BASIC PLOT
Dying in the Sun is the most eagerly awaited movie of 1947. It's a film that touches your heart, your soul and just might change the world.

DOCTOR
Second.

COMPANIONS
Ben and Polly.

MATERIALISATION CIRCUIT
The TARDIS doesn't appear and isn't mentioned, but presumably it lands somewhere in or near Los Angeles, 1947.

PREPARATORY READING
None.

CONTINUITY REFERENCES
Pg 137 "And evil must be fought." A bit tenuous, but this is reminiscent of the second Doctor's "They must be fought" speech in The Moonbase.

OLD FRIENDS AND OLD ENEMIES
None.

NEW FRIENDS AND NEW ENEMIES
Detective William Fletcher, Robert Chate, Maria Coleman.

The Selyoids.

CONTINUITY COCK-UPS

1. Pg 23 Ben Jackson is not in the merchant navy. Photos from War Machines clearly show him in RN uniform (HMS Teazer).
2. The purloined reel has none of the initial impact (pg 74) but it is 'infected' with the Selyoids (pg 133) who are activated by the microscope light.

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

1. The Selyoids influence may be subconsiously changing Ben's thoughts about himself.
2. There may not be enough Selyoids to have a noticable effect.

FEATURED ALIEN RACES
The Selyoids, tiny creatures of light who can influence a film's effects, or be ingested and share control with a person's mind. They fled from an unnamed planet that suffers an unexplained catastrophe, discovered frozen in Alaska. They were a civilisation of artists, of dreamers, of living stars... they pinned all hope on the scientists. The outcasts who had begun to see life as more than an excuse for creativity. The Selyoids name for themselves is 'The Children'. [With thanks to Julian White for this excellent summary]

FEATURED LOCATIONS
Los Angeles and surroundings, October 1947.

IN SUMMARY - Robert Smith?
It's a little heavy-handed in places and even trying to tackle the second Doctor these days is a brave step which bears about as much success here as all the others, but there's something refreshing about a book that has no continuity references, no mention of the TARDIS and just gets on with telling its own story. For once, the idea of a novel that's basically a movie in prose form is appropriate. Not too shabby.