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Doctor Who: Missing Adventures #9
Doctor Who: Dancing the Code
‘The Brigadier’s going to shoot you, Jo,’ the Doctor said grimly, ‘and then he’s going to shoot me. Both of us are going to die.’
The Doctor builds a machine designed to predict the future. It shows the Brigadier murdering him and Jo in cold blood. Unable to tell where or when this event is destined to occur, the Doctor and Jo decide that they must stay apart.
Jo is sent on a top-secret mission to the war-torn Arab nation of Kebiria. But upon arrival, she is immediately arrested and consigned to a brutal political prison. The Kebirians have something to hide: deep in the North African desert, an alien infestation is rapidly growing. And the Doctor and UNIT soon discover that unless it is stopped, the alien presence will spread to overrun the entire world.
The Doctor builds a machine designed to predict the future. It shows the Brigadier murdering him and Jo in cold blood. Unable to tell where or when this event is destined to occur, the Doctor and Jo decide that they must stay apart.
Jo is sent on a top-secret mission to the war-torn Arab nation of Kebiria. But upon arrival, she is immediately arrested and consigned to a brutal political prison. The Kebirians have something to hide: deep in the North African desert, an alien infestation is rapidly growing. And the Doctor and UNIT soon discover that unless it is stopped, the alien presence will spread to overrun the entire world.
280 pages, Paperback
First published April 20, 1995
197 people want to read
About the author
Paul Leonard
75 books8 followersPaul J. Leonard Hinder, better known by his pseudonym of Paul Leonard and also originally published as PJL Hinder, is an author best known for his work on various spin-off fiction based on the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who.
Leonard has acknowledged a debt to his friend and fellow Doctor Who author Jim Mortimore in his writing career, having turned to Mortimore for help and advice at the start of it. This advice led to his first novel, Venusian Lullaby being published as part of Virgin Publishing's Missing Adventures range in 1994. Virgin published three more of his novels before losing their licence to publish Doctor Who fiction: Dancing the Code (1995); Speed of Flight (1996) and (as part of their New Adventures range) Toy Soldiers (1995). Following the loss of their licence, Virgin also published the novel Dry Pilgrimage (co-written with Nick Walters) in 1998 as part of their Bernice Summerfield range of novels.
Leonard also wrote for the fourth volume of Virgin's Decalog short story collections. Following this, he was asked to co-edit the fifth volume of the collection with mentor Jim Mortimore.
Leonard's experience in writing for Doctor Who led to him being asked to write one of the first novels in BBC Books Eighth Doctor Adventures series, the novel Genocide. This led to four further novels for the range, of which The Turing Test received particular acclaim for its evocative use of real-life historical characters and first person narrative.
Leonard has also written short stories for the BBC Short Trips and Big Finish Short Trips collections.
Leonard has acknowledged a debt to his friend and fellow Doctor Who author Jim Mortimore in his writing career, having turned to Mortimore for help and advice at the start of it. This advice led to his first novel, Venusian Lullaby being published as part of Virgin Publishing's Missing Adventures range in 1994. Virgin published three more of his novels before losing their licence to publish Doctor Who fiction: Dancing the Code (1995); Speed of Flight (1996) and (as part of their New Adventures range) Toy Soldiers (1995). Following the loss of their licence, Virgin also published the novel Dry Pilgrimage (co-written with Nick Walters) in 1998 as part of their Bernice Summerfield range of novels.
Leonard also wrote for the fourth volume of Virgin's Decalog short story collections. Following this, he was asked to co-edit the fifth volume of the collection with mentor Jim Mortimore.
Leonard's experience in writing for Doctor Who led to him being asked to write one of the first novels in BBC Books Eighth Doctor Adventures series, the novel Genocide. This led to four further novels for the range, of which The Turing Test received particular acclaim for its evocative use of real-life historical characters and first person narrative.
Leonard has also written short stories for the BBC Short Trips and Big Finish Short Trips collections.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
April 26, 2017
While it wants to be a Doctor Who story it fails by having too little of the Doctor, UNIT used as gun fodder and far to bloody and sweary. The other major problem with this piece of fan fiction is the editing, their are many underplayed plots, abrupt stops and what seems to be some superflous characters.
