Birthright (novel)

Birthright
Doctor:	[[doctor::Seventh Doctor (mostly absent in this adventure)]]
Companion(s):	Ace, Benny
Main enemy:	the Charrl, Jared Khan
Main setting:	Earth, London, February, 1909 Antýkhon, 22,000
Key crew
Publisher:	[[publisher::Virgin Books]]
Writer:	Nigel Robinson
Release details
Release number:	17
Release date:	August 1993
Format:	Paperback Book, 216 Pages
ISBN:	ISBN 0426203933

Publisher's Summary

'I feel like a pawn in a blasted chess game, Ace.' 'I know what you mean. Trouble is, they keep changing the chess-players.'

The TARDIS has died. Stranded in early twentieth-century London, Bernice can only stand and watch as it slowly disintegrates.

In the East End a series of grisly murders has been committed. Is this the work of the ghostly Springheel Jack or, as Bernice suspects something even more sinister?

In a tiny shop in Bloomsbury, the master of a grand order of sorcerers is nearing the end of a seven-hundred year quest for a fabled magic wand.

And on a barren world in the far-distant future the Queen of a dying race pleads for the help of an old hermit named Muldwych, while Ace leads a group of guerrillas in a desperate struggle against their alien oppressors.

These events are related. Perhaps the Doctor knows how. But the Doctor has gone away.

Characters

• Ace
  • Gets stuck in 22,000.
  • Took a trip with the Doctor to Africa 'a long time ago'. The Charrl's hive resembles Termite mounds she saw there.
• Bernice Summerfield
  • Gets stuck in 1909.
  • Can't read Cyrillic.
  • She gets the flu.
• the Charrl
• Queen Ch'tizz
• Mikhail Vladimir Popov
  • Returns for a brief cameo in Happy Endings
• Jared Khan
  • Born 700 years ago.
• Margaret Waterfield
  • Is Edward Waterfield's sister.
  • Is murdered by Kahn's thugs.
• Muldwych
  • Is most likely the 'Merlin' incarnation of the Doctor.
  • Got stranded on Antýkhon for 1000 years.

References

• Antýkhon turns out to be a future Earth.
• The Brotherhood of the New Dawn believes man has become decadent and evil.
• Springheel Jack similar to Jack the Ripper, except springheel is a Charrl which has emerged through a time portal.
• The Great Divide a temporal portal from 22,000ish to 1909.
• Time Vector Generator is an ebony bar that links the exterior and interior dimensions of a TARDIS.
• The Migration the Charrl's movement from Anty'kon to Earth.
• Channel Tunnel still survives in 22,000.
• The Charrl created 300 of the 700 Wonders of the Universe.
• New Skaro is mentioned as the new home planet of the Daleks.

Notes

• This is one of several Virgin New Adventures which were adapted by Big Finish for their first season of Bernice Summerfield audio dramas; Birthright (audio drama).

• This novel almost does not feature the Doctor.
• A prelude to this novel was published in DWM Issue 203.
• The jacket illustration for this book was incorrectly reproduced as a full-colour page in Doctor Who: Timeframe: The Illustrated History. A second edition and paperback corrected this error.

Continuity

• This novel runs parallel with the events of NA: Iceberg, with the Doctor being absent for the majority of Birthright. This was the first "Doctor-lite" novel under the New Adventures banner (Target Books previously published two non-Doctor original novels, Harry Sullivan's War and Turlough and the Earthlink Dilemma), and in some ways was a rehearsal for the later Doctor-less series of novels featuring Benny that began in 1996.

• The Charrl and Muldwych make an appearance in NA: Happy Endings.

• The Charrl are to said to have created the 300 (of the 700) wonders of the universe, first mentioned in DW: Death to the Daleks.

• The Doctor also encountered a renamed future Earth in DW The Mysterious Planet.

External Links

• Prelude to White Darkness as published in DWM #203
• The Doctor Who Reference Guide detailed synopsis of Birthright
• The Discontinuity Guide to: Birthright at The Whoniverse