Salvation (novel)
- You may be looking for the concept or the Redacted audio story.
Salvation was the seventeenth novel in the BBC Past Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Steve Lyons, released 4 January 1999 and featured the First Doctor, Steven Taylor and Dodo Chaplet.
This line-up of Doctor and companions had never before been featured in novel form.
Publisher's summary
The gods have returned, and they're here to save our world.
New York, 1965. A time of conflict between ideologies, races, generations and genders, when crime runs rife and an unpopular war drags on in a distant land. In the midst of this turmoil, people cry out to their gods.
And now, it seems, the gods have answered their call. Walking the slums and tenements of downtown Manhattan, demonstrating extraordinary powers, five strangers are gathering a growing crowd of worshippers.
Steven wants to believe in miracles, but the Doctor is more sceptical. What are the strangers' real motives, and why does history make no mention of these events? As New York begins to tear itself apart, the Doctor's principles are tested to their limits. Which side should he choose to help? And what part will a London schoolgirl named Dorothea Chaplet play in the ensuing chaos?
What price is humankind willing to pay for salvation?
Plot
Dodo sees a green light in the sky one morning and observes soldiers on Wimbledon Common after school, later reading reports of similar lights in New York City. She visits Mr Miller to do his shopping as usual and finds a being who has killed Mr Miller and taken his form and attacks her, although he claims that he is here to save Earth. The being, whose body begins to look younger, holds her captive and takes on the name "Joseph". He tries to have sex with her, but Dodo resists and escapes onto the common when he suddenly experiences a pain in his head.
Running to safety in the TARDIS, Dodo fears that she has run into Joseph's spaceship and tells the Doctor and Steven that she came to call the police because of an accident. The Doctor dematerialises the ship to keep it from being discovered by approaching policemen and they arrive on West 25th Street in New York City. Whilst Steven looks around on his own, the Doctor and Dodo explore together and go to see the Statue of Liberty, after which the Doctor apologises for kidnapping her. Dodo is grateful, however, and tells him about losing her mother and father and what her life with Margaret has been like.
to be completed
Characters
- First Doctor
- Steven Taylor
- Dodo Chaplet
- Charles Marchant
- Kathy Marchant
- Byron Carter
- Alexander Lullington-Smythe
- Stanley Emerson
- Henry Wilkes
- Neville Albert Miller
The Latter-Day Pantheon
References
- Dodo was born in 1949.
- In November 1980, a science fiction film entitled Prey for a Miracle, which was inspired by the UFO / gods scare caused by the Latter-Day Pantheon, was released.
- Steven knows of the Cybermen.
- Steven shows Dodo to her bedroom aboard the TARDIS.
Notes
- The first two chapters are told from Dodo's perspective prior to her entering the TARDIS as depicted at the end of The Massacre.
- There is a reference to a movie about this event called Prey for a Miracle, which stars Peter Cushing as the "mysterious government advisor, Doctor Who". The real Peter Cushing had played Dr. Who in Dr. Who and the Daleks and Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D..
- The world of the "Gods" may be the same as the Crooked World, from the novel The Crooked World, also written by Steve Lyons. Both novels detail a planet populated by life forms which are essentially blank slates, without their own form or thought, until external intelligences impose new identities on them.
Continuity
- Dodo listens to John Smith and the Common Men but believes that they are "a bit past it." (TV: An Unearthly Child, AUDIO: 1963: Fanfare for the Common Men)
- The Doctor says that not even the first syllable of his name can be pronounced. The Sixth Doctor later told his companion Peri Brown the same thing (AUDIO: Slipback) as did the Seventh Doctor to Captain Hartmann. (PROSE: Illegal Alien) However, River Song was able to pronounce it. (TV: Forest of the Dead)
- Steven recalls seeing the ruins of New York City in the aftermath of the Dalek invasion and occupation of Earth in the 22nd century. The city had yet to be rebuilt in its entirety by his native time period. (TV: The Dalek Invasion of Earth)
- The Doctor mentions the Daleks and the Tzun as examples of hostile aliens intent on invading Earth. (TV: The Dalek Invasion of Earth, The Daleks' Master Plan, PROSE: First Frontier)
- General Marchant has seen evidence of "metal monsters in Shoreditch" in November 1963 (TV: Remembrance of the Daleks) and "strange goings on at Corman in Nevada" in 1957. (PROSE: First Frontier)
- The Doctor remarks that there are evil creatures in the universe which "must be fought." (TV: The Moonbase)
- When listing the Doctor's interferences in history, the Patriarch mentions his championing Greece in the Trojan War in circa 1200 BC, (TV: The Myth Makers) leaving the French Huguenots to be killed in the St Bartholomew's Day massacre on 24 August 1572, (TV: The Massacre) burning Rome in July 64, (TV: The Romans) sabotaging Barbara Wright's attempt to save the Aztecs in the 15th century, (TV: The Aztecs) arranging Rebecca Nurse's death on 19 July 1692 (PROSE: The Witch Hunters) and dragging Katarina into a conflict that she could neither understand or survive in 4000. (TV: The Daleks' Master Plan)
- The Doctor says that his body may be "wearing a little thin." He later repeated this assessment, not long before his first regeneration. (TV: The Tenth Planet)
External links
- Salvation at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
- The Discontinuity Guide to: Salvation at The Whoniverse
- The Cloister Library: Salvation
