2004 Books

Tuesday, 1 June 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
According to Amazon.co.uk, an update supplement to Telos Publishing's Howe's Transcendental Toybox will be out in September, and will feature "all items released worldwide in the anniversary year 2003, as well as main updates to the book, market reports and comments." Also listed at Amazon is a book entitled Doctor Who Error Finder: Plot, Continuity, And Production Mistakes In The Television Series And Films by R.H. Langley, due out in September from McFarland & Company Publishing. (Thanks to Planet Who)




FILTER: - Books

BBC Books Notes

Friday, 28 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Amazon.co.uk has story blurbs up for two forthcoming Doctor Who novels, The Sleep of Reason by Martin Day (due in August) and The Algebra of Ice by Lloyd Rose (due in September). They are as follows. Update: story blurb for "The Sleep of Reason" has been removed, as Outpost Gallifrey has received the actually BBC Books cover blurb; see story on June 2.
The Algebra of Ice, by Lloyd Rose

Edgar Allen Poe lies dying in a gutter in Baltimore... The Doctor and Ace cannot help him - his death has already happened. Poe will be taken to a hospital, and will die in three days time without ever coming out of his coma. But even as the Doctor explains this, the man in the gutter groans and expires. Bewildered, the Doctor hurries Ace back to the TARDIS. At the door, they look back and see that the gutter is empty. In a moment, Poe staggers around the corner, drops to his knees in the gutter, then gets up and stumbles into another bar... Can the Doctor discover what is causing the time anomaly? Will he be able to prevent the universe itself from unravelling when everyone seems to have turned against him - even the TARDIS? Will he be able to escape the cold hell of absolute order? The answer, it seems, lies in the algebra of ice...




FILTER: - Books

BBC and Big Finish Books

Wednesday, 26 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
The new DWM has information about both BBC Books' plans for 2005 as well as the rest of the year's Big Finish anthologies. On the BBC Books front, March through May will feature the frist three tie-in novels with the new series' characters, while Lance Parkin's book is due out in June and now has a name, The Gallifrey Chronicles. Barry Letts pens The Island of Death in July, a Third Doctor/Sarah novel, while August sees the Sixth Doctor book Future Nostalgia by Gary Russell. Richards tells DWM that they're still in the planning stages of the "ninth Doctor adventures," working with the production team to make sure the characterizations are correct; they will be distinct from the regular series for both fans and new viewers, but may have elements from the regular series crop up within them.

Meanwhile, Big Finish's Short Trips: Monsters, due out this summer and edited by Ian Farrington, features the following short stories: "Feeding Time" by Samantha Baker, "How I Stopped Trying to Kill the Doctor and Learned to Love Myself" by Nev Fountain, "The Secret of Fire" by Matt Grady, "Categorical Imperative" by Simon Guerrier, "The Touch of the Nurazh" by Stephen Hatcher, "Not So Much a Programme, More a Way of Life" by Anthony Keetch, "Trapped" by Joseph Lidster, "The Colour of Monsters" by Steve Lyons, "Best Seller" by Ian Mond & Danny Heap, "Chiaroscuro" by Jim Mortimore, "The Last Rites" by Marc Platt," and "Screamager" by Jacqueline Rayner. Meanwhile, the next Short Trips folume after that will be Short Trips: 2040 edited by John Binns, with stories by David Bailey, John Binns, Andy Campbell, Xanna Eve Chown, Matthew Griffiths, Alexander Leithes, Rebecca Levene, Kate Orman, Lance Parkin, Marc Platt, Jacqueline Rayner, Richard Salter, Tara Samms, Gareth Wigmore and Huw Wilkins. Finally, Short Trips: A Christmas Treasury is due out in December and is edited by Paul Cornell, with the author list to be announced soon.




FILTER: - Audio - DWM - Books

Richards on "Legend"

Monday, 24 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
The May 18 edition of "UK Newsquest Regional Press - This is Lancashire" discussed the now sold-out hardcover Doctor Who book The Legend by Justin Richards. "YOU'VE heard of coffee table books?" said the article. "Well this massive tome is hefty enough to be a table in its own right." It noted that Richards was "a long time fan of the series and actually met second doctor Patrick Troughton on a visit to the set in the sixties at the tender age of eight" and notes that there "are many [photographs] here among the 500 that have never been seen before and some have been borrowed from private collections."




