Colin Brake is an English television writer and script editor best known for his work for the BBC on programs such as Bugs and EastEnders. He has also written spin-offs from the BBC series Doctor Who. He currently lives and works in Leicester. Brake began working on EastEnders in 1985 as a writer and script editor, being partly responsible for the introduction of the soap's first Asian characters Saeed and Naima Jeffery. From there, he went on to work as "script executive" on the popular Saturday night action adventure program Bugs, before moving to Channel 5 in 1997 to be "script associate" on their evening soap Family Affairs. In the early 2000s, Brake wrote episodes of the daytime soaps Doctors and the revival of Crossroads. Away from television, Brake had his first Doctor Who related writing published as part of Virgin Publishing's Decalog short story collection in 1996. He then had his first novel Escape Velocity published by BBC Books in February 2001 as part of their Eighth Doctor Adventures range based on the television series Doctor Who. At the time, Brake was quoted as saying how appropriate it was that he was now writing for Doctor Who, as he was briefly considered as Eric Saward's replacement as script editor on the show - a job that eventually went to Andrew Cartmel instead. Brake followed Escape Velocity with the Past Doctor Adventure The Colony of Lies in July 2003, and then with the audio adventure Three's a Crowd from Big Finish Productions in 2005. His Tenth Doctor Adventure The Price of Paradise was released in September 2006. He has also written an audio for their Bernice Summerfield range, and a short story for their Short Trips range.

Jon de Burgh Miller is an author most associated with his work on a variety of spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who. He is also co-owner of and regular reviewer on the Shiny Shelf website. Miller's first published fiction was the Virgin Publishing Bernice Summerfield novel Twilight of the Gods, which was the final book of the series. He was brought on to the project by co-writer Mark Clapham, a friend from when both attended University College London. Following this, his Past Doctor Adventure Dying in the Sun was published by BBC Books in 2001. He has also written the novella Deus Le Volt for Telos Publishing Ltd.'s Time Hunter series, published in 2006.

Craig Paul Alexander Hinton was a British writer best known for his work on spin-offs from the BBC Television series Doctor Who. He also wrote articles for science fiction magazines and was the Coordinator of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society. He taught mathematics in London, where he was found dead in his home on 3 December 2006. The cause of death was given as a heart attack. Hinton first was known for his articles about science fiction television programmes, including Doctor Who and Star Trek. These brought him to the attention of the editor of Marvel UK's Doctor Who Magazine, who offered him the job of reviewing merchandise for the magazine's Shelf Life section. Whilst writing for the magazine, Hinton had his first novel published. The Crystal Bucephalus was part of Virgin Publishing's Missing Adventures range. The book - which Hinton often jokingly referred to as "The Crystal Bucket" - was originally submitted for Virgin's New Adventures, and 50,000 words of this version were written before the change was made. This novel was followed by a further Missing Adventure, Millennial Rites in 1995, and then by Hinton's only New Adventure in 1996, GodEngine, which features the Ice Warriors as well as oblique appearances by the Daleks. Following Virgin's loss of their licence for Doctor Who merchandise, Hinton began submitting proposals to BBC Books. In 2001 they published his novel The Quantum Archangel as part of their BBC Past Doctor Adventures range. This was followed in 2004 by Synthespians™. This had started life as a proposal for the Eighth Doctor before being adapted to a previous Doctor. An image of the television show Dynasty was used on the cover: the cover's creators had arranged for permission to use the copyrighted image, but had neglected to get permission to alter it. At the last minute a replacement cover had to be produced. It is this that appears on the cover. Hinton's Doctor Who novels often contain references to or explanations of elements of past continuity. He claimed to have been the originator of the term "fanwank", which he applied to his own work. Hinton continued to work with Virgin, writing pseudonymously under the name Paul C. Alexander for their Idol range. He wrote three books in the range: Chains of Deceit, The Final Restraint and Code of Submission. These titles were a major departure from his science fiction. They explored aspects of his sexuality only suggested in his other works. Hinton wrote for Big Finish Productions' Audio Adventures. The play Excelis Decays was produced in 2002 for their Doctor Who range and The Lords of Forever in 2005 for their The Tomorrow People range. Hinton also wrote short stories for their short fiction collections. Outside of the science fiction world Hinton was a noted IT journalist in the UK. He edited magazines in the mid-1990s for VNU Business Publications in London and moved on to ITNetwork.com shortly afterwards.

Simon Bucher-Jones is a British author, poet, artist, and amateur actor, best known for his Doctor Who novels for Virgin and the BBC and as a contributor to the Faction Paradox spin-off series. He is known for a hard SF approach. He has also written Cthulhu Mythos short stories. He also reviewed books for the Fortean Times, and for small press papers. He maintains a blog at http://www.simonbjones.blogspot.com where he is, among other projects, gradually turning all the Star Wars films into Shakespearean plays. He also markets a range of Cthulhu Mythos artwork t-shirts and mugs. He is also a major contributor of 'hidden cities' to the 'blind atlas' meme. His poetry has appeared in the Journal of the British Fantasy Society.

