Chick-lit writer Jenny Calgan has written an eleventh Doctor novel, Dark Horizons, that is set in Scotland in the 11th-century and features Vikings. It's due out in July. More here. According to BBC Books' Albert DePetrillo, this is the only eleventh Doctor novel in 2012. No NSAs, then.
Hmm - interesting (and a bit concerning) that they're scaling back the NSAs like this. Technically this is an NSA because it features the Eleventh Doctor, and there's also a Quick Reads novella, Magic of the Angels, coming out soon, and they're also considered part of the NSA line, so it's not the only original story coming out featuring him. But could it signal that BBC Books is starting to phase out its releases, or perhaps transition into more books on past Doctors like the Second Doctor novel coming out later this year? Maybe they're planning to allot more budget to reprinting additional Targets? The big risk is Dark Horizons better be a "corker" as Albert says otherwise if it's not a good book fans may have to wait a long time. The last time I saw a scale-back like this was with Simon & Schuster's decision to stand down on publishing Enterprise novels until the series ended due to the TV series often preempting storylines that were planned for the books (ambivalence towards the spin-off I'm sure was also a factor, but I remember on TrekBBS one of the editors of that line indicating this as a reason). Maybe this is a sign of interesting times ahead for the TV series if BBC Books doesn't want to chance doing original stories right now? Alex
I was wondering why we hadn't heard about any NSAs yet, as we usually do hear about the coming year's novels by now. I had figured this was a result of the season not starting until fall, therefore no NSA's would be released until then as they'd likely want to keep the novels tied into the show with the Doctor and whoever the companion(s) will be. Mind you, I see no reason why they can't do a set of NSAs without a companion, as the companionless NSAs from the end of Tennant's run were among the best the series has offered, IMO. Of course, since there is no referance to Amy or Rory or anyone else aside from the Doctor, it looks as though this does feature the Eleventh Doctor travelling alone. Also, they state that this is the only Eleventh Doctor novel for the year. So far we only know for certain about the Shada novelization and the next batch of Target re-prints. Is Stephen Baxter's Second Doctor novel due out this year? I keep hearing contradictory claims that yes it is, or no, not until after Alastair Reynolds's Third Doctor novel (which everyone consistently says will be released next year). Even if we assume Baxter's novel is out this year, that means 2012 Doctor Who lit consists of two original novels, a novelization of an unaired story, and six re-prints of thirty year old novelizations. Maybe I'm overreacting, but that does seem a bit sparse. Or is it a case of BBC trying to save money for an epic cash cow for the 50th anniversary next year?
It was probably easier to do the Tennants because there was a clear endgame in sight, and RTD probably indicated that they could do whatever they wanted so long as the Master wasn't featured. Which is technically incorrect as Magic of the Angels by Jacqueline Rayner is to be released in March as part of the Quick Reads novella series. Not the same as an event hardcover, granted... Although a date hasn't been confirmed, everything I've seen (and for various reasons I'm keeping close tabs on this release) say 2012. The assumption is the fall as the Moorcock and Abnett novels were issued in the fall to take advantage of the Christmas market. Reynolds' book likewise I expect to see in the fall of 2013. Possibly, but I don't see that as being sparse considering the novelisations are aimed at a) reintroducing the past Doctors and b) being bought by people who have never heard of the Target books and have no access to buy them if they did, so for them they're new. There's also the oversaturation aspect. I stopped buying the New Series Adventures regularly several years back because there were simply so many the only way I could keep up with them would be to read nothing but Doctor Who. This was the same reason why I ultimately stopped buying the Virgin New Adventures, never bought the BBC Eighth Doctor/Past Doctor series at all (those series at their peak were being issued monthly), and also ended up stopping buying Star Treks on a regular basis. But I DID buy Moorcock's event novel, and though I haven't got round to doing so yet, Abnett's is next. Alex
In publishing terms a novella is not a novel, just as a short story is not a novella. The terms refer to lengths of fiction, not how the fiction is published. Though Magic of the Angels will be published as its own book, that does not make it a novel. Its word count does. Someone working on the range for BBC Books, like Albert DePetrillo, would be making that technical distinction between novella-length fiction and novel-length fiction. It is, in fact, technically correct to not consider Magic of the Angels a "novel."
A lot of the NSAs were pretty flimsy runarounds so I wouldn't be upset if BBC Books started taking a different approach.
Here's the cover to the book. http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/images/1849904561/ref=dp_image_z_0?ie=UTF8&n=266239&s=books
You misunderstood me. Margaret Clark mentioned in this very BBS that they were reducing the frequency of releasing the books (hence, stand down) because they kept running into conflicts with the TV series. I never said there we no books published, but compare to the frequency of the other series and they pulled back on Enterprise. A 20 second search of Google found the posting: http://www.trektoday.com/news/180505_01.shtml Third paragraph, although there had been discussion previous to this point as well. And it's relevant to this discussion because it's very possible the same scenario has happened with BBC Books. For all we know they might have had a "Doctor faces death" scenario they had to kill because Moffat got there first. And The Doctor's Wife wasn't the first time the novels had featured the TARDIS is some form (not the recent novels, but still). it's a lot easier to come up with original novels when a) a series is not arc heavy, something DW has become under Moffat even moreso than under RTD and b) is not a going concern (ref. Virgin New Adventures, the Eighth Doctor novels, etc). Hence one of the reasons why you don't see as many novel spin-offs these days from TV series in general, as opposed to back in the day when book releases were almost an obligatory part of the marketing. Alex
If Steve misunderstood you, then I misunderstood you in the exact same way, and I suspect that most everyone here did as well. You said that Pocket scaled back "on publishing Enterprise novels until the series ended," which statistically was not true.
That looks pretty good, Admiral. I was at Barnes & Noble the other day and found another new hardcover (bigger than the standard current NSAs) with Ice Warriors on the front cover! I forget the title of that one.
^^The Silent Stars Go By by Dan Abnett. It's been out in North America since November. Since September in the UK.