Nightshade (novel)

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Written by Mark Gatiss, Nightshade is the eighth instalment in the series of Virgin Publishing's Doctor Who paperback novels. A New Adventure, it features the Seventh Doctor and Ace.

Publisher's summary[[edit] | [edit source]]

"I have done enough!"

Ace has never known the Doctor so withdrawn and melancholic. He is avoiding her company, seeking solace in the forgotten rooms and labyrinthine passages of his ancient time machine.

Perhaps he will find the peace he yearns for on his favourite planet, Earth, in the second half of the twentieth century — in the isolated village of Crook Marsham, to be precise, in 1968, the year of peace, love and understanding.

But one by one the villagers are being killed. The Doctor has to act, but for once he seems helpless, indecisive, powerless.

What are the signals from space that are bombarding the radio telescope on the moor? What is the significance of the local legends from the Civil War? And what is the aeons-old power that the Doctor is unable to resist?

Plot[[edit] | [edit source]]

In a prologue, the First Doctor steals a TARDIS and runs away from Gallifrey.

In the small Yorkshire village of Crook Marsham, close to Christmas 1968, Jack Prudhoe is lured into the moors by a vision of his wife, Win, as she appeared when she was younger and dies mysteriously.

Edmund Trevithick, the aging former star of BBC serial Nightshade, watches an old episode of his show in his old folks' home. Jill Mason, his nurse, informs him that the BBC will be visiting to interview him. That night, Trevithick sees one of the creatures from Nightshade break his window.

The staff of Crook Marsham's new telescope, including young couple Vijay Degun and Holly Kidd, stern and racist professor Thomas Hawthorne, and Dr Christine Cooper, are disturbed by a massive influx of strange readings coming from Bellatrix.

Billy Coote, a homeless man on the streets of Crook Marsham, sees the TARDIS materialize.

In the TARDIS, the Seventh Doctor takes Ace to the tertiary control room. Ace is worried about how moody the Doctor has been acting recently. In the control room, she finds Susan's old Coal Hill School uniform and tries it on, provoking anger from the Doctor.

Betty Yeadon wakes up from a nightmare in which her brother, Alfred, dies in World War II. Her husband, Lawrence, tries to comfort her, and she busies herself by doing her stepson Robin's laundry. She encounters a vision Alfred's ghost in the water when she does. Lawrence, concerned and unable to find the village doctor, sends Robin to retrieve Jill from the retirement home.

The Doctor and Ace arrive in Crook Marsham and encounter Robin, who directs them to a café for breakfast. At the café, the Doctor confesses that he is considering retiring from travel. He tells Ace that he needs time alone to think, and leaves her to go to the village's monastery. Vijay enters the café asking to use the phone, as the phones at the telescope are not functioning, but it seems that all phones in the village are down. Ace sneaks into Vijay's Land Rover to go to the telescope.

George Lowcock and the rest of the local police force arrive at the retirement home to investigate Threvithick's broken window. They find no other trace of the culprit. Lowcock recognizes Trevithick from Nightshade. Jill discusses how every resident of the home except Trevithick will be leaving for Christmas. Robin arrives and brings Jill and Trevithick to the village pub.

After returning to work, Cooper relieves Vijay of duty, and he goes to join Holly in his quarters. Ace, while snooping around the telescope grounds, encounters the telescope security guard's corpse, which then disappears in a flash of light. She goes into the observatory to inform the staff.

At the monastery, the Doctor meets Abbot Mervyn Winstanley, who gives him food, company, and records on the local history. In 1644, Oliver Cromwell's forces took Marsham Castle, where a soldier was burnt up in a supernatural burst of light after seeing his dead family. The castle was destroyed soon after. Winstanley tells the Doctor that the site of the castle is where the telescope now is.

Arriving at the pub, where he had agreed to meet back up with Ace, the Doctor is pushed into helping Betty once the locals hear that he is a doctor. He gives her smelling salts and discusses her nightmares with Robin, then heads to the telescope to find Ace. Lawrence and George leave to find help from another town. Robin, intrigued by Ace, follows the Doctor.

As Hawthorne and Cooper interrogate Ace, believing little of what she says, another spike of odd readings comes through the telescope. They send Ace to retrieve Vijay and Holly; she interrupts the two of them naked in Vijay's quarters. Vijay gets dressed and comes to the control room, but Holly does not. The Doctor and Robin arrive having encountered Jack Prudhoe's corpse.

Betty sees Alfred again, and this time is killed by him. Trevithick, while reminiscing about his last day of filming, again encounters the creatures from Nightshade. Win Prudhoe is also a victim of this night's attacks. Billy Coote, who has been experiencing headaches and visions, goes to the monastery.

Holly, half-asleep, encounters her dead fiancé, James. She is almost taken in by the vision, but is interrupted by Vijay, who sees James as nothing but a cloud of smoke. Ace and Robin watch TV together, having been given the telescope's TV room to sleep in.

Lawrence and George return having not made it far out of the village. As soon as they left, they began to experience strong nausea, so much so that they could not continue driving. Lawrence finds Betty dead in their bed.

