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Doctor Who Puffin Crossovers #4
Doctor Who: Rebellion on Treasure Island
Summoned to 1700s Plymouth, the Doctor and Clara must investigate a mysterious thievery from the Crown of King George.
Their travels take them to a remote island - but as the secrets of the theft are unearthed, the Doctor discovers something far more sinister. The spectre of a terrible intellect is afoot.
Thankfully, the Doctor and Clara won't be alone. A pirate called Long John Silver, a runaway called Janey Hawkins, and a professor called River Song, are all along for the ride.
Their travels take them to a remote island - but as the secrets of the theft are unearthed, the Doctor discovers something far more sinister. The spectre of a terrible intellect is afoot.
Thankfully, the Doctor and Clara won't be alone. A pirate called Long John Silver, a runaway called Janey Hawkins, and a professor called River Song, are all along for the ride.
229 pages, Paperback
First published June 22, 2023
14 people are currently reading
149 people want to read
About the author
Bali Rai
80 books72 followersBali Rai was born in 1971 and grew up in Leicester. As a child, Bali wanted to be a footballer or to write stories. Always an avid reader, he hails Sue Townsend, Douglas Adams and Robert Swindells as his writing heroes. Bali grew up reading Dr Seuss and Meg and Mog and his first book purchase was The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. He realised he wasn't good enough to play for Liverpool F.C. and after gaining a politics degree in London he returned to his home city and combined a variety of jobs in pubs and clubs with completing his first novel. Bali set about writing a story he had been thinking about for many years. He wanted to write accessible material for children of all ages and backgrounds and realising there were no British Asian authors writing for children, he saw a gap. Bali hopes his novels capture the unique ethnic mix of the UK, of which he is proud to be a part.
Bali writes stories inspired by his working class Punjabi/Sikh background, but his aim was always that his writing should be enjoyed by readers everywhere, irrespective of class or culture. His has the ability to tackle the harsh realities of growing up in the UK and blend this with humour and often a overriding optimism. Bali visits schools and libraries in every major UK city, averaging 70 school and library events a year.
His first book, (un)arranged marriage, created a huge amount of interest and won many awards, including the Angus Book Award and the Leicester Book of the Year. It was also shortlisted for the prestigious Branford Boase first novel award. Rani and Sukh and The Whisper were both shortlisted for the Booktrust Teenage Prize.
All of Bali’s teen titles have been short-listed for awards across the UK, including twice making the Booktrust Teenage Prize shortlist. His third novel Rani and Sukh has represented the UK at the International IBBY awards and this title has its own Facebook tribute group set up by fans. Bali’s first three novels appear in The Ultimate Teenage Book Guide. Bali also writes shorter novels for Barrington Stoke, his first book, Dream On, was selected for the Booktrust’s inaugural Booked Up list. He also writes the hugely popular Soccer Squad series for younger readers.
Bali writes stories inspired by his working class Punjabi/Sikh background, but his aim was always that his writing should be enjoyed by readers everywhere, irrespective of class or culture. His has the ability to tackle the harsh realities of growing up in the UK and blend this with humour and often a overriding optimism. Bali visits schools and libraries in every major UK city, averaging 70 school and library events a year.
His first book, (un)arranged marriage, created a huge amount of interest and won many awards, including the Angus Book Award and the Leicester Book of the Year. It was also shortlisted for the prestigious Branford Boase first novel award. Rani and Sukh and The Whisper were both shortlisted for the Booktrust Teenage Prize.
All of Bali’s teen titles have been short-listed for awards across the UK, including twice making the Booktrust Teenage Prize shortlist. His third novel Rani and Sukh has represented the UK at the International IBBY awards and this title has its own Facebook tribute group set up by fans. Bali’s first three novels appear in The Ultimate Teenage Book Guide. Bali also writes shorter novels for Barrington Stoke, his first book, Dream On, was selected for the Booktrust’s inaugural Booked Up list. He also writes the hugely popular Soccer Squad series for younger readers.
