Strange England (novel)

Strange England
Doctor:	Seventh Doctor
Companion(s):	Ace, Benny
Main enemy:	The Quack
Main setting:	An asteroid in the Jupiter belt London, England, 1873
Key crew
Publisher:	Virgin Books
Writer:	Simon Messingham
Release details
Release number:	29
Release date:	18 August 1994
Format:	Paperback Book; 11 Chapters, 276 Pages
ISBN:	ISBN 0-426-20419-0
Virgin New Adventures
← Previous	Blood Harvest
Next →	First Frontier

Strange England was the twenty-ninth New Adventures novel. It features the Seventh Doctor, Ace and Bernice Summerfield. This was Simon Messingham's first novel, and his only contribution to the Virgin Books range. His next Doctor Who novel was the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures novel The Face-Eater in 1999.

Publisher's summary

"The more the Doctor dreams," the Quack said, "the more real I become. He has not yet dreamed me fully, but he will."

When the TARDIS lands in the idyllic gardens of a Victorian country house, Ace knows that something terrible is bound to happen. The Doctor disagrees. Sometimes things really are as perfect as they seem.

Then they discover a young girl whose body has been possessed by a beautiful but lethal insect. And they meet the people of the House: innocents who have never known age, pain, or death — until now.

Now their rural paradise is turning into a world of nightmare. A world in which the familiar is being twisted into something evil and strange. A world ruled by the Quack, whose patent medicines are deadly poisons and whose aim is the total destruction of the Doctor.

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Seventh Doctor
• Ace
• Bernice Summerfield
• Galah
• The Quack
• Dr. Patrick Rix
• Stephen Rix
• Charlotte Aickland
• Richard Aickland
• Garvey
• Victoria
• Mrs Irving
• Archie Lewis
• Thos Lewis
• Arthur
• Bert Robbins
• Billy
• Frankie
• Gray

References

Foods and beverages

• Bernice enjoys light German wine on summer days.
• Cucumber sandwiches are often served at cricket matches.

Individuals

• Ace's skin is pale from being in space for so long.
• Bernice Summerfield doesn't get hay fever.

Music

• The Doctor has a moment of spoon playing.

TARDIS

• A TARDIS Protyon Unit is the reason why some TARDISes have independent thought.
• The Quack is a creation of Galah's TARDIS trouble-shooting program.

Time Lords

• Galah is a pacifist. She lived a long tedious life as a Gallifreyan sculptor.

Notes

• A prelude to this story was published in DWM 215.
• Author Simon Messingham has commented on more than one occasion that he was unhappy with this novel.

Continuity

• The Doctor, Ace, and Benny would visit another house of horrors that would be destroyed in a changing environment. (PROSE: Falls the Shadow)
• The Doctor plays the spoons again. (TV: Time and the Rani)
• He tells Bernice he has always believed evil to be an actual force. (AUDIO: The Guardians of Prophecy)
• Bernice mentions being inside a TARDIS (PROSE: Birthright) while Ace mentions being in an inside-out TARDIS. (PROSE: Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible) She implies this occurred relatively soon after she and the Doctor defeated the Timewyrm. (PROSE: Timewyrm: Revelation)
• Reference is made to the Matrix within a TARDIS. (TV: The Doctor's Wife)
• Being in the white void reminds Bernice of the Land of Fiction. (PROSE: Conundrum) She tries to deny the reality, but it doesn't work. (TV: The Deadly Assassin)
• Ace calls Arthur an angel, and has had enough of Victorian England. (TV: Ghost Light)
• She's aware that some components of a TARDIS are organic. (PROSE: Cat's Cradle: Time's Crucible)
• Galah connects herself to the Architectural Configuration Programme. (TV: Castrovalva)

External links

• Strange England at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
• The Discontinuity Guide to: Strange England at The Whoniverse
• The Cloister Library: Strange England