Showing results by publisher "BBC Audio" in Science Fiction & Fantasy

Originally published in 1943, The Glass Bead Game was Herman Hesse’s last novel. It was hailed as his magnum opus, and was instrumental in securing him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946. Set in a utopian future society, it explores themes of knowledge, individualism, creativity and spirituality, and has inspired contemporary thinkers from authors to game designers. Narrated by Derek Jacobi, this two-part radio drama tells the story of Joseph Knecht (Tom Ferguson), plucked from obscurity as a young orphan, admitted to the finest elite school and groomed for greatness.

This volume features thirty readings by some of the best-loved stars of Doctor Who including Peter Purves (Steven), Anneke Wills (Polly), Geoffrey Beevers (the Master), Matthew Waterhouse (Adric), Nicola Bryant (Peri), Louise Jameson (Leela), Frazer Hines (Jamie), John Leeson (K-9), Terry Molloy (Davros) and Dan Starkey (Strax) plus the multi-talented Jon Culshaw.

The brand new BBC Radio 4 full-cast series based on And Another Thing… the sixth book in the famous Hitchhiker’s Guide 'trilogy'. Forty years on from the first ever radio series of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Arthur Dent and friends return in six brand new episodes, in which they are thrown back into the Whole General Mish Mash in a rattling adventure involving Viking Gods and Irish Confidence Tricksters, with our first glimpse of Eccentrica Gallumbits and a brief but memorable moment with The Ravenous Bugblatter Beast Of Traal.

An alternative history of the US space programme, dramatised by Dirk Maggs. What if John F. Kennedy survived the assassination attempt and developed the space programme? President Nixon, with the help of former president JFK, has just green-lit NASA’s first manned expedition to Mars. Aboard the expedition is Natalie York, a geologist who risks everything she loves for the chance to go to space; Phil Stone, former X-15 test pilot; and Ralph Gershon, a Vietnam War hero intent on being the first African American to reach another planet.

In search of a segment of the Key of Time, the Doctor, Romana, and K9 arrive on the planet Tara, whose population has long mastered the art of android engineering. Romana is apprehended by the ambitious Count Grendel, who seeks to overthrow the king in waiting, and the Doctor is coerced into helping those loyal to the crown. With Reynart locked away in Grendel's dungeons, the Doctor must perfect an android that can be crowned in his place. Yet Reynart is not the only one of Grendel's prisoners to have a double: the captive Princess Strella is Romana's doppelganger.

While travelling on the London Underground one afternoon, Alice meets the gaze of a man standing on the platform of a mysterious 'ghost station'. As her train hurtles into a tunnel, he's gone. She's convinced that the man was her brother Alan who has been missing presumed dead for the past five years. This fleeting encounter is the beginning of Alice's increasingly bizarre, desperate and labyrinthine search for her missing brother, a journey that leads her back through time into London's past. 

The Doctor has a unique bond with their TARDIS. They’ve always loved the ‘old girl’ for the way she’s gone looking for trouble anywhere in the universe. The Doctor says they stole the TARDIS from Gallifrey. The TARDIS disagrees…she stole them. It hasn’t always taken the Doctor where they want to go, but it’s made sure to take them where they needed to be.

An unabridged reading of this original novel featuring the Seventh Doctor, as played on TV by Sylvester McCoy, and Ace in an encounter with the Cybermen. The Blitz is at its height. As the Luftwaffe bomb London, Cody McBridge, expat American private eye, sees a sinister silver sphere crash-land. He glimpses something emerging from within.

The military dismiss his account of events - the sphere must be a new German secret weapon that has malfunctioned. What else could it be?

A brand new stand-alone adventure for the 10th Doctor, which also forms part of the Time Lord Victorious story arc, read by Jacob Dudman. The Doctor travels with Brian, the Ood assassin, to the planet Magnox, one of the greatest receptacles of knowledge the universe will ever know. The Doctor needs to ask a vital question, but the answer is grade-one classified! In order to gain an audience with the Minds of Magnox themselves he must take a dangerous test. Is he smart enough to get through?

