The Evil of the Daleks (2023 novelisation)

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The Evil of the Daleks (2023 novelisation)

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The Evil of the Daleks (2023 novelisation)
Based on:	The Evil of the Daleks
Main character(s):	Jamie
Featuring:	Second Doctor, Victoria, Alpha, Zoe
Main enemy:	Dalek Emperor
Main setting:	Gatwick Airport, 20 July 1966, England, 2 June 1866, Skaro, 51st century
Key crew
Publisher:	BBC Books
Writers:	Frazer Hines, Mike Tucker, Steve Cole
Read by:	Frazer Hines, Nicholas Briggs
Release details
Release date:	26 October 2023
ISBN:	9781785948431
BBC Books novelisations
← Previous	Doctor Who and the Library of Time

The Evil of the Daleks was a novelisation based on the 1967 television serial The Evil of the Daleks ^[+]Loading...["The Evil of the Daleks (TV story)"]. It was written by Frazer Hines and released by BBC Books on 26 October 2023. It was the second such official novelisation following the original and justified itself as, in essence, a novelisation of the 1968 televised repeat of the original TV serial, making use of the framing device of Zoe Heriot being shown the events of the earlier adventure on a mind projector shortly after joining the Doctor's TARDIS.

Publisher's summary

Young astrophysicist Zoe wishes to join Jamie and the Doctor on their travels. To give her fair warning of the dangers she may face, the Doctor uses a mind projector to share one of their most harrowing adventures...

And so, Jamie is forced to relive his struggle against the evil Daleks at their most powerful and calculating. In a complex plot that drags him from modern-day London to Victorian times and finally to the Dalek world of Skaro, he endures ordeals that test his courage, strength - and his friendship with the Doctor - to the limit...

Chapter titles

• Chapter One: To Set a Trap

First Interlude

• Chapter Two: The Net Tightens

Second Interlude

• Chapter Three: A Trial of Strength

Third Interlude

• Chapter Four: A Test of Skill

Fourth Interlude

• Chapter Five: The Human Factor

Fifth Interlude

• Chapter Six: Escape to Danger

Sixth Interlude

• Chapter Seven: The End of the Daleks

Coda

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Second Doctor
• Jamie McCrimmon
• Victoria Waterfield
• Edward Waterfield
• Theodore Maxtible
• Ruth Maxtible
• Arthur Terrall
• Kemel
• Toby
• Mollie Dawson
• Dalek Emperor
• Frank Kennedy
• Keith Perry
• Bob Hall
• Zoe Heriot

to be added

Worldbuilding

to be added

Deviations from televised story

• Kennedy is given the first name Frank.
• The final scene from Episode 2, in which two Daleks discuss the beginning of the experiment and demand there be no delay, is absent.
• Terrall has further flashbacks to his time in the Crimean War. His Dalek conditioning further confuses these thoughts, causing him to believe he is actually fighting a war of extermination against the Thals.
• Kemel receives an expanded backstory explaining how he ended up in the employ of Maxtible: he was a wrestler in London who was defended from a murder charge by Maxtible after killing a thief in self-defence. The backstory is different from the one given to him in the original novelisation, where he met Maxtible while working for a blacksmith in Turkey.
• Besides Jamie, the Daleks also factor both Kemel and Victoria into the Human Factor experiment, in order to determine if the traits displayed by Jamie are common across race and gender.

Notes

• Each chapter corresponds to one episode of the televised serial. The chapter titles for all bar "Chapter Six: Escape to Danger" are the original working titles for the televised episodes, even though individual episode titles were by this time no longer being used; Season 3's four-part story The Gunfighters ^[+]Loading...["The Gunfighters (TV story)"] being the last to feature them. No working title is given on existing BBC paperwork for The Evil of the Daleks episode six. The original novelisation also featured these titles (except "Escape to Danger") among its 33 chapters.
• Each chapter concludes with the Doctor taking a short break from retelling the story on the mind projector, allowing him, Jamie and Zoe to comment on the events. This framing device results in the novel becoming a fully-detailed account of what takes place chronologically between The Wheel in Space ^[+]Loading...["The Wheel in Space (TV story)"] and Fear of the Daleks ^[+]Loading...["Fear of the Daleks (audio story)"].
• The scenes featuring Zoe and the mind projector are written in the first person from Jamie's perspective. The main bulk of the story, retelling The Evil of the Daleks, is written in the third person.
• On the cover, the front left Dalek has a white ring around its eyestalk lens. Silver Dalek props prominent throughout the 1960s did not have this feature, instead boasting dynamic lenses (which the other Daleks on the cover do have). The static ring became standard for Dalek props in the 1970s and 1980s, starting with Day of the Daleks ^[+]Loading...["Day of the Daleks (TV story)"].
• A poster for this novelisation and Rose ^[+]Loading...["Rose (novelisation)"] was included in SFX 373.

Continuity

to be added

Audiobook

• This novel was released as an audiobook on 26 October 2023 complete and unabridged by BBC Audio and read by Frazer Hines, with Dalek voices by Nicholas Briggs.

• 

  Audiobook cover

External links

• Official The Evil of the Daleks - novel page at Penguin Books
• Official The Evil of the Daleks - audio page at Penguin Books