That’s what I’ve heard.
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I love that Chapter 10 is a 9 second track.
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Having read none of the BF books I wouldn’t say any are absolutely essential as long as you know what happens and can live without the specifics.
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On the flip side, having listened to the audiobook versions and the second series of audio dramas, I’d say at this point the novels are more essential to Benny’s arc than the audio dramas. The Doomsday Manuscript introduces us to the Fifth Axis, The Squire’s Crystal introduces Avril Fenman and gives us the origin of Benny’s pregnancy, The Infernal Nexus gives us the return of Jason Kane, and the Glass Prison sees the birth of Peter Guy Summerfield as well as a return of the Fifth Axis. Meanwhile, none of audio dramas of Series 2 really connect to the arc at all apart from a couple mentions of Benny’s pregnancy in Skymines. I’d dare say that if we didn’t know they were Series 2, they could really just be inconsequential adventures set anywhere in Benny’s timeline. Plus, now that they’re available as audiobook downloads, there’s no reason (apart from the cost) to not include them in a Benny marathon. And for me, since this is my first time going through the actual Bernice Summerfield series, it seems weird to me not to include them where I can. Now, if only I could do the same for the short story collections.
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Nothing much to offer here, but it sure warms my heart to see all this discussion.
For my part, once Benny moved to Big Finish…hmm, I read Dead Men Diaries…and then later I started with the audios from “season” 2. Had to fill in the gaps as to what had happened in the books as best I could.
Many years later I started getting the books, and not in any particular order, and by then I didn’t remember much from the audios, and had to puzzle out what I could about the bigger picture.
And now I’m listening to the audios again, again doing my best to fill in the gaps.
Thing is, Benny is such a fun character, I find I can pick up just about any story and it enjoy it just for her presence. And I say that with the full confidence of someone who still has no clear sense of the character’s timeline!
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According to the timelines on Tardis Wiki, the Twelfth Doctor novel Big Bang Generation takes place between the Missing Persons boxset and the New Adventures of Bernice Summerfield series.
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Started The Greatest Shop in the Galaxy this afternoon. Despite the timey-wimey detector timeline on tardis.wiki stating that this story occurs before The Glass Prison, the simple comment from Adrian Wall’s credit chip about leaving him with the baby indicates otherwise. Only a short ways in, but really enjoying this one. The little snippet of WKRP in New Cincinnati was a great touch. And they seem to have disposed of the “Adventure is my Name” theme surprisingly quickly.
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For those looking to get into the Bernice Summerfield audios, the new website has Season Bundles.
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So I listened to The Mirror Effect today, the fourth and final audio of Series 3. And this is where things get interesting. I should prefice this by saying that I only really known Brax from Gallifrey. This was definitely an interesting story and the best of the season. The mirror and the creature within are interesting, and the start of the Dark Brax and his manipulations is especially interesting. I’m starting to see Brax as a sort of Gray Jedi. His powers of hypnosis are strong enough to rival the Master, and even in Gallifrey, you never quite know what his ulitimate goals are. Even in this story, it’s never really stated what he truly wanted with the mirror, whether it was mere curiosity, or some darker purpose.
This season has been the best so far of the two original seasons that I’ve listened to (having skipped Series 1 which was all novel adaptations). Series 2 was just kind of average, nothing terrible but nothing interesting either. The Novels was where the arcs were for that season. Series 3 was better. Greatest Shop was a lot of fun. Green-eyed Monsters was enjoyable if nothing overly exciting. Plague Herds was a fitting end to the Excelis series and an enjoyable outing with Benny and Iris. Dance of the Dead brought in the Ice Warriors and an interesting gimmick, but was rather boring and slow at the start. And then Mirror Effect pushes the arc forward.
