The Dying Days (novel)

Publisher's Summary
6 May 1997 The Dying Days of the Twentieth Century

On the Mare Sirenum, British astronauts are walking on the surface of Mars for the first time in over twenty years. The National Space Museum in London is the venue for a spectacular event where the great and the good celebrate a unique British achievement.

In Adisham, Kent, the most dangerous man in Britain has escaped from custody while being transported by helicopter. In Whitehall, the new Home Secretary is convinced that there is a plot brewing to overthrow the government. In west London, MI5 agents shut down a publishing company that got too close to the top secret organisation known as UNIT. And, on a state visit to Washington, the Prime Minister prepares to make a crucial speech, totally unaware that dark forces are working against him.

As the eighth Doctor and Professor Bernice Summerfield discover, all these events are connected. However, soon all will be overshadowed.

This time, the Doctor is already too late.

Characters
The Doctor
 * Refers to himself as the Eighth Man Bound.

Bernice Summerfield
 * Benny excavated Mare Sirenum, Mars when she was 24, this established her reputation as an archaeologist.
 * Benny's 20th century knowledge speciality actually ranges from 1963 to 1989
 * Can speak Martian.
 * Knows how to isolate electrics from the fuel supply of a 20th century helicopter.

Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart
 * Is made General by the end of this story.

Alexander Christian
 * Knew Jo Grant when she was studying her A levels.

Winifred Bambera

Edward Greyhaven

David Staines
 * Home secretary.

Xznaal

Eve Waugh
 * An American news reporter.

Continuity

 * The Doctor regenerated in DW: Doctor Who: The TV Movie.
 * The Doctor delivers Benny to Dellah for the start of the Virgin Bernice Summerfield New Adventures Oh No It Isn't!.
 * The Brigadier refers to debriefing Jo Grant after the events of DW: The Curse of Peladon.
 * Kadiatu and aM!xitsa last appeared in Happy Endings.
 * Benny asks how Martians can invade Britian now, but she also has Martians at her wedding. (Happy Endings).
 * In DW: The Christmas Invasion there is question of whether or not aliens are Martians and confirmed not to be the case.
 * Benny previously met the Brigadier in No Future and he attened her wedding in Happy Endings (which is subjectively in the future for the Brigadier).
 * The previous Mars missions are mentioned including the meeting of the Ambassadors (DW: The Ambassadors of Death).
 * The Doctor left Chris on Gallifrey in Lungbarrow.
 * Chris Cwej returns in BNA: Deadfall.
 * Bambera first met the (Seventh) Doctor in DW: Battlefield.
 * MA: Who Killed Kennedy is mentioned, as is co-author James Stephens, (which supposedly UNIT altered the dates within to change them from the actual dates).
 * In DW: Aliens of London/World War Three the public are (again) given practically unquestionable knowledge of aliens existing and (again) it is seen as a hoax.
 * The Doctor's House first appeared in Cat's Cradle: Warhead.
 * Veronica Halliwell originally appeared (and died) in MA: System Shock.
 * Susan was listening to John Smith and the Common Men in DW: An Unearthly Child.
 * Christmas on a Rational Planet is the first novel to mention a re-coronation of the Queen. But this was actually Lawrence Miles explaining a continuity problem in DW: Battlefield (a throwaway line of their being a King).