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
October 4, 2023
The eleventh doctor and Clara go to an island.
Clara meets some escaped slaves who tell her about the dangers of the mist that envelops the entire island, as a lot of people have gone missing. And she meets an old friend of the doctor.
The doctor meets up with Jane Hawkins and Long John Silver. And with the help of a treasure map, they go hunting for treasure.
The plot is an absolute mess. There’s just a lot of boring exposition in this story. So it feels like the story moves quite slowly, without much actually happening when it does move forward.
There are too many characters from the show stuffed in here. You got the doctor, Clara, Vastra, Jenny, Strax, River Song and a well-known antagonist of the show in one story, which makes it feel very crowded for such a short book. And that’s not even counting the one-off characters on the island. Plus, because there are so many characters, none of them manage to stand out in any way.
Also, for a book inspired by Treasure island, it’s a bit of a shame that there aren’t that many references to the original story. And those that are there are simply not explained very well, or at all.
This book has a good concept and a cool cover. It’s just a bit disappointing that those are the only positive things I can come up with to describe this story, as it had so much potential for more. If you’re looking for a good Doctor Who book inspired by Treasure Island, I’d recommend Justin Richard’s The Resurrection Casket instead of this one.
Clara meets some escaped slaves who tell her about the dangers of the mist that envelops the entire island, as a lot of people have gone missing. And she meets an old friend of the doctor.
The doctor meets up with Jane Hawkins and Long John Silver. And with the help of a treasure map, they go hunting for treasure.
The plot is an absolute mess. There’s just a lot of boring exposition in this story. So it feels like the story moves quite slowly, without much actually happening when it does move forward.
There are too many characters from the show stuffed in here. You got the doctor, Clara, Vastra, Jenny, Strax, River Song and a well-known antagonist of the show in one story, which makes it feel very crowded for such a short book. And that’s not even counting the one-off characters on the island. Plus, because there are so many characters, none of them manage to stand out in any way.
Also, for a book inspired by Treasure island, it’s a bit of a shame that there aren’t that many references to the original story. And those that are there are simply not explained very well, or at all.
This book has a good concept and a cool cover. It’s just a bit disappointing that those are the only positive things I can come up with to describe this story, as it had so much potential for more. If you’re looking for a good Doctor Who book inspired by Treasure Island, I’d recommend Justin Richard’s The Resurrection Casket instead of this one.
October 17, 2023
Set on Treasurer Island Long John Silver is on his last breath with cancer, looking for treasures to rob. When the Doctor is called in by the King to save a cargo of great fortune. But not told what it is.
A devil mist is taking people out to Vanishing inside a nothing.
But even River Song, Strax, Jenny, and Madame Vastra can't make this book is limited to get you in a muddle of a plot.
You will hate the cargo!
I guess very early on. The biggest problem with this book is that the ending is the same as Doctor Who book that came out last year which spoil it for me.
A devil mist is taking people out to Vanishing inside a nothing.
But even River Song, Strax, Jenny, and Madame Vastra can't make this book is limited to get you in a muddle of a plot.
You will hate the cargo!
I guess very early on. The biggest problem with this book is that the ending is the same as Doctor Who book that came out last year which spoil it for me.
April 28, 2024
It’s Doctor Who and pirates, it sounds like a work made in heaven for me! I don’t quite think they captured Matt Smith’s doctor overly well, but he is a complex and tricky figure to write! It was a fun and cute read, nothing particularly monumental but I always love a bit of Doccy Who fanfic once in a while 💙✨
March 22, 2025
Doctor Who novels are always 50/50 and it's extremely difficult to find a novel that is actually readable. "Doctor Who: Rebellion on Treasure Island" started off strong, up until the point where Clara just left the story. Everything fell apart after that point. Adding River was an interesting twist and I thought it would be interesting to see the dynamic between River, the Doctor and Clara, but then Clara just left and a million other characters took her place.