FILTER: - Books

Telos' Time Hunters Books

Monday, 24 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Telos Publishing has released details on the fourth and fifth books in their new Time Hunters spinoff series, which continued the characters and situations from their Doctor Who novella of last year, "The Cabinet of Light". Kitsune by John Paul Catton, due out September 23, "sees Honor? Lechasseur and Emily Blandish in the year 2020 where they find themselves thrown into a mystery as an ice spirit wreaks havoc during the Kyoto's Gion Festival, and a haunted funhouse proves to contain more than just paper lanterns and wax dummies." The Severed Man by George Mann ("The Human Abstract") is due out on December 2, in which "Honor? and Emily investigate the links between a clutch of sinister murders in Victorian London, an angel that appears in a Staffordshire village in the 1920s and a small boy running loose around the capital in 1950 and discover that nightmares can turn into reality." (Thanks to David Howe)




FILTER: - Books

Who's Next: A Guide to Broadcast Who

Monday, 24 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
In early 2005 Virgin Books will publish WhoÆs Next: An Unofficial & Unauthorised Guide To All Of Broadcast Doctor Who, a "comprehensive, critical journey through every episode of Doctor Who broadcast by the BBC on television, radio, and the Internet" by Mark Clapham, Eddie Robson and Jim Smith. Says the press release: "WhoÆs Next will be the immediate, obvious way into the seriesÆ past for new fans introduced to Doctor Who by its imminent return to television as well as offering new perspectives and opinions on the show to those already intimately familiar with it." Says Robson, "This isnÆt a continuity guide or a production history. Not only are such books already available, but also the seriesÆ lengthy history necessarily makes them weighty tomes. We recognise that this can be daunting for the uninitiated viewer and so weÆre aiming to boil it down to the essentials. ItÆs a viewersÆ handbook, the entry point in the seriesÆ vast and rich history. For those who are already very familiar with the series, we offer a fresh perspective on much-dissected material." An email list has been set up for updates and information, and can be found atgroups.yahoo.com/group/whosnextbookinfo. (Thanks to Mark Clapham)




FILTER: - Books

The Tomorrow Windows

Monday, 24 May 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Courtesy Tenth Planet, here is the cover illustration and blurb for the forthcoming novel The Tomorrow Windowsby Jonathan Morris, due out very shortly from BBC Books. (This has to be the closest instance yet of a book cover coming out immediately before the novel is due; in fact, some retailers are reportedly already selling advance copies of the book.)
The Tomorrow Windows, by Jonathan Morris

There's a new exhibition at the Tate Modern - The Tomorrow Windows. The concept is simple: look through a Tomorrow Window and you'll see into the future. You'll get "The Gist of Things to Come". According to the press pack, The Tomorrow Windows exhibition will bring about an end to war and suffering.

Which is why someone decides to blow it up.

Investigating this act of wanton vandalism, The Doctor, Fitz and Trix visit an Astral Flower, the show-world of Utopia, and Gadrahadradon - the most haunted planet in the galaxy. They face the sinister Cecces, the gratuitously violent Vorshagg, the miniscule Micron and the enigmatic Poozle. And they encounter the doomsday monks of Shardybarn, the warmongers of Valuensis, the politicians of Minuea and the killer cars of Estebol.

The also spend about half an hour in Lewisham.




FILTER: - Books

bbc books status

Thursday, 29 April 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Justin Richards tells Doctor Who Magazine, "It looks likely at the moment that the PDAs will continue to be published as before while the series is off-air, with New Who adventures - aimed very much at the same audience as the new series - coming out while the series is being transmitted." Whether that means that the current January-March 2005 publication schedule has changed remains to be seen. Richards also noted that "Doctor Who: The Legend," the hardcover anniversary book, is sold out (at least from BBC Books; copies remain in shops and distributors' hands.)




FILTER: - Books

fallen gods award

Friday, 16 April 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Fallen Gods, the Telos novella from 2003 written by Kate Orman and Jonathan Blum, recently won the 2004 Aurealis Award for Best Australian Science Fiction Novel, the first TV spin-off novel to win this award. The Aurealis is a jury-voted professional science fiction award. Congratulations to Jon and Kate on this achievement.




FILTER: - Books - Awards/Nominations

synthespians ™

Thursday, 15 April 2004 - Reported by Shaun Lyon
Outpost Gallifrey has received the cover blurb for the forthcoming BBC Books novel Synthespians™ by Craig Hinton, in release this summer. It reads as follows (with thanks to Craig):

Synthespians™, by Craig Hinton

"We're the Nestenes, darling," she said, turning to the camera and giving her trademark smile. "We've been colonising other planets for a thousand million years.

"All right, Mr Matheson - I'm ready for my close-up." 


In the 101st century, nostalgia is everything. Television from the 20th century is the new obsession, and Reef Station One is receiving broadcasts from a distant Earth of the past, transmitting them to a waiting audience. Dixon of Dock Green, Z-Cars and Professor X are ratings winners - and the inhabitants of the New Earth Republic can't get enough.

But there are other forces in the galaxy; other forces that need Reef Station One. An ancient but dying race sees this human outpost as a last desperate hope for survival... and billionaire Walter J Matheson III sees them as a marvellous business opportunity.

When the Doctor and Peri arrive on Reef Station One, they find a fractured society, totally dependent on film and television. They also discover that the Republic's greatest entrepreneur is in league with one of the Doctor's oldest enemies.

As the Nestene Consciousness spreads its tentacles throughout the Republic, the Doctor and Peri must unravel the link between Walter J Matheson's business empire and the Nestenes. Because, if they don't, they'll end up in the deadliest soap opera of all time.




FILTER: - Books