Bookwyrm: An Unauthorized & Unconventional Guide to the Doctor Who Novels, Volume 1: The New Adventures 1991-1997

by Anthony Wilson, Stacey Smith, Kate Orman (Foreword)

From the time Doctor Who vanished from TV screens in 1989 to its first return with the Paul McGann telemovie in 1996, the saga continued in print via a series of New Adventures novels. For many fans, this was the official continuation of the story that had ended with Ace and the Doctor walking into the sunset, perhaps never to be seen again.

This is an episode guide to a series of episodes that never were. With trivia, thematic discussions, plot holes, continuity notes, reviews and much more on all 61 NAs, this book is serious and not-at-all serious, thoughtful and disrespectful, accessible to newcomers and equally informative to those who can tell you fifteen unknown facts about Paul Cornell.

Too broad and deep; that’s the New Adventures in a nutshell. Let the BOOKWYRM be your guide!

Genres: Nonfiction

408 pages, Paperback

First published March 18, 2019

About the author

Anthony Wilson traces the initial inspiration for Mortimer back to a high school senior class trip to Washington, D.C. in 1984. As a journalist in the late 1980s, Anthony was encouraged to resist the urge to write a novel. As a parent in the 1990s, he did not have time to write a novel. As a project manager in the early 2000s, he was not sane enough to write a novel.

In 2007, Anthony rekindled the original spark and secretly started typing. What began as a study of leadership, morphed into a futuristic/sci-fi/fantasy with a thinly veiled message… you can handle whatever life throws at you as long as you trust in yourself, stay focused, and lean on your friends and loved ones.

Anthony has a bachelor’s degree in Communications from Missouri Southern State University (Joplin, MO) and a master’s degree in Human Resource Development from Pittsburg (KS) State University. He lives in Rochester, MN, with his wife, Linda.

Reviews

[Stephen Hartwell · Rating 5 out of 5]

As someone who was born in the early ninties, the New Adventures were not books I came to until much later, after my love of Doctor Who had its foundation laid through VHS releases, UK Gold repeats and occasionally Doctor Who magazine. Effectively I went through my own Who renaissance. experiencing a wide range of stories from the whole 26 years.

This guide to the NAs is absolutely sublime, as it charts the, perhaps lesser-known, journey of Doctor Who's own renaissance from cancellation to rebirth (well ok it still took a few years but it absolutely sowed the seeds for the new series coming back in 2005).

The authors here manage to analyse and thoroughly dissect each book, giving you all that you need to know to follow the on going story, but also giving you tantalising hints that will make you want to go away and read these books for yourself, which is exactly what I am planning on doing.

This is a hefty tome and it doesn't hold its punches when it needs to, but when the authors find something to inspire them, their words of joy simply sing off the page. I read this in great haste, not because I wanted to get to the end, but because the journey was so well-written that it was unputdownable.

Marvellous.

[Michel Siskoid Albert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some guide books take me ages to get through, others you don't really read cover to cover, but Bookwyrm? A real page-turner. Available from ATB Publishing, this "Unauthorized and Unconventional Guide to the Doctor Who Novels" by Anthony Wilson and Robert Smith? covers the Doctor Who New Adventures put out by Virgin in the 90s, and despite my having read only about half, I couldn't stop reading where I was up to. Spoilers be damned, I was having too much fun. The twist on the guidebook formula is that Wilson and Smith?'s voices are so clear, it's like you're part of a conversation between friends. There's plenty of humor, but also staunch devotion to what they think is a high-water mark in Doctor Who history. They draw links to the new series, which was more inspired by the novels than even I knew, gives examples of prose both good and bad, discusses all points of interest in a way that doesn't spoil everything (though the big beats are of course going to get spoiled, but I feel like I could still read the novels I haven't, perhaps with some distance, and enjoy them), before giving us their two reviews. I can't wait for the next volume, which proposes to give this treatment to the Eighth Doctor Adventures, but I guess I'll HAVE to wait, because that's a LOT of books.

[Neil Oliver · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent guide and memoir to the 1990s Dr Who books. Lovely and affectionate. I expect its pointless and bewildering if you have no interest in the subject