John Leeson reads this exciting novelisation of a classic Doctor Who adventure.
Reluctantly cancelling his well-earned holiday, the Doctor sets off in the TARDIS to trace and re-assemble the six segments of the Key to Time on which the stability of the entire Universe depends. Assisted by the argumentative Romanadvoratrelundar and K9, he lands on the planet Ribos in search of the first segment and finds himself entangled in the machinations of two sinister strangers, Garron and the Graff Vynda Ka. Who are they? Is Garron simply a shady confidence-trickster dealing in interplanetary real estate? Is the Graff Vynda Ka just a power-crazed exile bent on revenge? Or are they both really agents of the Black Guardian, intent upon seizing the precious Key in order to throw the Universe into eternal chaos? Risking his life within the monster-infested catacombs of Ribos, the Doctor has to use all his wit and ingenuity to find out... John Leeson, who provided the voice of K9 in the original 1978 TV serial, reads Ian Marter’s complete and unabridged novelisation, first published by Target Books in 1979.
Ian Marter is best remembered by Doctor Who fans as the actor who played the Fourth Doctor's companion Harry Sullivan. In fact, his first role in Doctor Who came a couple of years earlier when he played the character of Andrews in 'Carnival of Monsters'. Marter worked with his friend Tom Baker on ideas for a possible Doctor Who film, and together they developed a script. Though the film was never made, Marter continued to write and novelised nine Doctor Who adventures for Target books. Ian Marter died in 1986.
Robert Holmes, the original script writer of 'Ark in Space', served with distinction in the army and also in the police before becoming a journalist and television writer. Holmes went on to become one of the Doctor Who's most prolific writers. He took over as script sditor of Doctor Who in 1974 during one of the programme's most successful periods at the start of the Fourth Doctor's era, and established a background and society for the Time Lords that has endured to this day. Robert Holmes wrote for many other series including Doomwatch, Spy Trap, Dixon of Dock Green, Blake's 7and many others. Holmes died in 1986, while working on the final episodes of the Doctor Whostory The Trial of a Time Lord.