All in all a book that could have been edited so much better.
All in all a book that could have been edited so much better.
January 14, 2025
More action, grittier politics, and more gruesome horrors than typical of the Third Doctor era, but captures the character's voices and relationships perfectly. Full review: https://fakegeekboy.wordpress.com/202...
May 4, 2022
"Dancing the Code" is a particularly gory novel that I think is supposed to be an anti-war statement. The story centers on the fictional north African country of Kebiria, which is in the midst of a civil war. The country is run by a typical strong-man dictator who wants to wipe out (read genocide) the tribal peoples fighting against him. He believes he has a novel way to do this by using some alien cyborg insects that have been lying in the desert for centuries. This description perhaps gives away too much, because Leonard keeps so much of the what is going on well hidden. The story does involve the insects making copies of people and technology. This creates much confusion in a country at war.
The main idea itself is interesting, but the story is not well executed. It is all pretty gory and violent, just to begin with. Leonard wants to insist on just how horrible war is by turning the reader's stomach, often. He also describes just about everyone else's turned stomachs. Through the first half of the novel, just about everyone is in a constant state of nausea, apparently. UNIT proves utterly worthless, and pretty much gets wiped out. The Doctor is unduly harsh with the Brigadier, who here proves rather tame. Also, in the last few chapters, Leonard forgets that the Brigadier had a dodgy ankle as a result of a helicopter crash. Leonard's prose is serviceable, but not scintillating. Still, I do have to say that the main idea for the story, of a world over-run by cyborg termites, is handled with some logic.
The main idea itself is interesting, but the story is not well executed. It is all pretty gory and violent, just to begin with. Leonard wants to insist on just how horrible war is by turning the reader's stomach, often. He also describes just about everyone else's turned stomachs. Through the first half of the novel, just about everyone is in a constant state of nausea, apparently. UNIT proves utterly worthless, and pretty much gets wiped out. The Doctor is unduly harsh with the Brigadier, who here proves rather tame. Also, in the last few chapters, Leonard forgets that the Brigadier had a dodgy ankle as a result of a helicopter crash. Leonard's prose is serviceable, but not scintillating. Still, I do have to say that the main idea for the story, of a world over-run by cyborg termites, is handled with some logic.
January 16, 2021
In a small North African country, government forces campaigning against rebels suddenly vanish without a trace. In the rebel encampment, a British reporter witnesses a battered UNIT jeep crash into a tent, driven by a dying man exuding a honey-like substance. And in England, the Doctor detects a vision of the future, one in which the Brigadier will shoot both him and Jo Grant in cold blood. Together the three events point to the latest alien threat facing the Earth, one that threatens to consume all of humanity unless the Doctor can stop it.
This was the second of Paul Leonard's contributions to the Doctor Who franchise that I have read, and i approached it with expectations shaped by his previous novel for the Virgin Missing Adventures series, Venusian Lullaby. Perhaps this is why I was so disappointed with the work. Unlike his previous novel, which drew its strengths from its quirky setting and immersion into truly alien culture, this one suffered from a tired premise poorly developed by it. With numerous characters hurriedly introduced into the plot there is little investment in their fates, nor is there any suspense in a climax that doesn't measure up to its supposedly epic scale. With an ending that is equal parts rushed and predictable, the result is a book that is not among the better contributions to the series.
This was the second of Paul Leonard's contributions to the Doctor Who franchise that I have read, and i approached it with expectations shaped by his previous novel for the Virgin Missing Adventures series, Venusian Lullaby. Perhaps this is why I was so disappointed with the work. Unlike his previous novel, which drew its strengths from its quirky setting and immersion into truly alien culture, this one suffered from a tired premise poorly developed by it. With numerous characters hurriedly introduced into the plot there is little investment in their fates, nor is there any suspense in a climax that doesn't measure up to its supposedly epic scale. With an ending that is equal parts rushed and predictable, the result is a book that is not among the better contributions to the series.