For a while, my Mum has been gently suggesting that I might like to go through the boxes of my stuff that were under her stairs. This seemed important to her; after all, she needed the space. However, for me it felt less urgent. This was stuff that I'd not missed over the last twenty years. It could wait another day. But I went through it. Partly because I wanted to, and partly because she hauled the boxes out and said I wasn't allowed to leave the house until I had been through them. Many of the things that I had once chosen to keep went pretty much straight in to a black plastic bag, never to be seen again. Concorde ascii art printed from a dot matrix printer? It was the future once. Really. Other things were worth keeping though. And in there, I found my first published work. Second prize in a poetry competition. Aged four. Hopefully, I've got a bit better since then.

Keith Andrew Topping is an author, journalist and broadcaster most closely associated with his work relating to the BBC Television series Doctor Who and for writing numerous official and unofficial guide books to a wide variety of television and film series, specifically Buffy the Vampire Slayer.He is also the author of two books of rock music critique. To date, Topping has written over 40 books. One of the leading players in British Doctor Who fandom's fan-fiction movement during the 1980s, Topping's first published fiction was the BBC Books "Past Doctor Adventure" The Devil Goblins from Neptune in 1997. The novel was co-written with his friend and frequent collaborator Martin Day. The pair quickly followed this up with the acclaimed novel The Hollow Men in 1998. Following Day's move into TV scripting, Topping wrote the novels The King of Terror (2000) and Byzantium! (2001) solo. The latter novel is the only BBC Books Past Doctor Adventure to be set entirely within one episode of the television series Doctor Who — 1965's The Romans by Dennis Spooner. Topping also wrote the Telos Doctor Who novella Ghost Ship which was published in 2002 and proved so popular that it was one of only two novellas reissued as a paperback edition in 2003. As well as writing fiction, Topping has also authored numerous programme guides to television series as diverse as The X Files, The Avengers, Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Sweeney and The Professionals. These were all published by Virgin Books, and co-written with Martin Day and Paul Cornell. Cornell, Day and Topping also collaborated on the popular Doctor Who Discontinuity Guide, published by Virgin Books in 1995 and re-issued, in the US, by MonkeyBrain Books in 2004, a lighthearted guide to the mistakes and incongruities of the television series. The trio had first worked together co-writing two editions of The Guinness Book of Classic British Television (1993 and 1996 respectively). Subsequently, Topping wrote The Complete Slayer: An Unofficial and Unauthorised Guide to Every Episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and a number of related texts on this popular series as well as guide books to The West Wing (Inside Bartlet's White House), Angel (Hollywood Vampire), 24 (A Day in the Life) and Stargate SG-1 (Beyond the Gate), amongst others. According to the 2003 book Slayer Slang by Michael Adams (Oxford University Press), Topping was the originator of the word 'vampiry' (adj. "exhibiting features of a vampire") in the January 2000 edition of his book Slayer (pg. 26). In addition, Topping is a regular contributor of articles and reviews to several TV and genre titles including TV Zone, Xposé and Shivers and is a former Contributing Editor of Dreamwatch. He also worked as Project Consultant on Charmed: The Complete DVD Collection. On radio, Topping was the Producer/Presenter of the monthly Book Club (2005-2007) and currently co-presents a daily television review slot, Monday to Friday, on The Simon Logan Show for BBC Newcastle. He has also contributed to the BBC television series' I Love the '70s, Call The Cops and The Perfect Detective and has written for Sounds, the Daily Telegraph and The Sunday Times Culture Supplement and many other magazines and periodicals. Topping writes, and occasionally performs, stand-up comedy and has written radio comedy sketches, an (unproduced) stage play and a TV pilot (with Martin Day) that is, currently, stuck in “Development Hell.” Topping continues to live and work on Tyneside. He achieved a lifetimes ambition in 2005 when his book on The Beatles, Do You Want to Know a Secret was published by Virgin Books.

