The Slow Empire (novel)

The Slow Empire
Doctor:	Eighth Doctor
Companion(s):	Fitz, Anji
Featuring:	Jamon de la Rocas, Collector
Main enemy:	Vortex Wraiths
Main setting:	Shakrath, Thakrash, Goronos
Key crew
Publisher:	BBC Books
Writer:	Dave Stone
Release details
Release number:	47
Release date:	2 July 2001
Format:	Paperback Book; 8 Chapters, 251 Pages
ISBN:	ISBN 0-563-53835-X
BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures
← Previous	The Year of Intelligent Tigers
Next →	Dark Progeny

The Slow Empire was the forty-seventh novel in the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Dave Stone, released 2 July 2001 and featured the Eighth Doctor, Fitz Kreiner and Anji Kapoor.

Publisher's summary

Enter, with the Doctor, Anji and Fitz, an Empire where the laws of physics are quite preposterous — nothing can travel faster than the speed of light and time travel is impossible.

A thousand worlds, each believing they are the Centre, each under a malign control of which they themselves are completely unaware.

As the only beings able to travel between the worlds instantaneously, the Doctor and his friends must piece together the Imperial puzzle and decide what should be done. The soldiers of the Ambassadorial Corps are always, somehow, hard on their heels. Their own minds are busily fragmenting under metatemporal stresses. And their only allies are a man who might not be quite what he seems (and says so at great length) and a creature we shall merely call... the Collector.

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Eighth Doctor
• Fitz Kreiner
• Anji Kapoor
• Axon Miribilis
• Emperor
• Jamon de la Rocas
• Jarel
• Morel
• The Collector

Worldbuilding

• The Doctor finds in the TARDIS a yellow umbrella.

Popular culture

• Anji was forced to watch Quantum Leap. She has watched Independence Day and Star Wars.
• There is a mention of The X-Files and The Abyss.

Notes

• During her virtual reality experience in the Cyberdyne, Anji is saved by a stranger, described as a "dapper, sardonic-looking man dressed in a pristine dinner suit" with "jet-black hair" slicked with oil. This could be the first reference to Sabbath, whose ship Jonah was piloted by babewyns, matching the reference to his carnivorous "pets". Alternately, it could be seen to resemble the Man with the Rosette. Both characters would officially debut a few months later in The Adventuress of Henrietta Street.

Continuity

• Anji believes that when a person undergoes molecular transport (transmat, teleport, matter transmission), they're committing suicide. This idea known as teleportaphobia is explored in detail in PROSE: Down.
• The Fourth Doctor also once briefly encountered Collectors. (PROSE: Heart of TARDIS)
• The Doctor has told Fitz about the Vortisaurs. (AUDIO: Storm Warning)
• Anji is reminded several times of the events of PROSE: The Year of Intelligent Tigers.
• Fitz comments that he has the memories of someone anywhere between a year and several hundreds of years old. (PROSE: Interference - Book Two)
• Fitz recalls having spent some discontinuous time in the late sixties Earth. (PROSE: Revolution Man)
• Jamon de la Rocas has been to Eros. (PROSE: The Queen of Eros)

External links

• The Slow Empire at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
• The Discontinuity Guide to: The Slow Empire at The Whoniverse
• The Cloister Library: The Slow Empire