Faction Paradox is a franchise tangentially connected to Doctor Who, featuring godlike beings who control time known as the Great Houses, a time-traveling cult known as Faction Paradox, and a cosmic war fought across the very fabric of space-time. The stories told within this setting vary wildly, with sometimes the only shared traits being the fact of their taking place within this massive, cosmic setting filled with wild and vibrant worldbuilding ideas.
The franchise tends to be thought of in the Doctor Who fandom as some obscure, super-complex, hard-to-get-into spinoff of Doctor Who. This is true in some ways – however, it’s a lot more approachable than many make it out to be! Many installments of the franchise are quite standalone – everything ties into everything else, yes, but that doesn’t mean there’s prerequisites. Hell, you barely have to know Doctor Who to enjoy it! Rather, it just means that the more of the franchise you’ve consumed, the more context and perspective you get on each individual installment, which makes reread/relisten value very high.
Here’s my own breakdown of the various corners of the franchise, in an attempt to make it as approachable and understandable as possible.
Introductory Media
Faction Paradox lets you start at pretty much any point, but certain books serve as a particularly smooth or helpful inroads to the series.
There’s the relevant story arc in the Eighth Doctor Adventures books, of course; these serve as an inroads if you’d prefer to have something familiar to start you off.
Eighth Doctor Adventures guide
These are all the books relevant to the Faction Paradox / War in Heaven arc of the Eighth Doctor book series. Personally I’ve only read Alien Bodies and Interference, so if I’ve got anything wrong here please let me know.
- Alien Bodies - the introduction of Faction Paradox, written by Lawrence Miles himself!
- Unnatural History
- Interference (Book One, Book Two) - another one written by Miles, feat. lots of lore about the Remote.
- The Taking of Planet 5
- The Shadows of Avalon
- The Ancestor Cell - Miles notably hated this book and the way it depicted Faction Paradox, so take its relevance to the franchise with a mountain of salt.
- The Adventuress of Henrietta Street - not relevant to the Faction per se, but written by Miles, and introduces Sabbath Dei who appears in the audios and comics.
As for content that’s part of the franchise proper, there’s a couple good inroads. To start off I would recommend these two books:
- Dead Romance - originally published as a Bernice Summerfield VNA without Bernice Summerfield, it was later republished as a Faction Paradox novel with some minor edits to help it better fit into this franchise. This is the book I recommend most people start off the franchise with; it introduces you to the universe through a distinctly down-to-earth human perspective.
- The Book of the War - basically the Faction Paradox bible. It’s an encyclopedia/novel that details all sorts of things in the universe, allowing readers to work their own way through the lore and explore the wild world of Paradox. It’s a labyrinth of fascinating stories, lore, and mysteries, and a great way to familiarize yourself with the basic concepts and æsthetic of the franchise. This is the backbone of the series, with everything from here on out being built on this baseline. Unfortunately it’s out-of-print and borderline impossible to get your hands on a copy, but you know how it is with the internet.
Audio Dramas
Faction Paradox has two seasons’ worth of audio dramas, with different studios and actors but the same main cast of characters throughout. The audio series focuses on two Cousins of Faction Paradox who are suddenly thrust into a crucial position in the Faction, and who must fight to keep Faction Paradox alive while encountering threats from all sides. Also they’re kinda gay :3
Notably, the two main characters in these audios are Cousin Justine from Alien Bodies, and Christine Summerfield from Dead Romance (here known as Cousin Eliza). But once again, you don’t need to know their backgrounds to enjoy them here. The second season also features Gabriel Woolf returning to the role of Sutekh!
Audio drama guide
Season 1: The Faction Paradox Protocols
(produced by BBV)
- The Eleven Day Empire / The Shadow Play
- Sabbath Dei / In the Year of the Cat
- Movers / A Labyrinth of Histories
Season 2: The True History of Faction Paradox
(produced by Magic Bullet Productions)
Comics
There was a short-lived comic series set after the War in Heaven. It only lasted two issues out of a planned twenty-something, so the storyline never got wrapped up, but it’s an interesting curiosity.
Comic guide
Novels
Faction Paradox has a long-running series of novels, each of which tell their own standalone story set in the same universe. Almost every novel has a different author, and the series has been shunted around to different publishers over the years, meaning each book offers something different. Once again, there is no set reading order here!