The plot seemed to fluctuate to the point where it felt like there wasn't a plot at all. We discover who the villain is early on, so there's no mystery. There's too many characters who don't really have a goal or significant personality.
Doctor Who combined with pirates and treasure sounds like the beginning of an amazing story, but this book unfortunately didn't meet all my expectations. Like I've stated before, my main problem is how this book is described to be a novel about the Doctor and Clara when that's not what it's about at all. Also, the writer didn't quite manage to recreate the characters of the Doctor and Clara. Some of the things they say just seem a tad bit out of character.
I'm sure a younger fan would enjoy this book nonetheless, it's just not necessarily for me.
The plot seemed to fluctuate to the point where it felt like there wasn't a plot at all. We discover who the villain is early on, so there's no mystery. There's too many characters who don't really have a goal or significant personality.
Doctor Who combined with pirates and treasure sounds like the beginning of an amazing story, but this book unfortunately didn't meet all my expectations. Like I've stated before, my main problem is how this book is described to be a novel about the Doctor and Clara when that's not what it's about at all. Also, the writer didn't quite manage to recreate the characters of the Doctor and Clara. Some of the things they say just seem a tad bit out of character.
I'm sure a younger fan would enjoy this book nonetheless, it's just not necessarily for me.
November 25, 2023
We'll peg this at 3.5 stars. It doesn't quite get Matt Smith, leaning more towards a generic Doctor...it's a continuity overload and character reunion on par with anything Gary Russell or Craig Hinton could have produced...and the ending involves a memory tactic already used in one of last year's novels. But this overcrowded stew moves quickly, and makes for an enjoyable afternoon diversion in spite of being continuity top-heavy.
January 4, 2026
'Doctor Who: Rebellion on Treasure Island' has an interesting idea of having Doctor Who mix with the in-universe land of fiction, in the form of pirates in this story, something that's been done since William Hartnell played the Doctor back in the mid-1960s, but this story really falls flat on its face in the end.
The story starts off interesting enough with the Doctor receiving a mysterious phone call and heading to 1756, where he and Clara find themselves confronted with Captain Trelawny, who informs our TARDIS duo of Treasure Island, but shortly after arriving the Doctor and Clara are separated and then a couple chapters later, Clara is basically just written out entirely. She's still around, but you could honestly remove or replace her with any other singular companion and nothing would change. It would be the exact same story.
The plot is just constantly jumping about and the story is filled with characters simply expositing what's happening or what they're doing all the time, which really gets grating, and a lot of the characters feel flat. The 11th Doctor specifically but he is a hard character to write considering just how much character Matt Smith flooded his incarnation with, but that doesn't make up for the rest of the cast; most just came across as stereotyped characters, which leads to some very stunted and lacklustre dialogue, in my opinion.
This story also suffers from the same issue I have with 'The Return of Robin Hood' by Paul Magrs, which has all the main crew forget everything at the end. The difference here, however, is that the reason why they must forget is shoehorned into the story itself.
As for the main characters, it starts with the Doctor and Clara, then we're introduced to River, then we basically lose Clara for the rest of the story, and then afterwards we're brought to 1831 and meet the Paternoster Gang, who then, in a way, replace Clara. But the problem is one character gets replaced with three and we're already halfway through the story by this point, and in the middle of all this character swapping, we get introduced to the villain of the story. And the villain isn't even that interesting or creative.
I personally feel this story would've worked a lot better, character-wise, had it been the Doctor and Clara arriving on the island, the Doctor getting taken, Clara then going to the Paternoster Gang or persuading the TARDIS to take her there to get help, them then coming back, freeing the Doctor, and then we go from there. It means you cut out the need for the memory loss and the self-inflicted paradox too, both of which were just unneeded in an already flooded story.
With the number of characters in this story, it really feels as if Bali Rai was trying to do fan service with some of these character meet-ups but then never does anything substantial with them. You had Clara and River meeting each other for the first time and did nothing with it despite there being quite a lot of potential chemistry in there.
