Solitaire (audio story)

Publisher's summary
“What if there were a game you didn’t know you were playing? Where you didn’t know the aim and you hadn’t seen the rules?”

Charlotte Pollard arrives in a toyshop, but she doesn’t know where she is – or even who she is. The mysterious owner wants to play games. He’s the Celestial Toymaker, and he has already defeated the Doctor, whose essence is hidden inside a ventriloquist’s doll.

The Doctor is gone. The TARDIS is lost. But the game is only just beginning...

Plot
to be added

Cast

 * Charley Pollard - India Fisher
 * The Celestial Toymaker - David Bailie

Story notes

 * According to the Big Finish Podcast, the puppet Eighth Doctor on the cover was created by Alex Mallinson.


 * David Bailie reprises his role as the Celestial Toymaker form AUDIO: The Nightmare Fair. He previously played Taren Capel in AUDIO: Taren Capel and AUDIO: Checkmate.
 * To date, this is the only Companion Chronicle to feature the Eighth Doctor.
 * Along with AUDIO: The Time Museum and AUDIO: The Jigsaw War, this is one of only three Companion Chronicles not to feature any narration. All three are full cast audio dramas with only two speaking parts.
 * This is the first Companion Chronicle to star a companion created by Big Finish Productions. The only other such audio dramas are AUDIO: A Town Called Fortune (featuring the Sixth Doctor's companion Evelyn Smythe), The Perpetual Bond, The Cold Equations and The First Wave (featuring the First Doctor's companion Oliver Harper) and Project: Nirvana (featuring the Seventh Doctor's companions Sally Morgan and Lysandra Aristedes).
 * This audio drama was recorded on 15 January 2010.

Continuity

 * The First Doctor previously visited the Celestial Toyroom in the company of Steven Taylor and Dodo Chaplet. (TV: The Celestial Toymaker) In the interim, the Doctor encountered the Celestial Toymaker in Blackpool in 1986 during his sixth incarnation (AUDIO: The Nightmare Fair) and in Switzerland in 1926 during his seventh incarnation (AUDIO: The Magic Mousetrap).
 * The Toymaker refers to Orson Welles (AUDIO: Invaders from Mars), Edith Thompson (AUDIO: The Chimes of Midnight), the Nimon (AUDIO: Seasons of Fear) and the Solarians (AUDIO: Embrace the Darkness).
 * The Eleventh Doctor's companion Amy Pond was later turned into a doll in a similar manner to the Eighth Doctor. (TV: Night Terrors)