BASIC PLOT
The Doctor investigates a village that has been infested with giant insects.

DOCTOR
Twelfth.

COMPANIONS
Clara Oswald.

MATERIALISATION CIRCUIT
Pg 17 In a field, Ringstone, 2014.

Pgs 134-135 Ringstone, March 1944.

Pg 174 In the car park of the science park, Ringstone, 2014.

PREPARATORY READING
None.

CONTINUITY REFERENCES
Pg 20 "She wondered if Danny Pink would like the countryside." Into the Dalek et al.

Pg 21"The Doctor had risen to his feet and was using the sonic screwdriver to scan the air above his head." Fury From the Deep et al.

"Checking to see whether there's a trapped spacecraft hovering in the hyperspatial dimension above the circle or not." The Stones of Blood.

Pg 22 "Since his regeneration, the Doctor had become decidedly prickly in his dealings with anything remotely military. That in itself might not have been a problem if it wasn't for the fact that her new boyfriend - her potential new boyfriend - was an ex-soldier." Into the Dalek.

Pg 64 "Sometimes he didn't think the people at UNIT lived in the real world." The Invasion et al.

Pg 97 "'Who taught you how to do that?' 'A young lady called Jenny Flint.'" A Good Man Goes to War et al.

Pg 108 "'Judson?' 'Yes, before he got whisked off to work on the ULTIMA project.'" The Curse of Fenric. But see Continuity Cock-ups.

Pg 121 "'Can you ride a motorbike?' he asked, holding up a set of keys. The Doctor grasped them gratefully 'Yes!' His face immediately fell. 'No! I think so. Maybe.' He glared angrily at Robin, as if this confusion was somehow his fault. 'I don't know! I haven't had a proper chance to find out what this body can do yet.'" The Bells of Saint John.

Pg 130 "Charlie cut the engine. The Doctor was out of the sidecar in a flash, closing the door and hurryoing over to the control console. 'Clara does that with a lot more style and a lot less noise.'" The Day of the Doctor.

Pgs 219-220 "You will carry on with your allotted tasks, you will ignore me and anything I do. Indicate your understanding.' As one, the shambling technicians nodded." Pyramids of Mars.

Pg 245 "Department C-19 are in charge." Time-Flight.

Pg 246 "He had moved here as soon as the soldiers had started arriving, muttering something about 'never forgiving Winston Churchill for offering that reward'." Victory of the Daleks.

OLD FRIENDS AND OLD ENEMIES
None.

NEW FRIENDS AND NEW ENEMIES
Robin Sandfod, Charlie Bevan, Angela Drabble, Kevin Alperton, Simon George, Emily Nichols, Gabby. Colonel Paddy Dickinson, Captain Wilson, Private Arnopp, Private Hawkins, Corporal Palmer (it's unclear if he's related to the Corporal Palmer from the Pertwee era).

Josef Razowski appears in the epilogue but doesn't interact with anyone else in the book.

CONTINUITY COCK-UPS

1. Pg 108 "'Judson?' 'Yes, before he got whisked off to work on the ULTIMA project.'" Shouldn't the ULTIMA project be top secret? Why would a private even know about it? And wouldn't he know better than to casually chat about it, even all these years later?
2. Pg 111 "He was working in counter-intelligence at the time, and suggested that our experiments were having more success that the German's because they were conducted in proximity to ley lines." Huh? Not only should the "that" be "than", but the apostrophe suggests only one German was working on this highly important Nazi project.
3. Pg 249 "As he reached forward, fumbling with the controls to try and reduce the volume, something hit the windscreen of the van with a load 'thump'." Say what?

PLUGGING THE HOLES [Fan-wank theorizing of how to fix continuity cock-ups]

1. The ULTIMA project, although an embarrassing failure, was declassified and publicised to former soldiers of all ranks sometime in the 1970s. Or was it the 1980s?
2. Only one German was working on this highly important Nazi project.
3. The load that the truck was carrying went 'thump'.

FEATURED ALIEN RACES
Pg 24 A giant mosquito.

Pg 31 A giant crane fly.

Pg 51 A giant spider.

Pg 58 A giant beetle.

Pg 79 Giant ants.

Pg 102 A variety of giant hybrid insects.

Pg 153 A giant scorpion.

Pg 155 Wyrresters, mutant arachnids that look like scorpions with razor-sharp claws.

FEATURED LOCATIONS
Pg 8 Ringstone, UK. It's 2014 (Page142).

Pg 135 Ringstone, March 1944.

Pg 196 The planet Typholchaktas, 2014.

IN SUMMARY - Robert Smith?
This starts off like stock cliche Doctor Who novel #426. Giant insects are taking over a village, which is naturally cut off from the outside. And, to be fair, it's reasonably exciting, even though no explanation whatsoever is given for why the insects are so large (they explicitly aren't Wyrresters; did Clearfield grow them?). But then the TARDIS travels to 1944, which is a brilliant change of pace, and the book really picks up. After Clara gets mindswapped, it might have been fun to have the alien inhabiting her body actually do anything whatsoever in this role, but the Doctor figures it out within minutes, which does at least avoid the cliche. The Doctor is reasonably gruff, while Clara works just fine as a generic companion, helped by giving her a companion of her own for the duration. And the giant insects are appropriately creepy. All up, this could have been a lot worse.