The writer of the fifth in the Puffin Books series of e-books has been revealed to be Patrick Ness, the multi-award winning author of the Chaos Walking trilogy.


Born in Virginia, USA Patrick Ness spent his upbringing in the states of Hawaii, Washington and California before moving permanently to the UK. He is the author of the Chaos Walking trilogy which established him as one of the most original and exciting writers of today. The trilogy has won many awards including the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize, the Costa Children’s Book Award, the Booktrust Teenage Prize and the CILIP Carnegie Medal. Patrick’s sixth book A Monster Calls received high critical acclaim and is the winner of the Children’s Book of the Year Award at the Galaxy National Book Awards, the Red House Children’s Book Award and the UKLA Children’s Book Prize. In June 2012, A Monster Calls became the first book ever to win both prestigious CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals. His highly anticipated new novel for adults, The Crane Wife, was inspired by a Japanese folk tale and just published by Canongate in April 2013. A daring new YA novel More Than This is forthcoming later this year from Walker (Candlewick in the US).

Ness commented:

A video of the author will be released on YouTube by BBC Worldwide later in the month, with the book itself coming out on the 23rd May.

May will see the release by AudioGo of the next encounter for the Doctor in their ongoing 50th Anniversary series Destiny of the Doctor, this month reaching his fifth incarnation. Meanwhile, the latest audio adaption of the Target novelisations takes listeners on a trip to Peladon with the Third Doctor. Plus, readers also enter our competitions to be in with a chance to win copies.



In addition, AudioGo have also released an audio adaptation of the latest adventure for the Eleventh Doctor, Plague of the Cybermen:

The BBC have finally confirmed that the Regeneration set that has been listed on Internet sites such as the BBC Shop and Amazon will indeed be released in June.

As the title implied, this release deals with the Doctor's regenerations, and will be presented as a limited edition, "coffee-table" book which will include six DVDs covering the adventures associated with the change of actor - and includes the premiere of the newly animation-enhanced The Tenth Planet on DVD.

The full list of stories are: The Tenth Planet, The War Games, Planet of the Spiders, Logopolis The Caves of Androzani, Time and the Rani, Doctor Who: The Movie, Bad Wolf/The Parting of the Ways, and The End of Time.

Regeneration will now be released on 24th June and not 10th as originally scheduled.

.As previously reported, Splendid Chaps is a year-long performance/podcast project to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who hosted by comedian Ben McKenzie (Dungeon Crawl, Melbourne Museum Comedy Tour) and writer John Richards (ABC1 sitcom Outland, Boxcutters podcast)

Described by its creators as part intellectual panel discussion, part nerdy Tonight Show, Splendid Chaps is a combination of analysis, enthusiasm and irreverence. The first episode went to number 1 on the iTunes TV & Film Podcast chart in Australia, and to number 4 in the UK.  The podcasts to the first few episodes are now available at www.splendidchaps.com or at  iTunes.

Tickets are now on sale for their 5th Doctor show!
On Sunday May 19 they’ll be celebrating the era of the 5th Doctor, the cricket-and-celery-loving Peter Davison, and exploring the notion of Fear in Doctor Who. When is Doctor Who scary, and why? Guests will include comedian Tegan Higginbotham (from comedy duo Watson and The Comedy Channel’s Whatever Happened To That Guy?) and horror author Narrelle M Harris. That’s at The Public Bar, 238 Victoria Street, North Melbourne, at 5pm.

Splendid Chaps: A Year Of Doctor Who: "Five: Fear"

Space: The Public Bar, 238 Victoria Street, North Melbourne
Time: Saturday 19 May 2013, 5 PM
Accessibility: This venue is wheelchair accessible.
Tickets: All tickets $15 (plus booking fee where applicable)
Bookings: via trybooking.com, or buy tickets at the door (subject to availability)
Podcast: not yet available, released 23 May 2013.

Big Finish have released details on the latest adventures for the Doctor and his companions in April ...

Competition:

Thanks to Big Finish we have five copies of The Library of Alexandria for this month's competition. To be in with a chance to win, please answer the following question:
Send your answer to alexandria-competition@doctorwhonews.net with the subject line "Was that your Mummy?", along with your name, address, and where you saw the competition (the news website, twitter, facebook, etc.). Only one entry per postal address will be accepted. The competition is open worldwide, and the closing date is 30th April 2013.

Overwhelming demand for events in the BFI's Doctor Who At 50 celebratory season has led to a rethink on ticket allocation.

As part of the season, the organisation is showing one story per Doctor per month with an accompanying guest panel, and all events so far have sold out to members - who get priority booking - immediately after being made available to them, which has led to huge numbers of fans who are not members missing out and being left disappointed.

As a result, the BFI is introducing a ticket ballot system for May's screening onwards. The Caves of Androzani, which marked the end of the Fifth Doctor's era, is being shown on Saturday 4th May at 2pm, and seats are being restricted to two per buyer, with a ballot also being run to try to ensure the fairest possible allocation.
BFI Champions can apply from Monday 1st April and BFI Members from Tuesday 2nd April. They will be able to apply via e-mail up to 8.30pm on Friday 5th April saying how many seats they would like, but will only be allowed a maximum of two. These will then be allocated by ballot, and not on a first-come first-served basis.

Ticket applicants can ask for specific seat numbers in their e-mail and the BFI says it will do its best to meet those requests. If applicants are happy to sit elsewhere in the auditorium if their choice is unavailable they should state this in their application and the BFI will try to seat them as near as possible to where they wanted to be. If people only want their specified seats or are happy to be seated anywhere in the auditorium they are similarly asked to state this in their application.

Any tickets that are left over following the ballot plus about 25 set aside for the public will then go on release to non-members on Tuesday 9th April when, again, purchasers will be restricted to two seats each.

As in the past, returns and stand-bys are also always a possibility once an event has sold out, so keep checking back with the BFI.

BBC Worldwide have provided some more detail on the new features to be included in the two disc special edition version of Fifth Doctor story The Visitation:

• Grim Tales (dur 45’09”) – cast members Peter Davison, Janet Fielding and Sarah Sutton are taken on a trip back to the filming locations used in the story by fellow TARDIS travelling companion Mark Strickson. A slice of a very impressive cake awaits them at the manor house in return for their memories of the time...
  
  
• The Television Centre of the Universe – Part One (dur 32’12”) – Blue Peter presenter Yvette Fielding takes Peter Davison, Mark Strickson and Janet Fielding on a trip through BBC Television Centre, meeting up with old friends and colleagues as they reminisce on their time spent working in the iconic building. With film traffic supervisor Neville Withers, assistant floor manager Sue Hedden, costume designer Odile Dicks-Mireaux, production assistant Jane Ashford, make-up artists Joan Stribling and Carolyn Perry, and BBC producer and writer Richard Marson.
  
  
• Doctor Forever – The Apocalypse Element (dur 27’29”) – the latest instalment of our new series looks at the work of those who kept Doctor Who alive in the form of audio adventures following the TV’s show’s cancellation in 1989. With actors Colin Baker, William Russell and Lisa Bowerman, new series executive producer Russell T Davies, Big Finish executive producers Jason Haigh-Ellery, Nicholas Briggs and Gary Russell, Big Finish producer David Richardson, BBC range editor Steve Cole, writers Mark Gatiss, Robert Shearman, Paul Cornell, Joseph Lidster and Justin Richards, and AudioGO commissioning editor Michael Stevens. Introduced by Ayesha Antoine.

The DVD is due to be released in the United Kingdom (R2) on 6th May 2013 and in North America (R1) on 14th May 2013.

The Caves of Androzani is to be shown by the BFI to represent the Fifth Doctor's era in its Doctor Who At 50 season, it announced today.

Written by Robert Holmes and directed by Graeme Harper, the four-part adventure - which first aired in March 1984 - saw the final regular appearance of Peter Davison as the Doctor.

The "regeneration" adventure will be shown on the big screen at BFI Southbank on Saturday 4th May, as reported earlier this week, with the start time for the event now confirmed as 2pm. The names of the guests for the accompanying panel discussion will be announced nearer the time.

Dates for when tickets go on sale are also yet to be announced. BFI Champions get first pick, followed by standard members and then the general public. So far, all the events in the celebratory season have sold out to BFI members in advance of tickets being released to the public, but returns and stand-bys are possible.

Tom Baker, Louise Jameson, and Philip Hinchcliffe will be the special guests at next month's BFI screening of The Robots of Death.

The announcement was made at yesterday's première of the colour-restored story The Mind of Evil. Big-screen showings with guests are being staged by the BFI for each Doctor this year as part of its Doctor Who At 50 season.

The four-part adventure is being screened at BFI Southbank on Saturday 20th April at 2pm to mark the Fourth Doctor's era. Tickets go on sale to the general public at 11.30am tomorrow. They were made available to Champion members last Monday and to standard members last Tuesday. All three screenings held so far sold out to members before tickets were due to go on general release, but returns and stand-bys are possible.

It was also announced yesterday that the story marking Fifth Doctor Peter Davison's era will be shown on Saturday 4th May. The title is due to be revealed later this week.

BBC Worldwide have announced the re-issue of eleven books featuring all eleven Doctors as part of the celebration of Doctor Who's 50th Anniversary, each featuring a new cover and special introduction.

The books hail from various periods in the history of Doctor Who in print, and feature a variety of well-known authors:

• The First Doctor: Ten Little Aliens, by Stephen Cole (2002)
• The Second Doctor: Dreams of Empire, by Justin Richards (1998)
• The Third Doctor: Last of the Gaderene, by Mark Gatiss (2000)
• The Fourth Doctor: Festival of Death, by Jonathan Morris (2000)
• The Fifth Doctor: Fear of the Dark, by Trevor Baxendale (2003)
• The Sixth Doctor: Players, by Terrance Dicks (1999)
• The Seventh Doctor: Remembrance of the Daleks, by Ben Aaronovitch (1990)
• The Eighth Doctor: Earthworld, by Jacqueline Rayner (2001)
• The Ninth Doctor: Only Human, by Gareth Roberts (2005)
• The Tenth Doctor: Beautiful Chaos, by Gary Russell (2008)
• The Eleventh Doctor: The Silent Stars Go By, by Dan Abnett (2011)