The Forgotten Son was the first novel published by Candy Jar Books and premiered their Lethbridge-Stewart series. The series was licensed by Henry Lincoln and the Mervyn Haisman estate and is set following the events of The Web of Fear.
Publisher's summary
The Great Intelligence has been defeated. And Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart's world has changed.
For Colonel Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart his life in the Scots Guards was straightforward enough; rising in the ranks through nineteen years of military service. But then his regiment was assigned to help combat the Yeti incursion in London, the robotic soldiers of an alien entity known as the Great Intelligence. For Lethbridge-Stewart, life would never be the same again.
Now he has a mammoth task ahead of him – the repopulating of London; millions of civilians need to be returned home after being evacuated so suddenly. On top of that, he also has his engagement to think about.
Meanwhile in the small Cornish village of Bledoe a man is haunted by the memory of an accident thirty years old. The Hollow Man of Remington Manor seems to have woken once more. And in Coleshill, Buckinghamshire, Mary Gore is plagued by the voice of a small boy, calling her home.
What connects these strange events to the recent Yeti incursion, and just what has it all to do with Lethbridge-Stewart?
Plot
to be added
Characters
- Colonel Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart
- Anne Travers
- Driver Gwynfor Evans
- Staff Sergeant Albert Arnold
- Captain Ben Knight
- Corporal Lane
- Mary Gore
- Major General Oliver Hamilton
- Lance Corporal Sally Wright
- Rifleman William Bishop
- Major Walter Douglas
- Lance Corporal Caroline Bell
- Owain Vine
- Raymond Phillips
- Eileen Phillips
- Henry Barns
- Maureen Barns
- Lewis Vine
- Shirley Vine
- George Vine
- Charles Watts
- Mrs Fleming
- Joy Felming
- Jemima Barns (nee Fleming)
- John James
- Gerald Sherwin
- Gordon Conall Lethbridge-Stewart
- Mark Cawley
- Ross Howard
- Richard Watts
- Mrs Watts
- Billy Moynihan
- Shosty
- Fred Murray
- Great Intelligence
- Harold Phillips
- Reverend Ted Stone
- Pastor Ronald Stone
- Doctor Jason Starling
- Jonathan Barns (mentioned)
- Brân Moynihan (mentioned)
- Susan Moynihan (mentioned)
- Karen Connolly (mentioned)
- Isobel Davies (mentioned)
- Matthew Lethbridge-Stewart(mentioned)
- Mahasamatman (mentioned)
References
- Owain has a radio so that he can listen to football matches when his mother is watching sitcom comedies like Her Majesty's Pleasure or super-spy programs like The Saint.
- "Tin Soldiers" by Small Faces plays while Lethbridge-Stewart drives through London, although he prefers "Lily the Pink" by Scaffold.
- Pirate radio station Radio Caroline is back on the air.
- The lyrics to Desmond Decker's song "Israelites" are briefly chanted by Lewis and Charles.
- Mary mentions Desert Island Discs. That week's presentation is on Lady Diana Cooper. She says that her acting is better than her writing. The guest would be introduced by Roy Plomley, and involves asking what records the person in question would take to a desert island, along with other questions.
- Ray's first book was called The Hollow Man of Carrington Lodge and was based on the true events which occurred to him from September 1937 to March 1938.
- The pub visited throughout the story is named The Rose & Crown.
- When Charles later visits Lewis at his house, George and Shirley are watching Hugh and I Spy.
- When Lethbridge-Stewart enters the bar, the song "We Gotta Get Out of this Place" by The Animals is playing.
- Lewis and Charles check all over town, even in the graveyard of Bledoe Parish Church, where they find nothing but an old woman.
- Ray puts on a Gioachino Rossini record to fall asleep.
- Televisions have come out with colour.
- Lethbridge-Stewart's father's tomb stone reads, "1902-1945".
- Sally and Alistair's song is "Cinderella Rockefella" by Abi Ofarim.
- Travers is considering returning to in Det-Sen Monastery in India to meditate.
- Inspired by Travers, at the end of the book Lethbridge-Stewart decides to visit the one place he knows has seen alien life, the Himalayas.
- At the end of the book, Owain and Lethbridge-Stewart discuss the upcoming match between Arsenal and Southampton at Highbury, which took place on 29 March 1969.
- In chapter one it is Friday 14 March, which fits the above 1969 reference.
Notes
Audiobook cover.
- The opening chapter sees a Yeti inside an outside toilet in Tooting Bec. This is a reference to Jon Pertwee's comment about there being nothing more scary than coming home and finding a Yeti on your loo in Tooting Bec.
- Mention is made to the BBC calling to complain that they are not being allowed to film in the underground after the event. This is a sly reference to the real-life British Broadcasting Corporation's inability to use the setting for The Web of Fear.
- The audiobook of The Forgotten Son was released by Fantom Films on 6 March 2016, read by Terry Molloy.
Continuity
- There are several mentions of a secret vault in Northumberland, where the Yeti and other technology left over from the London Event are stored, (PROSE: The Scales of Injustice, AUDIO: Tales from the Vault, etc) and where Anne Travers went to work on behalf of the British Army. (PROSE: One Cold Step)
- Colonel Lethbridge-Stewart is aware of the United Nations creating new protocols the previous year. When he contacted the Toclafane, the Saxon Master violated the first contact protocols established by the Security Council in 1968. (TV: The Sound of Drums)
- Lethbridge-Stewart sees his future, which includes allusions to various incarnations of the Doctor, his wives (PROSE: The Scales of Injustice, TV: Battlefield) his children (HOMEVID: Downtime, PROSE: Transit) and his grandchildren. He also sees his resurrection as a Cyberman, and the final salute to the Twelfth Doctor. (TV: Death in Heaven) He does not retain any of this information, however.
- It is stated that the Intelligence had existed before The Snowmen, "for centuries it has lived without form, seeking to add more minds to its own. But now it is lost, falling through time, weak. It cannot even remember its name. If it ever had one. It falls to Earth, like snow in winter. On Earth the year is 1842 and there it meets a boy". 1842 is fifty years prior to The Snowmen. The events of that story are the earliest concrete memory that the Intelligence has, but it recalled being called a "great intelligence" in Tibet (where it had taken over Padmasambhava's body for 300 years prior to The Abominable Snowmen). Over the years between it learns of its previous visits to Earth, and there are several references to its enemy who it fought in both Tibet and London, "so many times humans have encountered it, and it seems one man is always there to defeat it. The same man who defeated it in the nineteen century", as well a reference to its younger self in the London Underground (TV: The Web of Fear)
- The Intelligence takes on the appearance of Walter Simeon twice throughout the book.(TV: The Snowmen)
- The Great Intelligence seen in this book is the one who entered the Doctor's time stream in Name of the Doctor. It is weakened by Clara jumping in after him, and finds her defeating him at every end. He attempts to change the events of The Web of Fear, but another encounter with Clara deters this. Realising that she will always be there to protect the Doctor from him, he instead travels down Lethbridge-Stewart's timeline in an attempt to kill the Doctor's greatest ally. This book claims to show the final end of the Great Intelligence, but notes that the original Intelligence not from the future is still "out there."
External links
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