Island of Death (novel)

Island of Death
Doctor:	Third Doctor
Companion(s):	Sarah
Featuring:	The Brigadier, Benton, Jeremy
Main enemy:	The Skang, Hilda Hutchens
Main setting:	London, India and Africa, the 1970s
Key crew
Publisher:	BBC Books
Writer:	Barry Letts
Cover by:	Black Sheep
Release details
Release number:	69
Release date:	7 July 2005
Format:	Paperback Book; 32 Chapters, 281 Pages
ISBN:	ISBN 0-563-48631-7
BBC Past Doctor Adventures
← Previous	Match of the Day
Next →	Spiral Scratch

You may wish to consult Island of Death (disambiguation) for other, similarly-named pages.

Island of Death was the sixty-ninth novel in the BBC Past Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Barry Letts, released 7 July 2005 and featured the Third Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith and Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart.

This was also Letts' only solo novel (he had previously written Deadly Reunion with Terrance Dicks) and his final contribution to the franchise.

Publisher's summary

"He would learn nothing from the internal organs — and for a very good reason: there was nothing there. The dead girl's body was literally just skin and bone."

A New Age cult worships a hideous god — or is it a demon? — called the Skang. What possible connection can it have with the mysterious corpse on Hampstead Heath?

Sarah Jane Smith enlists the help of the Third Doctor and the Brigadier, and their investigations take them halfway across the world, to a remote island that has been turned into a paradise for the followers of the cult.

But the island is not what it seems, and neither is the Skang itself; and the Doctor and his companions are faced with the task of saving not only its devotees but the whole of mankind from a loathsome death.

Plot

to be added

Characters

• Third Doctor
• Sarah Jane Smith
• Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart
• Sergeant Benton
• Jeremy Fitzoliver
• Mama Fitzoliver
• Alex Whitbread
• Hilda Hutchens
• Clorinda
• Will Cabot
• Sister Helga
• Brother Dieter
• Brother Dafydd
• Major Chatterjee
• Mr Gorridge
• Lieutenant-Commander Eugene Hogben
• First Lieutenant Peter Andrews
• Emma
• Bob Simkins
• Chris Watts
• Mortimer Willow
• Brian Prebble

Worldbuilding

Anatomy and physiology

• Regeneration causes unpredictable gaps in memory.

The Doctor

• The Doctor uses the phrase "two shakes of a sluggerlug's tail".
• The Doctor claims he would have been a keen cricket player if he had regenerated into a younger body.

Biology

• A sneg is a kind of hairy newt.
• A flubble is a Gallifreyan animal resembling a small-nosed, six-legged koala.
• A Schlenk Blossom is a type of Gallifreyan flower.

Foods and beverages

• The Doctor and Sarah drink hot rum toddies after being rescued at sea.
• The Doctor also drinks port.
• The Brigadier drinks Scotch while he's on the plane to Bombay.

Individuals

• The Doctor has met Charles Darwin.
• Sarah lives in an attic bedsit near Hampstead Heath.
• Sarah's father is from Liverpool.

United Nations Intelligence Taskforce

• Most of the men under the Brigadier's command at UNIT are ex-SAS professionals.

Notes

to be added

Food and beverages

• The Doctor and Sarah drink hot rum toddy after being rescued from the sea. He later drinks port.
• Sarah's breakfast consists of wholemeal toast and banana.
• The Brigadier drinks scotch on board the plane to Bombay and later downs half a bottle on the Hallaton whilst under the influence of the Skang.
• Sarah eats mangoes for the first time.

Continuity

• Sarah wrote an article on Space World. (AUDIO: The Paradise of Death)

External links

• Island of Death at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
• The Discontinuity Guide to: Island of Death at The Whoniverse
• The Cloister Library: Island of Death