Doctor Who : City of Death

The Doctor takes Romana for a holiday in Paris - a city which, like a fine wine, has a bouquet all its own. Especially if you visit during one of the vintage years. But the Tardis takes them to 1979, a table-wine year, a year whose vintage is soured by cracks - not in their wine glasses but in the very fabric of time itself.

Soon the Time Lords are embroiled in an audacious alien scheme which encompasses home-made time machines, the theft of the Mona Lisa, the resurrection of the much-feared Jagaroth race, and the beginning (and quite possibly the end) of all life on Earth.

Aided by British private detective Duggan, whose speciality is thumping people, the Doctor and Romana must thwart the machinations of the suave, mysterious Count Scarlioni - all twelve of him - if the human race has any chance of survival. But then, the Doctor's holidays tend to turn out a bit like this.

Featuring the Fourth Doctor as played by Tom Baker, City of Death is a novel by Gareth Roberts based on the 1979 Doctor Who story written by Douglas Adams under the pen-name David Agnew. City of Death is one of the best-loved serials in the show's 50-year history and was watched by over 16 million viewers when first broadcast.

About the Author

Gareth Roberts was born in Chesham, Buckinghamshire in 1968. His scripts for Doctor Who on television include 'The Shakespeare Code' (2007), 'The Unicorn And The Wasp' (2008), 'The Lodger' (2010) and 'Closing Time' (2011), and he has also written many scripts for the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures, as well as scripts for programmes as diverse as Emmerdale and Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased).

He has written nine previous original Doctor Who novels, and lives in West London. Douglas Adamswas born in Cambridge in 1952, and was educated at Brentwood School, Essex and St John's College, Cambridge, where he read English.

As well as writing all the different and conflicting versions of The Hitch Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy he has been responsible for Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul, and, with John Lloyd, The Meaning of Liff and The Deeper Meaning of Liff. In 1978-9, he worked as Script Editor on Doctor Who. He wrote three scripts for the programme - 'The Pirate Planet', 'City of Death' (under the name David Agnew), and 'Shada'. Douglas Adams died in May 2001.