Camera Obscura was the fifty-ninth novel in the BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures series. It was written by Lloyd Rose, released 5 August 2002 and featured the Eighth Doctor, Fitz Kreiner and Anji Kapoor.
Publisher's summary[]
The Doctor sat alone and listened to the beat of his remaining heart. He had never got used to it. He never would. The single sound where a double should be. What was this new code hammering through his body? What did it mean? Mortal. No, he'd always known he could die. Not mortal. Damaged. Crippled. Through his shirt, his fingers sought the thick ridge of his scar. Human...
The Doctor's second heart was taken from his body — for his own good, he was told. Removed by his sometime ally, sometime rival, the mysterious time-traveller Sabbath. Now, as a new danger menaces reality, the Doctor finds himself working with Sabbath again. From a seance in Victorian London to a wild pursuit on Dartmoor, the Doctor and his companions work frantically to unravel the mystery of this latest threat to Time... Before Time itself unravels.
Plot[]
to be added
Characters[]
- Eighth Doctor
- Fitz Kreiner
- Anji Kapoor
- Sabbath (alias Mr G.K. Thursday)
- Angel-Maker (aka Elizabeth Kelly)
- Death
- Sebastian Chiltern
- Nathaniel Chiltern
- Constance Jane
- Micah Scale
- Octave
- O'Keagh
- Hugo Little
- Vera
- Henrietta the Narrow-Minded
- Reginald the Colossus
- Rudy the Dynamic Diminutive
- Wobry the Human Serpent
- William
- Mrs Hemming
- George Williamson
Worldbuilding[]
- The Jonah, Sabbath's time vessel, is mentioned.
- The Doctor travels down into the realms of Death.
- Chiltern's time machine works along principles of temporal interferometry.
- The Doctor quotes The Hound of the Baskervilles.
- Elizabeth Kelly is a time sensitive.
- Dr Chiltern mentions the Blair Witch hoax in America.
Notes[]
- There is a brief appearance by "William the Bloody Awful Poet", a nick-name given to regular Buffy the Vampire Slayer character, Spike (played by James Marsters, who later played Captain John Hart in Torchwood). Although there are several other references to Buffy as a fictional series throughout the DWU, this is the only one to imply any form of crossover between the two. The Buffy franchise later returned the favour by having lookalikes of the Tenth Doctor and Rose Tyler appear in a continuation comic.
- Camera Obscura won Best Book in the 2002 Jade Pagoda mailing list awards.[1]
Continuity[]
- The Doctor speaks of Sabbath's previous ploys including Station One and Barcelona in the earlier BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures novels Anachrophobia [+]Jonathan Morris, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 2002). and History 101 [+]Mags L. Halliday, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 2002).
- When the Doctor is crushed by the sandbags, it is his connection to Sabbath through his second heart, which was removed in the earlier novel The Adventuress of Henrietta Street [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 2001). and that Sabbath implanted in his own body, that keeps him from dying.
- Fitz goes to a history lecture on Siberia and meets explorer George Williamson. The expedition appears in PROSE: Time Zero.
- Fitz recalls his visit with the Doctor to San Francisco and shares his limited knowledge of biodata, a reference to earlier novel of the same range, Unnatural History [+]Jonathan Blum and Kate Orman, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999).
- Sabbath says that Scarlette was the only woman the Doctor ever got close to. The Doctor married her in an earlier novel of the same range, The Adventuress of Henrietta Street [+]Lawrence Miles, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 2001).
- When the Doctor and Sabbath agree to work together, the Doctor has a memory of being in league with a moral monster and falling, which is most likely a reference to the Fourth Doctor's alliance with the Tremas Master and subsequent regeneration in the television story Logopolis [+]Christopher H. Bidmead, Doctor Who season 18 (BBC1, 1981).
- While the Doctor is in a coma after his chest is crushed, he experiences a dream where he feels like his body is just a coat he's taken off and he'll find another one around a corner, hinting at some buried memories of regeneration. During his dream, he studies his shadow and feels as though it should remind him of something, possibly its loss and replacement with a Faction-influenced shadow. This is a reference to the arc begging with Unnatural History [+]Jonathan Blum and Kate Orman, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 1999)., and ending with The Ancestor Cell [+]Peter Anghelides and Stephen Cole, BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures (BBC Books, 2000).
External links[]
- Camera Obscura at the Doctor Who Reference Guide
- The Discontinuity Guide to: Camera Obscura at The Whoniverse
- The Cloister Library: Camera Obscura
Footnotes[]
- ↑ Jade Pagoda awards (2008). Archived from the original on 22 September 2008.