October 15, 2018
The 1990s saw a plethora of Doctor Who. The TV series might have been over but, under Virgin at least, the series was thriving on the printed page. It was perhaps inevitable that a range would start up featuring the six Doctors with writers keen both to recapture a bit of nostalgia while expanding upon the eras in question. Paul Leonard's Dancing The Code, the ninth book in the Missing Adventures range, is such an example of trying to do both at the same time and the dangers in doing so.
Let's start with the nostalgia bit first. If like me, you're a fan of the Third Doctor era on TV, there will be plenty to like about the book. Leonard seems to have a gift for capturing the Third Doctor/Jo/UNIT team of the Season 10 (since the back cover and various internal references set this between Planet of the Daleks and The Green Death). Pertwee's Third Doctor reads particularly well while Jo, thrown in at the proverbial deep end without the Doctor for much of the novel's length, gets to shine in some heady situations. The Brigadier comes across the best of the returning TV characters, coming across more as a soldier than the comedic foil he became in stories like The Three Doctors. The plot feels very much of the era with lots of running around, pitch battles, and escaping that became the hallmarks of the longer stories of the time. For a Pertwee fan, there's a particular thrill to be found in reading that.
Leonard wasn't content just recreating the era. While the New Adventures got the pitch of being "stories too broad and deep for the small screen," works like Dancing the Code prove that was true of Virgin's Who output in general. Set principally in a war-torn African country with cities on the Mediterranian and great desert wastelands, the setting alone would have broken the budget for the show in the early 1970s. Indeed, it's hard to imagine even New Who in the 21st century with its borderline cinematic production values being able to stage the massive battles between flying insects turned helicopters and UNIT with the firepower thrown about in the novel's conclusion. Perhaps Big Finish, having the ability to create soundscapes without having to worry about visuals, could do it and at times the book seems like a fit for their current range of Third Doctor Adventures (minus the Brigadier, of course). That's only at times, however.
For the scope isn't the only way in which Leonard expands things. Though the Third Doctor era on TV was arguably Classic Who at its most political, writers and the production team often did so with allegories or burying things within enough genre context to separate it from the real world of the time. While the country of Kebiria may be fictional, it could well be any number of real post-colonial African countries confronting civil wars, competing visions of the future, and tribal politics. It's a heady mixture and one slightly ahead of its time in the idea (explored in later books and audios) of a country's leaders trying to solve their problems by using found extraterrestrial technology. That's a heavy dose of realism which gets added onto by Leonard's descriptions of violence which is stark and, to some extent, realistic, if not off-putting at times. The problem ultimately becomes what happens when you try to present the fantastical side of the Pertwee/UNIT stories with Leonard's commentary combined with the verisimilitude of the setting and the violence: it just doesn't quite work.
Perhaps, in the end, Dancing the Code is guilty of being too ambitious. It wants to be a part of the Third Doctor era, expanding it while also trying to put it in the real world. While David Bishop did that successfully with Who Killed Kennedy (itself a unique book), Paul Leonard doesn't quite pull off the same trick here. Maybe it's something down to the clash of styles between the fantastic with the real world or, even, the sheer grisliness of his prose with its depictions of violence. In any case, it's a read that is one exhilarating and unsatisfying, too little and yet too much at the same.
Let's start with the nostalgia bit first. If like me, you're a fan of the Third Doctor era on TV, there will be plenty to like about the book. Leonard seems to have a gift for capturing the Third Doctor/Jo/UNIT team of the Season 10 (since the back cover and various internal references set this between Planet of the Daleks and The Green Death). Pertwee's Third Doctor reads particularly well while Jo, thrown in at the proverbial deep end without the Doctor for much of the novel's length, gets to shine in some heady situations. The Brigadier comes across the best of the returning TV characters, coming across more as a soldier than the comedic foil he became in stories like The Three Doctors. The plot feels very much of the era with lots of running around, pitch battles, and escaping that became the hallmarks of the longer stories of the time. For a Pertwee fan, there's a particular thrill to be found in reading that.
