The ''Virgin Missing Adventures'' were a series of novels from

Virgin Publishing Virgin Books is a British book publisher 90% owned by the publishing group Random House, and 10% owned by Virgin Group, the company originally set up by Richard Branson as a record company. History Virgin established its book publishing arm ...

based on the British science-fiction television series ''

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series, created by Sydney Newman, C. E. Webber and Donald Wilson (writer and producer), Donald Wilson, depicts the adventures of an extraterre ...

'', which had been cancelled in 1989, featuring stories set between televised episodes of the programme. The novels were published from 1994 to 1997, and featured the First through

Sixth Doctor The Sixth Doctor is an incarnation of The Doctor (Doctor Who), the Doctor, the protagonist of the British Science fiction on television, science fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. He is portrayed by Colin Baker. Although his televisual t ...

s. (The

Seventh Doctor The Seventh Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. He is portrayed by Scottish actor Sylvester McCoy. Within the series' narrative, the Doctor is a centuries-o ...

also appeared in one novel.) The ''Missing Adventures'' complemented the ''

Virgin New Adventures The ''Virgin New Adventures'' (NA series, or NAs) are a series of novels from Virgin Publishing based on the British Science fiction on television, science-fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. They continued the story of the Doctor from th ...

'' range, which had proved successful.

Publication history

Virgin had purchased the successful children's imprint Target Books in 1989, with Virgin's new fiction editor

Peter Darvill-Evans Peter Darvill-Evans (born 1954) is an English writer and editor. Early life He was born and lived in Buckinghamshire until he went to university, graduating in 1975 from University College, London with a degree in History. Career In 1976 Darvil ...

taking over the range. Target's major output was novelisations of televised ''Doctor Who'' stories, and Darvill-Evans realised that there were few stories left to be novelised. He approached the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

for permission to commission original stories written directly for print, but such a licence was initially refused. However, after the television series was cancelled at the end of 1989, Virgin were granted the licence to produce full-length original novels continuing the story from the point at which the series had concluded. The first range covered only the continuing adventures of the Seventh Doctor, but when that proved successful, Virgin also created this range covering the previous Doctors, with new stories that fit in between the televised serials. In addition to original novels, the Missing Adventures series also incorporated two novelisations: '' The Ghosts of N-Space'', based upon a mid-1990s BBC audio play, and ''

Downtime In computing and telecommunications, downtime (also (system) outage or (system) drought colloquially) is a period when a system is unavailable. The unavailability is the proportion of a time-span that a system is unavailable or offline. This is ...

'', which was based upon an independent video production featuring several characters from the ''Doctor Who'' series (the novelisation is one of the few ''Doctor Who'' novels in which the Doctor does not appear as a central character). When the BBC decided in 1996 to do their own line of novels with the

Eighth Doctor The Eighth Doctor is an incarnation of the Doctor, the protagonist of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who''. He is portrayed by Paul McGann. The character was introduced in the 1996 TV film ''Doctor Who'', a back-door p ...

, they withdrew the license from Virgin to publish the

Eighth Doctor Adventures The ''Eighth Doctor Adventures'' (sometimes abbreviated as EDA or referred to as the EDAs) are a series of spin off novels based on the long running BBC science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'' and published under the BBC Books impri ...

. The adventures of the previous Doctors were taken up by the BBC in the Past Doctor Adventures line of books.

Reprints

In 2014, both ''The Scales of Injustice'' and ''The Sands of Time'' were reprinted as part of

BBC Books BBC Books (also formerly known as BBC Consumer Publishing and BBC Publishing) is an imprint majority-owned and managed by Penguin Random House through its Ebury Publishing division. The minority shareholder is BBC Studios, the commercial subsidia ...

' ''The Monster Collection''. These were followed with ''The English Way of Death'', a part of ''The History Collection'' (2015).

List

Including books featuring two of the Doctors, the total tallies are: First Doctor, 5 books; Second, 4 books; Third, 6 books; Fourth, 8 books; Fifth, 5 books; Sixth, 5 books; and Seventh, 1 book.

Continuity

Three of the ''Missing Adventures'' were sequels to televised serials, they were: *''The Sands of Time'' — '' Pyramids of Mars'' *''The Shadow of Weng-Chiang'' — '' The Talons of Weng-Chiang'' *''Twilight of the Gods'' — '' The Web Planet'' Two of the ''Missing Adventures'' were novelisations: *''The Ghosts of N-Space'' — the

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927. The service provides national radio stations cove ...

audio drama '' The Ghosts of N-Space'' *''Downtime'' — the Reeltime Pictures direct-to-video spin-off ''

'', featuring the Great Intelligence and forming a sequel to ''

The Abominable Snowmen ''The Abominable Snowmen'' is the mostly missing second serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series '' Doctor Who'', which originally aired in six weekly parts from 30 September to 4 November 1967. In this se ...

'' (1967) and '' The Web of Fear'' (1968). Many ''Missing Adventures'' featured old foes, including: *''Killing Ground'' — The Cybermen *''The Dark Path'' — The

Master Master, master's or masters may refer to: Ranks or titles In education: *Master (college), head of a college *Master's degree, a postgraduate or sometimes undergraduate degree in the specified discipline *Schoolmaster or master, presiding office ...

*''The Scales of Injustice'' — The Silurians *''Lords of the Storm'' — The

Sontaran The Sontarans ( ) are a fictional race of extraterrestrial life, extraterrestrial humanoids principally portrayed in the British science fiction on television, science fiction television programme ''Doctor Who'' and its spin-off series ''The Sa ...

s *''State of Change'' — The

Rani ''Rani'' () is a female title, equivalent to queen, for royal or princely rulers in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia. It translates to 'queen' in English. It is also a Sanskrit Hindu feminine given name. The term applies equally to a ...

*'' Millennial Rites'' — The Valeyard *''The Well-Mannered War'' — The Black Guardian *''The Romance of Crime'' — The Ogrons ''Speed of Flight'' is the only novel in the series that is a prequel; to Timelash.

''Burning Heart''

''Burning Heart'' was originally planned to feature

Judge Dredd Judge Joseph Dredd is a fictional character created by writer John Wagner and artist Carlos Ezquerra. He first appeared in the second issue of the British weekly anthology Comic book, comic ''2000 AD (comics), 2000 AD'' (1977). He is the magazi ...

and was going to be set in Mega-City One. Virgin Books held the rights to the ''Judge Dredd'' novels at the time, and author Dave Stone had already written ''Judge Dredd'' novels for Virgin. This plan was scrapped after the release of the 1995 film based on that character.Doctor Who Ratings Guide
/ref> The book was re-written, and the character of Dredd was replaced by one Adjudicator Joseph Craator.

''Who Killed Kennedy''

In 1996, Virgin Books published '' Who Killed Kennedy'', a ''Doctor Who'' novel by David Bishop. Although set during the time of the Third Doctor, Virgin published this book as a standalone work and not as part of the Missing Adventures series.

External links

The ''Doctor Who'' Bewildering Reference Guide
– a guide to continuity references in selected ''Doctor Who'' original novels.
The Cloister Library
– commentaries on selected ''Doctor Who'' original novels, named and modeled after '' The Discontinuity Guide'' by Cornell,

Day A day is the time rotation period, period of a full Earth's rotation, rotation of the Earth with respect to the Sun. On average, this is 24 hours (86,400 seconds). As a day passes at a given location it experiences morning, afternoon, evening, ...

and Topping * – a guide to ''Doctor Who'' original novels.
''The TARDIS Librarys listing of Missing Adventures

References

{{Doctor Who books, selected=Missing Adventures Book series introduced in 1994