Virgin Decalog

 ( Book Series Introduced In 1994 ) 

The Virgin Decalog books were collections of short stories published by Virgin Publishing based on the television series Doctor Who: they gained their name from the fact that each volume contained ten stories (although the last collection contains eleven). Five volumes were published between 1994 and September 1997, although volumes 4 and 5 did not feature the Doctor or any other non-Virgin characters. This is because the BBC decided not to renew Virgin's licence to produce original fiction featuring the Doctor or any characters featured in the TV series (Virgin transitioned to featuring characters created for literature over which the BBC had no rights). Following this, the BBC began producing their own Doctor Who fiction, including short stories under the name Short Trips.

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The Books

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Decalog The first volume of stories published was Decalog (Virgin, 17 March 1994), edited by Mark Stammers and Stephen James Walker. It contained the following stories:

Seventh Doctor

Second Doctor, Jamie McCrimmon & Zoe Herriot

Fourth Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith

Third Doctor, Liz Shaw, UNIT

Fourth Doctor, Sarah Jane Smith

First Doctor, Ian Chesterton & Barbara

Fifth Doctor, Peri Brown

First Doctor, Dodo Chaplet, Steven and the Sixth Doctor

Third Doctor, Liz Shaw and UNIT

Fifth Doctor, Nyssa & Tegan Jovanka

The Story Playback by Stephen James Walker was a short linking piece that recurred between the other stories, detailing the story of an amnesiac claiming to be the Doctor having his memories restored by going through the items in his pockets: each item relates to one of the stories.

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Decalog 2: Lost Property The next volume was Decalog 2: Lost Property (Virgin Publishing, 20 July 1995), again edited by Mark Stammers and Stephen James Walker. This volume abandoned the linking story concept used in Decalog, and instead concentrated on having all its stories written on the same theme – a property that the Doctor owns somewhere or when in the universe. It contained the stories:

Second Doctor, Jamie and Zoe

Fourth Doctor, Leela & K-9

Third Doctor, Jo Grant & UNIT

Seventh Doctor, Bernice,

Sarah Jane Smith, Mike Yates & K9

First Doctor, Ian & Barbara

Fifth Doctor, Nyssa

Fourth Doctor, Leela

Sixth Doctor, Peri

Seventh Doctor, Ace & Bernice

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Decalog 3: Consequences The final Decalog collection before Virgin lost their licence to use The Doctor and characters from the 1963–89 series was called Decalog 3: Consequences (Virgin Publishing, 18 July 1996), and was joint edited by Justin Richards and Andy Lane. It introduced a new idea for linking the stories whereby each story would contain an element from the previous and subsequent stories, and the first contained an element from the last and vice versa. It contained the following stories:

Third Doctor, Jo

Sarah Jane Smith, K9

First Doctor, Dodo

Fifth Doctor, Nyssa

Fourth Doctor, the Brigadier

Second Doctor, Jamie & Zoe

Sixth Doctor, Melanie Bush

Seventh Doctor, Bernice

Fourth Doctor, K9

Fifth Doctor, Vislor Turlough

This was Steven Moffat's first Doctor Who work. He later went on to write for the 2005 revival of the television series, and would become head writer for the series from the 2010 season onwards. Jackie Marshall was an established writer of Doctor Who fan fiction at the time. DeCandido went on to write novels for the Star Trek franchise. Moffat would later use many plot elements from Continuity Errors as the basis for the 2010 Christmas Special, as well as for River Song's backstory in "Let's Kill Hitler".

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Decalog 4: Re-Generations The first Decalog collection after Virgin lost their licence to use Doctor Who TV characters was called Decalog 4: Re-Generations (Virgin Publishing, 15 May 1997), and was again joint edited by Justin Richards and Andy Lane. In order to try to keep the audience of previous Decalogs even though the Doctor could no longer appear in the stories, it was decided to theme the collection around the family history of one of the Doctor's companion Roz Forrester. As this companion had been created by co-editor Andy Lane for the Virgin New Adventures, there were no copyright issues in including her. It contained the following stories:

Alex Stewart

Kate Orman

Gus Smith

Ben Jeapes

Liz Holliday

Peter Anghelides

Richard Salter

Lance Parkin

Paul Leonard

Justin Richards and Andy Lane

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Decalog 5: Wonders The final Decalog collection was called Decalog 5: Wonders (Virgin Publishing, 18 September 1997), and was jointly edited by Paul Leonard and Jim Mortimore. This time, all but one story were free-standing science fiction pieces on the theme of "the Ten Wonders of the Universe", without direct connection to the Doctor Who universe. One story, The Judgement of Solomon by Lawrence Miles, however features former New Adventures companion, Bernice Summerfield. The collection contained the following stories:

Nakula Somana

Stephen Baxter

Dominic Green

Neil Williamson

Mike O'Driscoll

Lawrence Miles

Liz Sourbut

Stephen Marley

Jeanne Cavelos

Ian Watson

Stephen Marley

Following the publication of this book, Virgin produced no further Decalog collections.

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