Leonard wasn't content just recreating the era. While the New Adventures got the pitch of being "stories too broad and deep for the small screen," works like Dancing the Code prove that was true of Virgin's Who output in general. Set principally in a war-torn African country with cities on the Mediterranian and great desert wastelands, the setting alone would have broken the budget for the show in the early 1970s. Indeed, it's hard to imagine even New Who in the 21st century with its borderline cinematic production values being able to stage the massive battles between flying insects turned helicopters and UNIT with the firepower thrown about in the novel's conclusion. Perhaps Big Finish, having the ability to create soundscapes without having to worry about visuals, could do it and at times the book seems like a fit for their current range of Third Doctor Adventures (minus the Brigadier, of course). That's only at times, however.
For the scope isn't the only way in which Leonard expands things. Though the Third Doctor era on TV was arguably Classic Who at its most political, writers and the production team often did so with allegories or burying things within enough genre context to separate it from the real world of the time. While the country of Kebiria may be fictional, it could well be any number of real post-colonial African countries confronting civil wars, competing visions of the future, and tribal politics. It's a heady mixture and one slightly ahead of its time in the idea (explored in later books and audios) of a country's leaders trying to solve their problems by using found extraterrestrial technology. That's a heavy dose of realism which gets added onto by Leonard's descriptions of violence which is stark and, to some extent, realistic, if not off-putting at times. The problem ultimately becomes what happens when you try to present the fantastical side of the Pertwee/UNIT stories with Leonard's commentary combined with the verisimilitude of the setting and the violence: it just doesn't quite work.
Perhaps, in the end, Dancing the Code is guilty of being too ambitious. It wants to be a part of the Third Doctor era, expanding it while also trying to put it in the real world. While David Bishop did that successfully with Who Killed Kennedy (itself a unique book), Paul Leonard doesn't quite pull off the same trick here. Maybe it's something down to the clash of styles between the fantastic with the real world or, even, the sheer grisliness of his prose with its depictions of violence. In any case, it's a read that is one exhilarating and unsatisfying, too little and yet too much at the same.
October 10, 2019
This novel is the complete opposite of Time of your Life (the last Missing Adventure I read). A well-written, well-crafted book, with an interesting plot and good point of view characters. It is actually a relief to say that this is a good book! I might not usually read this kind of militaristic thriller, but it's still a proper novel. It's just not that good as a Doctor Who story, which is a shame.
Even as a UNIT-era story, it spends too much time being military and there is way too much shooting going on. I understand the author was probably going for more realism in the war scenario than Doctor Who stories usually get, as there is a proper chain of command, no one really trusts the UN forces (a Very 1990's Take), when Jo is arrested she's taken to an actually female prison, there is a member of the press present as there would be in a conflict like that and the contacts with the different factions are all hers. It doesn't adds up to a badly written story, but it feels a lot like someone threw the Doctor into a previously written military thriller where he didn't fit very well. It feels like half the horror of the story could have been prevented if only the Doctor had acted sooner, and that is never a good look for Doctor Who stories.
But I do have something to say. If this is what happened to Jo before The Green Death, than of course I get why she just declined the Doctor's offer and just left UNIT. I would also understand if she never again touched honey in her life.
Even as a UNIT-era story, it spends too much time being military and there is way too much shooting going on. I understand the author was probably going for more realism in the war scenario than Doctor Who stories usually get, as there is a proper chain of command, no one really trusts the UN forces (a Very 1990's Take), when Jo is arrested she's taken to an actually female prison, there is a member of the press present as there would be in a conflict like that and the contacts with the different factions are all hers. It doesn't adds up to a badly written story, but it feels a lot like someone threw the Doctor into a previously written military thriller where he didn't fit very well. It feels like half the horror of the story could have been prevented if only the Doctor had acted sooner, and that is never a good look for Doctor Who stories.
But I do have something to say. If this is what happened to Jo before The Green Death, than of course I get why she just declined the Doctor's offer and just left UNIT. I would also understand if she never again touched honey in her life.
January 13, 2022
This book feels much more grounded than many of the other Doctor Who novels I have read despite taking place in a fiction country and involving some of the more far fetched alien concepts. This is the result of some excellent writing. An attention to detail and maturity gives this book a more adult tone than others in the missing adventures range but yet it still maintains that Doctor Who charm.