It's ten years since Harry Sullivan left UNIT and gave up his travels in the TARDIS with the Doctor and Sarah Jane. Since then he has been engaged in top secret work, developing antidotes to nerve toxins. But when he is transferred to Yarra in the Hebrides to work on weapons research, he has severe misgivings. For one thing, it goes against much of what he believes in. For another, someone is out to kill Harry Sullivan.

How long is 73 Yards? Haunted by a sinister presence, Ruby must cope with losing the Doctor and the life she once knew. With her new life without her best friend becoming bleaker by the day, something terrifying is unleashed, and it’s up to Ruby to stop it.

Materialising to avoid a head-on collision in space, the TARDIS becomes trapped on board an eerily deserted alien spacecraft. The Doctor transmats to Earth to solve the problem - yet when the TARDIS follows on, Tegan and Nyssa find that they have arrived five years too early. While the Doctor enjoys a reunion with Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart in 1983, in 1977 his companions are confronted by a hideously deformed figure who claims to be the Doctor. Unsure whether or not this is their friend, Tegan and Nyssa must choose whether to answer his desperate pleas for help. 

The first human colony on Mars is destined for destruction in a nuclear explosion. This tragedy is a fixed point in history. The laws of time dictate that it cannot - must never - be changed. But as the Doctor's darkest hour comes calling, he resolves to break the rules as he never has before.

For two decades, from the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s, every fan of the Doctor hoped to find The Doctor Who Annual in their Christmas stocking. Larger than life and twice as colourful, the stories within were exuberant - and often charmingly naive - in their take on 'the children's own programme which adults adore'. Here, for the first time on audio, Peter Purves (Steven), Anneke Wills (Polly), Geoffrey Beevers (the Master), Matthew Waterhouse (Adric) and Nicola Bryant (Peri) read a selection of these tales.

April, 1242: the Doctor and Ruby answer a distress call sent from medieval Russia. The signal’s sender? Ranavere, an alien girl forced to take part in a barbaric conflict between the armies of Estonia and Novgorod on the frozen surface of Lake Peipus. Ranavere wants to escape, but her distress call has summoned her warmongering sisters, intent on preserving family tradition whatever the cost.

An unabridged reading of this classic novelisation, based on a BBC TV adventure featuring the Third Doctor. A mysterious power loss strands the TARDIS on Exxilon, a sinister fog-shrouded alien planet. The Doctor meets the survivors of a beleaguered expedition from Earth, while Sarah finds a mysterious super-city and becomes a captive of the savage Exxilons. Worst of all, the Doctor's greatest enemies, the Daleks, arrive on a secret mission of their own.

The TARDIS arrives in Gaul in AD 451, on the eve of battle between the forces of Attila the Hun and those of the crumbling Roman Empire. But the Doctor soon finds that both sides are being helped by sinister supernatural creatures. While Graham makes allies in the Roman camp and Ryan is pursued by the enigmatic Legion of Smoke, the Doctor and Yasmin are pressed into service as Attila’s personal sorcerers. But the Doctor knows there is science behind the combat magicks - and that the true war will pit all humanity against a ruthless alien threat.

Best known as the author of the popular space serial Earthsearch, James Follett wrote over 50 radio dramas, 25 novels and a number of TV scripts. This gripping 3-book series, adapted and abridged for BBC Radio and read by Nigel Anthony, explores what takes place when a West Sussex village becomes cut off from the outside world by an alien force field after a UFO crash-lands.

In present day England, a group of scientists are intent on analysing an impossibly ancient skull. But when the ultra-modern technology of their Time Scanner combines with the ancient evil of Fetch Wood, it brings to life a terror that has lain hidden for twelve million years. Arriving in the TARDIS, the Doctor and Leela must fight to destroy the Fendahl, a recreated menace that threatens to devour all life in the galaxy. Louise Jameson, who played Leela in the BBC TV series, reads this classic novelisation of Chris Boucher's 1977 serial. 

Launched into space 350 years ago, a meteor is returning to Earth. Inside it waits Nemesis, a silver statue made of the living metal validium, the most dangerous substance in the Universe. Three factions await the statue: the neo-Nazi de Flores and his stormtroopers; Lady Peinforte, who saw Nemesis exiled in 1638, and the advance part of a Cyberman invasion force. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Ace are in Windsor.