I do think this book is readable, but I honestly wouldn't recommend it unless you're okay with reading a story with the 11th Doctor and his late era's team fighting an alien menace, and then in the background are some pirates, because that's what this story is in a nutshell.
Overall I give this story 2/5 stars. There are definitely better stories in this range you can read; this one is just a dud.
The story starts off interesting enough with the Doctor receiving a mysterious phone call and heading to 1756, where he and Clara find themselves confronted with Captain Trelawny, who informs our TARDIS duo of Treasure Island, but shortly after arriving the Doctor and Clara are separated and then a couple chapters later, Clara is basically just written out entirely. She's still around, but you could honestly remove or replace her with any other singular companion and nothing would change. It would be the exact same story.
The plot is just constantly jumping about and the story is filled with characters simply expositing what's happening or what they're doing all the time, which really gets grating, and a lot of the characters feel flat. The 11th Doctor specifically but he is a hard character to write considering just how much character Matt Smith flooded his incarnation with, but that doesn't make up for the rest of the cast; most just came across as stereotyped characters, which leads to some very stunted and lacklustre dialogue, in my opinion.
This story also suffers from the same issue I have with 'The Return of Robin Hood' by Paul Magrs, which has all the main crew forget everything at the end. The difference here, however, is that the reason why they must forget is shoehorned into the story itself.
As for the main characters, it starts with the Doctor and Clara, then we're introduced to River, then we basically lose Clara for the rest of the story, and then afterwards we're brought to 1831 and meet the Paternoster Gang, who then, in a way, replace Clara. But the problem is one character gets replaced with three and we're already halfway through the story by this point, and in the middle of all this character swapping, we get introduced to the villain of the story. And the villain isn't even that interesting or creative.
I personally feel this story would've worked a lot better, character-wise, had it been the Doctor and Clara arriving on the island, the Doctor getting taken, Clara then going to the Paternoster Gang or persuading the TARDIS to take her there to get help, them then coming back, freeing the Doctor, and then we go from there. It means you cut out the need for the memory loss and the self-inflicted paradox too, both of which were just unneeded in an already flooded story.
With the number of characters in this story, it really feels as if Bali Rai was trying to do fan service with some of these character meet-ups but then never does anything substantial with them. You had Clara and River meeting each other for the first time and did nothing with it despite there being quite a lot of potential chemistry in there.
I do think this book is readable, but I honestly wouldn't recommend it unless you're okay with reading a story with the 11th Doctor and his late era's team fighting an alien menace, and then in the background are some pirates, because that's what this story is in a nutshell.
Overall I give this story 2/5 stars. There are definitely better stories in this range you can read; this one is just a dud.
November 25, 2025
This was saved by the Paternoster Gang and River Song and their fun dialogue, otherwise it was a miss.
The point of it being associated with Treasure Island was irrelevant as it could have just been a generic pirate adventure and the Doctor and River knew they were in a book, but that was never expanded or or explained why it was relevant. The only real connection to the book was the island and Long John Silver, who was irrelevant to the plot. It probably would have felt better if it was not associated with Treasure Island at all.
Also Clara was also sidelined for the majority of the adventure that it could have worked with with the 11th Doctor travelling solo.
The point of it being associated with Treasure Island was irrelevant as it could have just been a generic pirate adventure and the Doctor and River knew they were in a book, but that was never expanded or or explained why it was relevant. The only real connection to the book was the island and Long John Silver, who was irrelevant to the plot. It probably would have felt better if it was not associated with Treasure Island at all.
Also Clara was also sidelined for the majority of the adventure that it could have worked with with the 11th Doctor travelling solo.
October 28, 2023
A glitch in the TARDIS mainframe causes the Doctor and Clara Oswald to appear on an island in the Caribbean Sea in the late eighteenth century. The Doctor immediately realises something has gone wrong when he meets "Long" John Silver, who is trying to save children who are disappearing into a mysterious mist.