Overall this is an excellent book.
Overall this is an excellent book.
July 13, 2025
The first 100 or so pages are great, with all the main characters brilliantly written for. By the time I got towards the end of the book I just couldn't wait for it to end - it so cliched and the aliens are pretty damned boring.
August 17, 2022
The first two thirds are a pretty good UNIT invasion story that fits well into the era and was a lot less problematic than I expected. Unfortunately it falls apart at the end. A shame.
February 9, 2019
I believe I have said this before, though I could be wrong, the Missing Adventures help to expand the Doctor Who universe in areas that could not be seen on TV. Dancing the Code does this, though it has mixed results.
When it comes to books by Paul Leonard for the Missing Adventure series he is able to create alien races that are different from the standard ones you see. this allow a more realistic view of what aliens could be, this is good and bad. Here we are presented a race of aliens that are more insect that humanoid. It creates a situation of how do you communicate or deal with them.
This opens the plot to how will they be stopped if we can't deal with them normally. Add to the mix, the Third Doctor personality of trying to work things out to prevent UNIT from destroying, it is hard to see how this will end. At the same time I had to re-read parts because of the uniqueness of the aliens to understand what was going on.
From a UNIT standpoint, you wonder how many people are in UNIT. We get insight to the scope of UNIT and a lot of deaths. This expands from what you see on TV because we are out of the limitations of the BBC budget. This expands the possibilities.
Overall it is a good story. Even though it does what you expect for creating a true science fiction story, it feels out of joint being placed in Doctor Who. When you don't except things to be so alien. Your enjoyment of this story will depend on your approach to it. The three stars is due to your feelings on it could go either way.
When it comes to books by Paul Leonard for the Missing Adventure series he is able to create alien races that are different from the standard ones you see. this allow a more realistic view of what aliens could be, this is good and bad. Here we are presented a race of aliens that are more insect that humanoid. It creates a situation of how do you communicate or deal with them.
This opens the plot to how will they be stopped if we can't deal with them normally. Add to the mix, the Third Doctor personality of trying to work things out to prevent UNIT from destroying, it is hard to see how this will end. At the same time I had to re-read parts because of the uniqueness of the aliens to understand what was going on.
From a UNIT standpoint, you wonder how many people are in UNIT. We get insight to the scope of UNIT and a lot of deaths. This expands from what you see on TV because we are out of the limitations of the BBC budget. This expands the possibilities.
Overall it is a good story. Even though it does what you expect for creating a true science fiction story, it feels out of joint being placed in Doctor Who. When you don't except things to be so alien. Your enjoyment of this story will depend on your approach to it. The three stars is due to your feelings on it could go either way.
August 29, 2014
The great thing about "Dancing the Code" is that it's a great run-of-the-mill Third Doctor adventure. The bad thing about "Dancing the Code" is that it's a run-of-the-mill Third Doctor adventure. Like many of the Virgin Missing Adventures, this one is full of the flavor of the era without really contributing anything major, albeit an exotic location in the midst of a civil war in this case.
It's a solid story with intriguing villains and a clever bunny trail of a subplot involving the Doctor's (accurate) prediction that the Brigadier will shoot Jo and the Doctor. (The resolution of this seems unbelievably predictable when you looks at the story as a whole, but is tied up nicely without insulting the reader's intelligence.) The fault of the story lies in the last quarter, in which half a dozen characters are running about from place to place, making it difficult to keep track of in multiple sittings; there's more getting captured and escaping than "Frontier in Space", not to mention a total of three quick trips between England and the fictional nation of Kebiria.
Not a bad way to spend three hours reading, but I have the strong impression I'm going to forget all about this one in six months' time. Recommended strongly for fans of the Pertwee era.
It's a solid story with intriguing villains and a clever bunny trail of a subplot involving the Doctor's (accurate) prediction that the Brigadier will shoot Jo and the Doctor. (The resolution of this seems unbelievably predictable when you looks at the story as a whole, but is tied up nicely without insulting the reader's intelligence.) The fault of the story lies in the last quarter, in which half a dozen characters are running about from place to place, making it difficult to keep track of in multiple sittings; there's more getting captured and escaping than "Frontier in Space", not to mention a total of three quick trips between England and the fictional nation of Kebiria.
Not a bad way to spend three hours reading, but I have the strong impression I'm going to forget all about this one in six months' time. Recommended strongly for fans of the Pertwee era.
February 5, 2014
http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/2217422.html[return][return]One of the earlier Virgin Missing Adventures, which piqued my interest when I realised that a substantial chunk of the plot revolves around a conflict bordering Morocco and Algeria, a situation to which I have a professional connection. However there's one important difference - Leonard's fictional country of Kebiria is on the Mediterranean coast rather than the Atlantic. The plot is actually rather similar to the last Eighth Doctor novel I read, in that actors in a local conflict find that they have potential alien allies, but those alien allies actually have their own agenda. But I liked it a lot more, partly because setting a story like this in the firm anchorage of the Third Doctor and Jo Grant UNIT era gives Leonard a good stock cast for this sort of thing, all of whom he does well by (apart from Yates who is unsalvageable anyway), and also partly because his aliens do a neat line in dopplegangers, which I always enjoy, and body-horror, which I like when it's done right.
May 4, 2025
January 2021
I honestly get why some people would be put off by the violence, because there's a lot of it and it's often fairly explicit, but this is the most invested I've been in one of these for a while. It lays some nice groundwork for Jo's decision to get involved in Earth's problems, too, which I always appreciate.
April 2025
Not faultless, but there's so much here I profoundly adore, both its willingness to evoke a more grounded and gritty UNIT era reminiscent of season 7 (one of my favourite Doctor Who seasons of all time) and its characterisation of Jo, her insistent and recurrent "we have to do something" which occasionally comes back to bite her and the people around her but which is so very HER and so very rooted in her compassion, determination, and optimism that I can't bring myself to hate it.
I honestly get why some people would be put off by the violence, because there's a lot of it and it's often fairly explicit, but this is the most invested I've been in one of these for a while. It lays some nice groundwork for Jo's decision to get involved in Earth's problems, too, which I always appreciate.
April 2025
Not faultless, but there's so much here I profoundly adore, both its willingness to evoke a more grounded and gritty UNIT era reminiscent of season 7 (one of my favourite Doctor Who seasons of all time) and its characterisation of Jo, her insistent and recurrent "we have to do something" which occasionally comes back to bite her and the people around her but which is so very HER and so very rooted in her compassion, determination, and optimism that I can't bring myself to hate it.
November 4, 2008
Big disappointment here.
Strong characterization of the UNIT crew is about all this book has going for it. The aliens weren't that interesting, UNIT gets used as cannon fodder instead of being allowed to do much and an interesting sub-plot between JO and a young terrorist/freedom fighter gets cut short just as it's getting interesting.
Strong characterization of the UNIT crew is about all this book has going for it. The aliens weren't that interesting, UNIT gets used as cannon fodder instead of being allowed to do much and an interesting sub-plot between JO and a young terrorist/freedom fighter gets cut short just as it's getting interesting.
February 28, 2011
It's a rather dark and thrilling novel. Unfortunately, I find that it's not really a "Doctor Who" novel...and it's certainly not one reflective of the period in which it's set. Hell, even a season seven-centric Pertwee setting would still makes this novel seem incredibly incongruous and hard to enjoy.
June 24, 2013
The characterization in this story is great. However, I have a silly, picky problem with one aspect of the prose: the author's apparent aversion to using 'and' and 'then' in lists of actions. He continuously wrote such things as "The Brigadier looked at his list, found Al-Batir's call sign." and "He ducked down again, asked, 'Where are we going now?'"
It irks me for some reason.
It irks me for some reason.
January 28, 2016
This book was surprisingly graphic and real in its portrayal of human deaths. It was powerful and moving in the way it handled the complexity of killing, and moral ambiguity in war. The plot, however, was lackluster.
January 18, 2012
Dr Who books range from OKish to completely awful usually but I really liked this
February 2, 2015
A solid Third Doctor adventure, nicely told through a number of viewpoints. Biggest flaw is a rather rushed ending.
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews