence Miles, calls it “delicious, but a bit text-heavy and fragmented as hell.” Dave Owen, at the time, bemoaned the release schedule, saying that if the book had “been among the first handful of New Adventures it would have been immediately seized upon as radical, unprecedented, and exhibiting a fresh approach to Doctor Who storytelling,” but suggesting that the disposable nature of the novels means that it won’t get the second reading it deserves. Shannon Sullivan’s rankings have it embodying mediocrity – at thirty-first out of sixty-one it is the median New Adventure with a 69.1% rating. DWRG Summary. Whoniverse Discontinuity Guide (worth it for the attempt to figure out if fan rumor of a reference to every Doctor Who story is true. It’s not – Miles misses thirty-three even by a sympathetic count).

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It’s July of 1996, one of those months where the number one single changes weekly. Baddiel, Skinner, and the Lightning Seeds start us off with “Three Lions.” Then we get The Fugees’ “Killing Me Softly,” Gary Barlow’s “Forever Love,” and finally the real news in The Spice Girls’ “Wannabe.” Los Del Rio, Underworld, Celine Dion, Toni Braxton, Belinda Carlisle, and Mariah Carey also chart. While in news, Dolly the sheep is successfully cloned, Boris Yeltsin is reelected, and Eric Robert Rudolph, an anti-abortion domestic terrorist, bombs the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.

In books, it’s Lawrence Miles’s debut novel, Christmas on a Rational Planet. Which means we finally have to do Lawrence Miles. Except he’s not Lawrence Miles yet. Which is an odd thing to say, but bear with me. Lawrence Miles, the grand figure of myth who provided the primary creative vision of the Eighth Doctor era, has his debut novel with Alien Bodies. That’s the book with which Miles immediately seized the crown of “most interesting writer in the line.”…

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