Business Unusual (novel)
Business Unusual was author Gary Russell's attempt at depicting Melanie Bush's first adventure with the Sixth Doctor. It also served as the Brigadier's introduction that incarnation, and functioned as the middle chapter of a wider trilogy which included the Third Doctor novel, The Scales of Injustice and Evelyn Smythe's print introduction, Instruments of Darkness.
Publisher's Summary
A security force with no official identity... a managing director with no name... a sinister creature on guard patrol resembling some kind of hellhound... SenéNet is no ordinary multinational company.
The Doctor arrives in Brighton, 1989, travelling alone. He soon discovers his old friend, the Brigadier, has gone missing investigating SenéNet, whose new interactive games console is soon to be released at an absurdly reasonable price. He was last seen at their headquarters - based in the picturesque Ashdown Forest...
Investigating further, the Doctor becomes more and more entangled in a deadly web of intrigue. Together with Mel, a plucky computer programmer from Pease Pottage, the Doctor must overcome the conspiracy of silence, rescue the Brigadier and save the world once again - something that would be a lot easier if he just knew where to start...
Characters
References
to be added
Notes
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Continuity
- The novel depicts a Sixth Doctor desperately trying to avoid contact with Melanie Bush, because he fears that if she meets him, she will somehow become his companion and he will be set on the path towards becoming The Valeyard. This premise, central to the novel, makes little objective sense. Mel is instrumental in his victory in The Trial of a Time Lord. Indeed, his adventure with her in Terror of the Vervoids is the key piece of evidence he offers in his defense. If he doesn't meet Mel, then it is unclear how he would have won his freedom. He seems to forget, here, that he has already overcome the Valeyard, and so no longer has to fear becoming him. It is only the audience who knows the Valeyard appears to have survived the events of The Ultimate Foe.
