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Mad Dogs and Englishmen was the fifty-second novel in the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Paul Magrs. It featured the Eighth Doctor, Fitz Kreiner and Anji Kapoor.
Publisher’s Summary
‘Grrrrr.’
The greatest book ever written.
Professor Reginald Tyler’s The True History of Planets was a twentieth-century classic; an epic of dwarves and swords and wizardry. And definitely no poodles. Or at least there weren’t when the Doctor read it.
Now it tells the true tale of how the Queen of the poodles was overthrown; it’s been made into a hit movie, and it’s going to cause a bloodbath on the Dog World -- unless the Doctor, Fitz and Anji (and assorted friends) can sort it all out.
The Doctor infiltrates the Smudgelings, Tyler’s elite Cambridge writing set of the early twentieth century; Fitz falls for flamboyant torch singer Brenda Soobie in sixties Las Vegas, and Anji experiences some very special effects in seventies Hollywood. Their intention is to prevent the movie from ever being made. But there is a shadowy figure present in all three time zones who is just as determined to see it completed... so the poodle revolution can begin.
Characters
References
Books
- The True History of Planets was a book about elves and magic, until it was rewritten as a text to support a revolution on Dog World.
The Doctor
- The Doctor tells Enid that he is from somewhere in the south of Ireland beginning with the letter G.
Earth mammals
Foods and beverages from the real world
- Freer eats mock turtle soup.
Individuals
- Fritter and Char are poodle archivists from the Dog World.
- John Fuchas starves to death, forgotten.
- Ron Von Arnim is just a bit unstable.
- Princess Margaret is poodle (royal Poodle) from the Dog World.
- Martha has been Brenda Soobie’s (Iris Wildthyme) companion for over sixty years.
Organisations
- Mida Slike is an agent of Ministry for Incursions and Ontological Wonders.
- Professor Alid Jag is of an aphid-like species and also an agent of MIAOW. He faked his own death by pretending to be squashed by the materialising TARDIS.
Planets
- Karim is a planet inhabited by lobster-people.
Species
- The Doctor accidently created the Tusken race.
Towns and cities
Time travel
- Noel Coward has a set of Pinking Shears that allow him to time travel.
Colleges and universities
- Mida Slike holds a Chair of Bastardisation at the University of Outer Angila.
Notes
- Upon arriving on the Dog Station, the Doctor, Anji and Fitz are regarded by the poodles as pets and stripped naked, put in collars and made to crawl around. Anji is the only one mortified.
- Everyone is a little bit disgusted when it is revealed that novelist William Freer and Princess Margaret had been lovers since 1932.
- This is the hundredth BBC Books Novel (EDA & PDA combined). The cover's Doctor Who logo was printed in reflective gold foil in celebration.
- The novel contains a spoof of J. R. R. Tolkien's experiences writing The Lord of the Rings. The character representing C. S. Lewis in this also appears in Magrs's non-Doctor Who novel To the Devil — a Diva! and the Smudgelings reappear in his novel Something Borrowed.
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Continuity
- The Doctor still has a beard. (PROSE: The Adventuress of Henrietta Street)
- The Doctor's earliest memory is of waking up on a train. (PROSE: The Ancestor Cell)