Rai captures the various characters well and the plot is interesting as well as easy to follow for younger readers. Tying neatly into the Eleventh Doctor era shortly after he meets Clara, the Impossible Girl.
Rai captures the various characters well and the plot is interesting as well as easy to follow for younger readers. Tying neatly into the Eleventh Doctor era shortly after he meets Clara, the Impossible Girl.
September 22, 2024
It's a decent enough Doctor Who story, and very easy to read and enjoy. The Paternoster Gang are great and characterisation is pretty decent. But there are perhaps too many characters and by the end I struggled to follow all the strands coming together. It also has a lot of in-story time travel, which I think is cheating a bit. Crucially, it doesn't really have much connection to Treasure Island - that novel's characters are way down the supporting cast - making it a bit more of a run-of-the-mill pirate story.
July 2, 2025
If you could have given me an unlimited amount of guesses as to who the enemy in this book would be I don’t think I would have picked who it was.
And that’s a good thing but then trying to work out why the author picked The Great Intelligence of all things became a big sticking point for me. Because I expected something that made more sense for a Pirate themed story whereas this fell more into a sort of pulpy adventure that didn’t seem to work with the enemy chosen for it (though after a while it clicked and made sense).
And that’s a good thing but then trying to work out why the author picked The Great Intelligence of all things became a big sticking point for me. Because I expected something that made more sense for a Pirate themed story whereas this fell more into a sort of pulpy adventure that didn’t seem to work with the enemy chosen for it (though after a while it clicked and made sense).
January 27, 2024
I did quite like the story - although it did feel like a repeat of the same stories with this villain. HOWEVER Clara was not written well at all. Like I don’t know who this companion was but it wasn’t her. The 11th Doctor was also weird.
It felt like a very weirdly written book. The conclusion felt okay but there was a HUGE gap where you don’t know why something happens and don’t get me started on the inconsistencies compared to the show
It felt like a very weirdly written book. The conclusion felt okay but there was a HUGE gap where you don’t know why something happens and don’t get me started on the inconsistencies compared to the show
September 3, 2024
It's a big celebration of the Eleventh Doctor's era. Largely I would say the book is pretty good. However if you're a fan of Clara you will not enjoy this book. She gets sidelined immediately and is not much of a character in the book which is a shame because very few stories exist with the 11th Doctor and Clara. I did have a good time reading it though and I do recommend it.
January 1, 2024
11th Doctor
Not enough Clara, but still entertaining. Old friends on a new adventure. An ancient enemy with an evil plan. Was kinda slow in a couple of places, but a good story. Recommended for all Dr Who fans.
Not enough Clara, but still entertaining. Old friends on a new adventure. An ancient enemy with an evil plan. Was kinda slow in a couple of places, but a good story. Recommended for all Dr Who fans.
November 5, 2023
Rating: 3.5 Stars
December 29, 2023
Would have been better if there was more of Clara. But after all those years we finally got a new Eleven/Clara adventure, so I won‘t complain.
4.5/5
4.5/5
April 29, 2024
Quite fun if somewhat slight and did we ever find out if Long John Silver was a real person or if the story was set in a fantasy world? Does it matter?
June 21, 2024
Clara Oswald y River Song, como personajes muy bien definidos. La gran inteligencia amenaza con esos artiluguos del saber. Entretenida y muy aventurera novela.
September 19, 2024
The only pun I was missing was about the "flesh drives" ;)
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 6, 2025
I loved this story !
I was confused to how it could fit in the canon but the explanation was extremely satisfying.
I was confused to how it could fit in the canon but the explanation was extremely satisfying.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 2, 2025
Absolutely loved this book, who wouldn't with all the action, humour, mystery, pirates and don't forget the Paternoster Gang AND River Song! Literally the only thing that made it fall short was the ending where everyone's memories of their adventure were erased so for that reason I'd give it 4.5/5 stars 🌟
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews