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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

9 Comments

  1. Stuart Ian Burns
    June 3, 2011 @ 6:37 am

    "… and arguably the appearance of River Song in the Russell T. Davies era."

    Fabulous. Yes, yes, yes.

    Other examples from BBC Books:

    10th vs. old style Daleks in Prisoner of the Daleks
    10th vs. remnants of the time war from the 8th Doctor novels in The Eyeless
    Mephistopheles Arkadian from Big Finish's Gallifrey spin-off series appearing in an early 10th & Rose Doctor Who Adventures strip
    The Vyans from Big Finish originating in a 10th Doctor Annual short story.

    Iris Wyldethyme in general.

    Reply

  2. Matthew Celestis
    June 3, 2011 @ 7:25 am

    I would like to read The Dark Path, but second-hand copies are incredibly expensive.

    Reply

  3. Aaron
    June 3, 2011 @ 7:44 am

    Also, Goth Opera has the 5th Doctor finishing the job the Seventh started in Blood Harvest, and the audios have quite a few. The Sixth Doctor meets Charley out of order, for instance, and the most recent Sixth Doctor trilogy featured him meeting DI Menzies out of order with how she's used to meeting him. Also, the Gathering/Reaping/Harvest trilogy is done out of order, with the 6th Doctor's part happening first, then the 5th's, then the 7th's. Oh, and I think the viryan thing was done sort of out of order, but I didn't pay any attention to it. I think that's actually the strength of Big Finish, that they can do out of order meetings to tell a larger story. Unfortunately, since they're so often completely trad stories, they very rarely take advantage of this.

    Reply

  4. Elizabeth Sandifer
    June 3, 2011 @ 7:54 am

    Well, as I said, crossing over the past Doctor lines into the current events of the current Doctor line is common. As, at this point in Big Finish, seem to be the backwards stories. Those are basically just internal crossovers, though – as is, for instance, having a Sixth Doctor/Charley story from Big Finish when Charley is already a Big Finish character.

    That seems to me different from what happens here or in Asylum, where you merge two eras neither of which are primarily associated with the book lines in question and do so anachronistically.

    Reply

  5. inkdestroyedmybrush
    June 3, 2011 @ 9:38 pm

    Unfortunately, not only does this type of story become an odd confrontation of Pertwee villian versus Patrick Doctor, it also starts to really point out the differences in the Doctors themselves. As you've noted, Pat's Doctor didn't seem one for cleaning up his messes. In fact, he often tends to act the fool not only to disarm the people around him, but to also have the freedom to almost innocently act the anarchist. Whereas Jon's doctor had the buy in with the established order to make the majority of his era work, Pat's Doctor was certainly the major shit disturber. Even more so than eras, books like this point out the differences in a main protagonist that we're supposed to believe is the same character, and, well, he's not.

    It certainly is why I prefer Pertwee's first season by far over all the others; he's really a different character in those first four stories.

    Reply

  6. Ken
    November 11, 2011 @ 5:46 pm

    To be honest, the Master is one of the only villains that it makes sense to have a Pre-Pertwee adventure with. Since I haven't read the book (any of the na/ma series, to be honest) I can't comment on how it was handled, but the concept is not out of the relmm of possibilities. Musch like when the Doctor says he's been somewhere or met someone, that opens up the possibilites for a missing adventure (though I suppose rule number one may come into play…)

    Reply

  7. Nick Campbell
    March 18, 2013 @ 11:46 pm

    I’d never thought how rarely the books do that achronology – oddly, I assumed it happened far more often than it does. I’d like to re-read this novel now – I do remember being excited about it when it came out, though that was partly because of the gorgeous cover. Like you suggest, there is something about achronology which is sort of immediately (superficially?) very pleasurable.

    I think the ‘Time Lords’ thing in pre-War Games stories is less about ‘spoiling’ a plot point (in any sort of hypothetical way) and more about the name and concept of the Time Lords being extremely cheesy. I’ve never written published (or publishable!) Doctor Who fiction, but I can envision the attraction of a Hartnell or Troughton novel being that you don’t have to use that baggage – or, potentially, you can modify it slightly. Empire of Glass, which I read for the first time last year, plays games with our ability to recognise stuff – but there’s also something redemptive about using Braxiatel and doing a sort of Meddling Monk, Celestial Toymaker revisionist (erm, retro-revisionist?!) version of the Doctor’s home-world.

    Anyway, still loving the blog!

    Reply

  8. Daibhid C
    July 23, 2015 @ 12:40 pm

    Just a random trivia point, but apparently one Hartnell-starring spin off that does talk about Gallifrey is "The Thief of Sherwood" in Short Trips: Past Tense … which, given that it's written as ephemera relating to a TV story that never happened, has a better reason than most not to!

    Reply

  9. John Voorhees
    December 21, 2016 @ 8:34 pm

    Now that Big Finish has an entire line dedicated to breaking this development/continuity wall (New Monsters Classic Doctors), I’d be curious to read your assessment of them. Any of them.

    Reply

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