Tim Medway, the reporter from the BBC sent to interview Trevithick, enters the village while reminiscing about Christmas as a child. On the way in, he encounters the crashed coach bus containing Jill and many of her charges from the home. The driver, afflicted by the same illness George and Lawrence experienced, died in the crash. Medway drives the survivors to the monastery.

Robin returns home to check on Betty. Lawrence blames him for her death.

Ace and the Doctor go to the monastery, where they find that the site of the telescope was also site to a now-abandoned quarry. After Jill and her charges arrive, the Doctor returns to the telescope. The Doctor suggests the history of the site and the mysterious readings might be related, and Hawthorne reacts disbelievingly and aggressively, culminating in him calling Vijay a slur and nearly resorting to violence. He returns to his quarters, where he encounters a tar baby and dies just as another surge of readings begins.

Medway reports the bus accident to the local police, who are inundated with various missing person reports. He then goes to the pub to talk to Trevithick.

The retirement home residents gathered at the monastery, indulging in nostalgia, break into song. Ace and Jill watch all of them encounter visions from their past and burst into columns of light. Jill runs out of the monastery, while Ace runs up a stairwell. Robin arrives, and Ace brings him up with her. Winstanley enters the main hall of the monastery, where he sees the scene and believes it to be Jesus Christ. The vision tells him that he is forgiven, and he dies.

Trevithick tells Medway that he has been seeing the creatures from Nightshade. They go to the telescope, where the influx of readings causes the power to short out. Medway, disturbed by everything he has encountered, attempts to leave town and crashes his car. Vijay, Holly, and Trevithick theorize that they are being attacked by things they are nostalgic for or have strong memories and emotions of. The Nightshade creatures attack the telescope, forcing the three to split up.

The Doctor returns to the monastery. The Doctor tells Jill to gather all the survivors in the village somewhere safe. He encounters a vision of Susan, which he is able to resist after some temptation. Ace and Robin are hiding out in the stairwell. Ace confesses to Robin that she is a time traveller. They enter the attic, where they find a possessed Billy Coote; they then climb up to the roof.

A vision of Betty kills Lawrence.

Vijay and Holly find the abandoned quarry. Trevithick finds a mass of glowing light beneath the telescope.

The Doctor encounters Coote in the attic and attempts to communicate with the Sentience possessing him, but it only says that it "needs." Ace, hearing the Doctor, attempts to help by detonating nitro-nine. The Sentience consumes the energy generated by the blast, and Robin, the Doctor, and Ace escape the collapsing monastery and return to the telescope.

The Doctor, Ace, Robin, Vijay, Holly, Trevithick, and Cooper reunite at the telescope, where the Doctor explains that the Sentience is a very old power consuming the life force of the townsfolk using their nostalgia as bait. It also is responsible for the effect that prevents people from leaving. The Doctor, Vijay, Holly, and Trevithick go down to the quarry to attempt to communicate again with the Sentience. The Sentience kills Holly, and Trevithick sacrifices himself so Vijay and the Doctor can escape.

The town gathers in the church, where visions of dead soldiers appear, many of which wearing gas masks. George takes the mask off of one, revealing a perfectly blank face.

Ace purposefully summons a vision of her mother, then banishes it by refusing to believe in it or care about it. Inspired by this, the Doctor summons a "Susan" to communicate to the Sentience with. He directs it towards the supernova that the telescope had been monitoring, where it will be able to feast on energy to its heart's content. It willingly leaves.

Ace tells the Doctor that she'd like to stay with Robin. He says he'd like to show her one thing first, and she agrees; they go in the TARDIS to the same place in 1644, when the supernova first formed. They find that the Sentience has been trapped in a black hole after feeding off of it. Ace then asks to return to 1968, to which the Doctor doesn't respond.

Characters[[edit] | [edit source]]

Worldbuilding[[edit] | [edit source]]

The Doctor[[edit] | [edit source]]

  • The Doctor thinks of Susan almost every day now.
  • The Doctor's departure from Gallifrey was observed.

Individuals[[edit] | [edit source]]

Locations[[edit] | [edit source]]

Species[[edit] | [edit source]]

  • The Sentience absorbs the energy from Ace's Nitro-9.

Astronomy[[edit] | [edit source]]

Food and beverages[[edit] | [edit source]]

Television series[[edit] | [edit source]]

Notes[[edit] | [edit source]]

Continuity[[edit] | [edit source]]

Images[[edit] | [edit source]]

The e-book version published by the BBC on their website included several illustrations by Daryl Joyce. Titles of illustrations are as they were on BBC's site.

  • Original cover

    Original cover

  • Textless cover

    Textless cover

  • E-book cover, designed to resemble the Past Doctor Adventures

    E-book cover, designed to resemble the Past Doctor Adventures

  • Vijay investigates

    Vijay investigates

  • Tertiary console room

    Tertiary console room

  • Rising from the deep

    Rising from the deep

  • Winstanley's study

    Winstanley's study

  • Escape from danger

    Escape from danger

  • Medway in York

    Medway in York

  • The tar baby

    The tar baby

  • Attacked!

    Attacked!

  • Billy

    Billy

  • Beyond the grave

    Beyond the grave

  • Susan

    Susan

External links[[edit] | [edit source]]

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Seventh
Doctor
1991
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Bernice
Summerfield
1997
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