Original novels featuring the incumbent Doctor and companion duo is something we’ve not seen since 2018, in three stellar books that were some of the first things covered here on The Who Shelf. In its place, we’ve had Target novelisations, and stories penned by cast members past and present. For 2024, we’ve been treated to not only the latest actor-led story, but the return of original novels featuring the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday.

Editors note: Full reviews are forthcoming but life has gotten in the way. Still, I wanted to get my initial thoughts out.

Death in the Stars by Bonnie Langford

In the great tradition of Doctor Who actors penning original stories starring their character – be it Tom Baker’s Scratchman, Alex Kingston’s The Ruby’s Curse or Sophie Aldred’s At Childhood’s End – it was perhaps inevitable that national treasure Bonnie Langford would turn her hand to fiction, having returned to Doctor Who on television as Mel Bush in 2022… And 2023 … And 2024.

Death in the Stars (or, to give its full title: Death in the Stars: A Melanie Bush Mystery) follows Mel in the early days of her travels aboard the Nosferatu Two with galactic wheeler-dealer Sabalom Glitz. Langford shows incredible sensitivity to Mel’s character, placing her mixed feelings at having recently left the Doctor and shacked up with Glitz at the heart of the story. Mel’s desire to find her own feet in the universe and shake off the companion role is neatly mirrored as she picks up a sidekick of her own in the form of Hope.

I was also relieved to find that Langford resisted the urge to tell the story of how the Doctor and Mel first met – something which has never been shown on TV but done to death in spin-off media. Editors of the Doctor Who Wiki will be pleased. The story also rebrands Mel’s mid-eighties computer skills into an intuitive sense for systems and organisation that lets her adapt to the technology of the far future. Though as the number of quirky characters entering in the story starts to balloon towards the midpoint, I found some chapters becoming unwieldy and lost track of a few plot threads.

Ruby Red by Georgia Cook

With a number of critically-acclaimed audios under her belt, Georgia Cook takes her first leap into the world of Doctor Who novels with Ruby Red. Arriving in thirteenth century Russia on the eve of battle, the Fifteenth Doctor and Ruby Sunday intercept a young alien runaway in a deadly rite of passage. The transition from Doctor Who audio to prose can be tricky, but Cook acquits herself as a master of the craft, filling the novel with rich descriptions that speak to a distinct style from this author. Generally, writers of these tie-in novels save their best stuff for the weird and the alien, often leaving Earth-bound settings feeling a little generic. Cook, however, takes the time to create an atmosphere and explores how Ruby adjusts in an environment no less alien to her than another planet.

It does, however, suffer from the same problem that always afflicts first-wave novels for a new Doctor – it was written before the TV episodes were finished. I expect Cook had access to the scripts, but not the footage and so the distinctive quirks of the Fifteenth Doctor are underused. The dialogue is right, but the nuances of Ncuti Gatwa’s Doctor are absent. But I’m very excited to read another Fifteenth Doctor story by Georgia in the near-future so that Gatwa’s charm and Cook’s eye for detail can create something beautiful.

Caged by Una McCormack

A prolific author of both original stories and licensed work in the worlds of Star Trek and Firefly, Una McCormack has more than earned a place as one of the best Doctor Who writers in the business. I saved this one for last since I knew it was going to be a treat, and I was not disappointed.

Caged sees the Doctor and Ruby land on the peaceful world of Cavia, filled with equally as peaceful people who know nothing of aliens, until they meet a young local who thinks she’s had a close encounter. It’s a wonderfully simple concept that McCormack weaves into a complex narrative: how would aliens handle an alien abduction, especially when the Doctor and Ruby – different, but no less alien – rock up at your door. Where Cook focused on atmosphere, Una McCormack goes for the action and unapologetic, full-blooded science fiction. As expected, a novel that feels like it was specifically engineered to appeal to me.

Though McCormack likewise has to work with the limitations of not seeing Ncuti Gatwa’s performance onscreen, she latches onto the new Doctor’s sense of fashion that was revealed very early on through set photos and interviews. It goes a long way to distinctly seeing the Fifteenth Doctor himself on the page. Though we’re three-for-three on Doctor Who novels with a naive young girl who guides the characters through their new environment and proves pivotal to the plot. It’s not necessarily a bad thing and there are differences, but I couldn’t help imagining Chirrachar much like Ran and Hope from the previous novels.

All three Doctor Who novels are available to buy now from all good retailers, published by BBC Books. With thanks to Penguin RH and BBC Books for providing review copies.