The Burning (novel)
The Burning was the thirty-seventh novel in the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Justin Richards, released 7 August 2000 and featured the Eighth Doctor.
This was the beginning of an arc of stories featuring an amnesiac Doctor trapped on Earth. This arc of novels and short stories were effectively a soft reset/reboot of the Eighth Doctor line of stories. With the destruction of Gallifrey and an amnesiac Doctor the writers were able to begin a new-ish line of stories featuring the Doctor without as much of the arcs and history that had carried the series up to The Ancestor Cell.
Publisher's summary[[edit] | edit source]
The late nineteenth century — the age of reason, of enlightenment, of industrialisation. Britian is the workshop of the world, the centre of the Empire.
Progress has left Middletown behind. The tin mine is worked out, jobs are scarce, and a crack has opened across the moors that the locals believe reaches into the depths of Hell itself.
But things are changing: Lord Urton is preparing to reopen the mine; the Society for Psychical Research is interested in the fissure; Roger Nepath and his sister are exhibiting their collection of mystic Eastern artefacts. People are dying. Then a stranger arrives, walking out of the wilderness: a man with no name, no history.
Only one man can unravel the mysteries; only one man can begin to understand the forces that are gathering; only one man can hope to fight against them. And only one man knows that this is just the beginning of the end of the world.
Only one man can stop the Burning.
Plot[[edit] | edit source]
to be added
Characters[[edit] | edit source]
- Eighth Doctor
- Pete Manson
- Roger Nepath
- Colonel Wilson
- Reverend Matthew Stobbold
- Professor Isaac Dobbs
- Eloise Urton
- Robert Urton
- Alistair Gaddis
- Betty Stobbold
- Captain Michael Brookes
- Harry Devlin
- Sergeant Griffiths
- Patience Nepath
- Sir William Grant
- Fire elemental
- Arthur Melstead
- Rosie Devlin
- Annie Devlin
- Lawrence Devlin
- James Devlin
- Webber
- Garfield Gelt
- Milton
- Olson
- Jimmy Moorgate
- Michael Grisham
- Carter
Worldbuilding[[edit] | edit source]
- The Doctor has a note left in his pocket by Compassion which reads, "Meet me in St. Louis, February 8, 2001. Fitz."
- Middletown was halfway between Ambleton and Branscombe-sub-Edge.
Notes[[edit] | edit source]
- This is the first story in the "Eighth Doctor on Earth Arc".
- The novel plays with the imagery that usually surrounds the Doctor's arrival and description (i.e. someone looking mournfully at a body, or a wild haired gentleman making unusual conversations at dinner). The Doctor actually arrives paragraphs before the reader realises he's there at dinner.
Continuity[[edit] | edit source]
- The Doctor revisits Reverend Stobbold's daughter Betty in PROSE: Father Time.
- The origin of the fire elemental is explained in PROSE: Time Zero.
External links[[edit] | edit source]
- The Burning at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
- The Discontinuity Guide to: The Burning at The Whoniverse
- The Cloister Library: The Burning