Novel guide
- This Town Will Never Let Us Go - over six hours one night in a small town, a young adult attempts to awaken a horror beneath the town’s surface, an ambulance crewman makes nervous preparations for something drastic, and a pop star becomes all too aware of her own reflection. By the end of the night, humanity’s future may very well be changed forever.
- Of the City of the Saved - The City of the Saved is essentially Heaven, a haven for all of humanity at the end of the universe where nobody can so much as get hurt… so what does it mean when a City Councillor turns up murdered in his own bedroom?
- Warlords of Utopia - An aristocrat born into a world where Ancient Rome just kept growing in prosperity, Marcus Americanius Scriptor was the man who discovered parallel universes, championing the war between the universes where the Nazis won WWII and the universes where Rome never fell. This tome is a rip-roaring memoir of his interdimensional exploits.
- Warring States - Cousin Octavia, lover-to-enemy of Princess Anastasia of Russia as detailed in the Book of the War, travels to Boxer Rebellion–era China in an attempt to find the secret of immortality – but she’s not the only one in pursuit of it.
- Erasing Sherlock - Gillian Petra has traveled back in time to Victorian London to complete her master’s thesis on the life of young Sherlock Holmes. However, as she’ll soon discover, Sherlock – and the intrigue surrounding both of them – is a lot more than she’s bargained for.
- Newtons Sleep - Three denizens of 17th-century England get wrapped up in a war across the heavens, one more complex than they could ever have imagined. As Nate Silver, Mistress Piper, and Aphra Behn all make contact with the celestial in distinct ways, each of them finds themself chasing after the War in an attempt to find their life’s purpose.
- Against Nature - I honestly can’t come up with a good brief summary for this one – it’s very complex and symbolic, if also very good. It’s kind of a stealth sequel to Doctor Who’s “The Aztecs” so that’s neat.
- The Brakespeare Voyage - Robert Scarratt leads a galaxy-sized timeship on a mission to capture one of the beasts who live in the void between universes. For reasons he’ll slowly come to understand, however, there’s parties working against him on all sides, including the very denizens of the ship he’s supposed to be captaining…
- Head of State - As the next US election cycle is getting into gear, journalist Rachel Edwards is sent to report on its events, and comes to realize there may be a conspiracy afoot – or at least a serial killer stalking the campaign, which is never fun. Meanwhile, a couple of centuries prior, Richard Burton explores Arabia and the course of his life is changed indelibly.
(I haven’t read any of the novels following Head of State so I can’t provide synopses! I’m sure they’re well worth it, though.) - Weapons Grade Snake Oil
- Spinning Jenny
- Hyponormalisation: A Faction Hollywood Production
- Inward Collapse
Anthologies
The most recent holder of the Faction Paradox license, Obverse Books, has come out with a series of anthologies based on it, many of which have interconnecting themes and occasionally even story arcs.
Anthology guide
- A Romance in Twelve Parts
- Burning with Optimism’s Flames
- Liberating Earth - an anthology with an all-female set of writers
- The Book of the Enemy
- The Book of the Peace
- The Boulevard - an open-submission anthology split into two volumes
The City of the Saved
The City of the Saved was introduced in – where else? – the Faction Paradox novel Of the City of the Saved: it’s a city at the end of the universe where every human who ever lived exists. This is a premise packed with potential, and Obverse has accordingly come out with a whole series of anthologies set in the City!
I’ve already written up a whole guide for this corner of the franchise here, but the gist is that you can read Of the City of the Saved, followed by “A Hundred Words from a Civil War” from the anthology A Romance in Twelve Parts, and you’ll pretty much be good to go for the anthology series.
City of the Saved guide
- Tales of the City
- More Tales of the City
- Tales of the Great Detectives - feat. at least seven or eight different variations of Sherlock Holmes
- Furthest Tales of the City
- Tales of the Civil War
- Stranger Tales of the City
And that’s that! I hope this helps people find this franchise more approachable Frankly, between early drafts of books, Arcbeatle spinoffs, and books which started life as Faction novels before being published independently, there’s even more than this to explore if you’re really invested… but I’m doing my best not to be overwhelming, so perhaps those kinds of things are best saved for a separate post. For now, please enjoy this guide and the wonderful, strange world of Paradox!