Big Finish Productions has released a special video teaser for its upcoming box set, "The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield Vol. 2: The Triumph of Sutekh" that breaks new ground for the long-running character of Dr. Bernice "Benny" Summerfield.

The teaser titled "Transmission from Mars" features Benny's voice actress Lisa Bowerman as Benny relaying an emergency message. Although Bowerman has played the character in dozens of audio dramas for Big Finish since the late 1990s, including posing for publicity photos in-character and voicing Benny for a CGI minisode, this is the first time she has been featured on screen performing the role. (She first appeared on screen in Doctor Who as Karra, one of the cheetah people, in the final story of the original series, "Survival", and also voiced an alien in the animated special "Dreamland".)

The New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield Vol. 2, featuring Sylvester McCoy as the Seventh Doctor and Gabriel Woolf reprising the role of Sutekh the Destroyer from "Pyramids of Mars", consisting of four new audio dramas, is scheduled for release by Big Finish later this month.

This month sees two audio books released by BBC Audio on the 21st May, the adaptation of one of the final 20th Century Doctor Who stories to come out in print, 1979's Season 17 adventure City of Death (published on the same day in the UK), and an adaptation of the BBC Book Last of the Gaderene by Mark Gatiss, originally published in 2000 and again in 2013 as part of the 50th Anniversary collection.



Novelisation adaptions for the rest of the year are currently scheduled as: The Massacre (11th June), Doctor Who and The Ark in Space (16th July), The Two Doctors (3rd September), The Curse of Fenric (5th November), and K9 and Company (3rd December).




The next 'old' novel adaptation to be published will be Paul Cornell's Human Nature on 20th August.

Candy Jar Books have released the cover and details for their next book in the Lethbridge-Stewart saga:


Author David A McIntee (who also wrote the Brigadier-centric BBC Book The Face Of The Enemy) said:

Cover art is by Cosgrove Hall's background artist, Nathan Hudson, and the book also features an exclusive foreword written by Amanda Haisman, daughter of Lethbridge-Stewart creator Mervyn Haisman, in which she publically talks about her father and the legend he created for Doctor Who.

The book is available to pre-order from Candy Jar Books.

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Coming up later in the year are Beast of Fang Rock by Andy Frankham-Allen and Terrance Dicks, and Mutually Assured Domination by Nick Walters.

Frankham-Allen, who wrote the series opener The Forgotten Son, said:
Walters said:

Candy Jar Books have announced a change in schedules for their novels based upon the character of Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart.

Owing to Lance Parkin being unavailable for the project at present, his novel Horror of Det-Sen will no longer be published in June, with David A McIntee's The Schizoid Earth now moving into that slot. Shaun Russell, head of publishing, said:
McIntee's novel will be followed by a new replacement a few months later entitled Beast of Fang Rock which, as the name implies, is a prequel/sequel to the Season 15 opener Horror of Fang Rock; it will be co-written by Andy Frankham-Allen and the original script's writer Terrance Dicks. This will then be followed by the previously announced Mutually Assured Domination by Nick Walters.

Looking to 2016, novels have been commissioned from John Peel (author of a number of Virgin/BBC Books and story novelisations), Jonathan Cooper (former Doctor Who correspondent with the Mirror), Lizbeth M Myles (author of several short stories), and Adrian Rigelsford (The Hinchcliffe Years and The Harper Classics).

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To celebrate the success of the first book in the range, The Forgotten Son, Candy Jar Books have made a 65 page e-book freely available for download from their website. Hayley Cox, senior publishing co-ordinator, said:

Lethbridge-Stewart: Top Secret Files contains previously unpublished material, as well as an extended short story first published in Doctor Who Magazine #483 in February. It also includes a special, previously unreleased interview in which Doctor Who director Graeme Harper talks about the actor who played Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart, Nicholas Courtney.

• The Ambush! – A short story originally published in Doctor Who Magazine #438, now extended with new scenes. It is set during the Doctor Who serial The Web of Fear, and serves as an introduction to the Lethbridge-Stewart book series.
• We Won’t Let Him Down – An extended version of the final chapter of Candy Jar Books’ Companions: Fifty Years of Doctor Who Assistants, focussing solely on the television adventures of the Brigadier.
• What Lies Beyond – A brief look at some of the Doctor Who novels that have featured the Brigadier over the years that pertain to the future of the Lethbridge-Stewart series of novels.
• Graeme Harper – An extended interview with Doctor Who director Graeme Harper (the only director to have worked on the classic series and the revived series) from the book Calling the Shots, in which he talks about Nicholas Courtney, the man who brought the Brigadier to life.
• Original Prelude – Never-before-seen original prelude that was written to open The Forgotten Son, set during the final moments of the Brigadier’s life.
• The New World – The opening chapter of The Forgotten Son, the first novel in the Lethbridge-Stewart series.

The e-book is also available for the Kindle via Amazon.

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Character Options have released details of their latest range of Doctor Who Action Figures along with details of a new collection of electronic moving Daleks.

BBC Books are to publish an anthology of short stories on Thursday 5th March:


The book will be available in hardback and via e-book.

Lovarzi have released two officially-licensed Doctor Who Umbrellas, available to pre-order now.

The items are available from 10 March for £34.99 and can be pre-ordered now. Link to Time-Lord Umbrella. / Link to TARDIS Umbrella (UK Only)

FBS Publishing Ltd have announced a new book aimed to help those new to Doctor Who discover what the series is all about...
The book is published on 5th March 2015, and is available for pre-order via the FBS Publishing website.

The new issue of Doctor Who Magazine is officially out tomorrow, and features the first major interview with Paul Wilmshurst, director of the recent Doctor Who episodes Kill the Moon, Mummy on the Orient Express and Last Christmas.



Also inside this issue:

• Doctor Who's very first director, Waris Hussein, reveals how the classic 1964 adventure Marco Polo was made – with the help of unique documents unseen for 50 years!
• Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat answer readers’ questions – including one from former showrunner Russell T Davies! – in his exclusive column.
• Peter Purves, who played companion Steven Taylor in the 1960s, looks back at some of his most memorable adventures in the second part of an exclusive interview.
• DWM presents an exclusive prelude to the new series of books featuring Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart, in the form of a complete short story by Andy Frankham-Allan: The Ambush.
• Bernard Kay, the much-loved actor who appeared in four Doctor Who stories, is remembered by his friend Toby Hadoke.
• The Doctor and Clara tackle both Sontarans and Rutans in the concluding part of The Instruments of War, a brand-new comic strip written and illustrated by Mike Collins.
• En garde! Discover fascinating new facts about the swashbuckling Fourth Doctor adventure The Androids of Tara in The Fact of Fiction.
• The Time Team watch the Tenth Doctor take a bus to alien world, as they visit the Planet of the Dead.
• Jacqueline Rayner demonstrates the fun to be had in spotting Doctor Who actors in other roles in Relative Dimensions.
• The DWM Review assesses the very latest Doctor Who audio and book releases.
• The Watcher examines the changing nature of history in Doctor Who, in the latest Wotcha!
• The DWM Crossword, prize-winning competitions, official news and much more!