Sue Cowley is an experienced teacher, writer and presenter, whose specialism is in the area of behaviour management. After qualifying as a primary school teacher, she taught in a number of different secondary schools in London and Bristol. Sue has also taught overseas, at an international school in Portugal. She still works on a voluntary basis with children in local schools, to ensure that she keeps up to date with life 'at the chalkface'. Sue was recently called as an Expert Witness on behaviour, to appear in front of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Education. Sue is the best selling author of twenty books for teachers and parents, including Getting the Buggers to Behave, Teaching Skills for Dummies and How to Survive your First Year in Teaching. Her books have been translated into many different languages, including Slovene, Spanish and Polish. Sue has been a regular contributor to the TES and for Scholastic Magazines. She has written articles for a range of other teacher publications, and also for parenting magazines. She has also produced materials about behaviour management for the Open University / BBC. Sue has recently created a series of Positive Behaviour Management DVDs, in conjunction with educational company Creative Education. A key part of Sue’s work is in providing training in positive behaviour management for schools and colleges around the UK and in Europe. She has given presentations for the National Union of Teachers and the General Teaching Council, for FastTrack and Advanced Skills’ teachers, to students at Cambridge, Bedford and Southampton Universities, to staff at the renowned Wellington College, and also to a number of deputy and head teacher conferences. Sue has also travelled to Europe to give training for teachers working for Service Children's Education, to teachers at international schools in Switzerland, and to teachers and trainee teachers in Slovenia. She combines her writing, training and presenting work with the wonderful job of being a parent. Sue’s primary aim through her work is to give practical, realistic and honest advice to teachers and parents. Her books offer a combination of tips, ideas and strategies, written in an easily accessible and amusing way. Through the training courses that she runs, Sue puts across her ideas about teaching and behaviour management in a fun and engaging format.

Colin Baker (born 8 June 1943, London) is a British actor who is known for playing Paul Merroney in The Brothers from 1974 to 1976 and as the sixth incarnation of the Doctor in the long-running science fiction television series Doctor Who, from 1984 to 1986. Colin Baker was born in London, but moved north to Rochdale with his family early in his life. He was educated at St Bede's College, Manchester and originally studied to become a solicitor. At the age of 23, Baker changed professions and enrolled at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA), where he studied alongside David Suchet.

is a freelance comic writer and author. He is best known for his work on a variety of spin-offs from both Doctor Who and Star Wars, as well as comics and novels for Vikings, Pacific Rim, Sherlock Holmes, and Penguins of Madagascar. Cavan Scott, along with Justina Ireland, Claudia Gray, Daniel Jose Older, and Charles Soule are crafting a new era in the Star Wars publishing world called Star Wars: The High Republic. Cavan's contribution to the era is a comic book series released through Marvel Comics titled Star Wars: The High Republic.

R.J. (Rebecca) Anderson was born in Uganda, raised in Ontario, and has spent much of her life dreaming of other worlds entirely. She is the author of ten traditionally published fantasy/SF books for children and teens, including the UK-bestselling faery romance KNIFE. Her latest published book is TORCH (Book 3 of the Flight and Flame trilogy, which began with SWIFT and NOMAD). * * * REVIEW POLICY * * * I review books that I enjoyed reading and think other readers may enjoy as well, but that doesn't mean I agree with or endorse those books in every respect. If you're concerned about content, please check out other reviewers or sites that provide detailed warnings. I'm no longer giving star ratings as I don't find them nuanced enough, but for books I've already rated, see below: 5 stars: I loved this book so much that I expect to read it again and again—I reserve this rating for beloved classics and books that knocked my socks off. 4 stars: I really enjoyed the book and/or thought it was excellently done—there is a good possibility that I'll re-read it. 3 stars: I enjoyed the book and thought it was well done. Should not be taken as belittling the book or its author—it really does mean "I liked it". 2 stars: I didn't connect to this book as I'd hoped. This category includes books by authors whose other works I truly love, so it's not a dealbreaker. Just found this particular book wasn't for me. 1 star/DNF: Definitely not for me. But I won't be reviewing it because I choose to focus on books I enjoy.

Deborah Andruccioli is the daughter of Albert, an Italian emigrant who married Anna Bonderchuk, whose father emigrated from Eastern Europe. Growing up, she often heard Italian and Russian spoken. Raised outside Detroit, she attended Michigan State University where she graduated with a degree in Interior Design. After college she married and started the next stage of her life moving to Traverse City, Michigan to live on a cherry farm. A few years welcoming her first child. Shortly after having her second child the family moved to Minnesota. A desire to do more with her life one of her early aspirations was to write a book, but year after year she dismissed the idea, feeling she didn’t have the skills to become an author. Finally, pushing those self-doubts aside, she wrote her first novel, which to her surprise has won six awards. Now having completed the sequel to The Serpent’s Disciple, she is working on the third book in the series. She has plans for others with at least one being a non-fiction book about secrets inside the Vatican. Pinnacle Book Achievement Award, Winner, Category Thriller Book Excellence Awards, Awarded Book Excellence Award American Fiction Awards, Winner, Category Religious Thriller Best Book Awards, Finalist, Category Fiction General Great Midwest Book Festival, Honorable Mention, Category Fiction International Book Award, Finalist, Category Religious Fiction