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I just listened to The Mirror Effect again the other day and I completely agree, it’s a deliciously dark story. And hearing Brax go a bit darker is lots of fun - I can’t 100% remember where/how/if this lines up with the Gallifrey timeline but I do believe it’s strongly suggested that having Pandora in his head from the Gallifrey audios is part of what makes him more wont to do dark things in the Benny audios. Please don’t take my word as fact for that though, I’m pulling it out of a dark recess of my mind 
I also really love Greatest Shop and Plague Herds, I think this is definitely one of my favourite sections of the Benny audios.
I just dug out Life During Warfare because Death and the Daleks is my next one and I fancied reading the short stories again first
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Mirror Effect is such a fascinating story! And yes, it really is just the start of Brax’s manipulations. His arc is truly incredible.
I pretty much completely agree on your season 3 thoughts, too! My favourite Benny stories are the ones with strong arc elements that feature the returning cast of the Collection. They become more and more prominent as time goes on, and you really grow attached to the characters, or at least I did!
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I mean Greatest Shop didn’t really have any arc threads or Collection regulars, but it sure was a lot of fun.
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I’ve just uploaded my reviews of the dreaded second series… three of the four stories featured sound design and music from the Richards-Baker duo… which was a painful listen!
#2.01. The Secret of Cassandra
#2.02. The Stone’s Lament
#2.03. The Extinction Event
#2.04. The Skymines of Karthos
If you enjoy reading these reviews, do feel free to drop them a like - I’m working towards those illustrious reviewer badges.
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Nice reviews.
Personally, I didn’t like Skymines of Karthos, but I did like Secret of Cassandra. The other 2 I do agree with.
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Good news, everyone!
I’ve uploaded three more Bernice Summerfield reviews.
I included the ‘Excelis’ episode here, because it is noted to take place directly before ‘Dance of the Dead’.
#3.01. The Greatest Shop in the Galaxy
#3.02. The Green-Eyed Monsters
#004. The Plague Herds of Excelis
If you enjoy reading these reviews, do feel free to drop them a like - I’m working towards those illustrious reviewer badges.
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Yet more good news, everyone!
I’ve uploaded more Bernice Summerfield reviews - including the rest of Series Three and most of the fourth series.
#3.03. Dance of the Dead
#3.04. The Mirror Effect
#4.01. The Bellotron Incident
#4.02. The Draconian Rage
#4.03. The Poison Seas
If you enjoy reading these reviews, do feel free to drop them a like - I’m working towards those illustrious reviewer badges.
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Agree on pretty much everythng you said in these - The Draconian Rage is genuinely sickening and brilliant and horrible, and I only don’t like it because it makes me feel so viscerally. So I do like it because it’s brilliant. But I don’t because it’s horrible. The rest of them, yeah, they’re okay. Disagree about The Mirror Effect though, I like that one a lot. I enjoy that it’s the start of Brax’s long game
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I do actually really like ‘The Mirror Effect’ - that doesn’t exactly come across the best in my review, but I think what stopped it getting higher than a 7/10 for me was that it tried to do so much in so little time.
Would’ve hugely benefitted from another CD.
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That’s fair and I can’t disagree with that - however I’m not sure that even longer in the strange mirror place would have been particularly enjoyable to listen to. Ah well, I suppose we have what we have with it, and it does set up a lot of good stuff
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Exceptional news, everyone!
I’ve now updated all my old Bernice Summerfield reviews - this includes everything from the first six series.
They’re now all available to read.
This also means I will be able to start reviewing Series Seven (my favourite) in the near future.
#4.04. Death and the Daleks
#5.01. The Grel Escape
#5.02. The Bone of Contention
#5.03. The Relics of Jegg-sau
#5.04. The Masquerade of Death
#6.01. The Heart’s Desire
#6.02. The Kingdom of the Blind
#6.03. The Lost Museum
#6.04. The Goddess Quandary
#6.05. The Crystal of Cantus
If you enjoy reading these reviews, do feel free to drop them a like - I’m working towards those illustrious reviewer badges.
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