Martin Day

Biography

Martin Day is Lecturer in Scriptwriting & Screenwriting and a member of both the Creative Writing team in the School of Humanities (Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences) and the Film Production team in the Faculty of Education and the Arts. He has been a freelance author and scriptwriter for over 35 years.

After gaining a degree in English Literature and Film Studies in 1989 at the Polytechnic of North London, Martin wrote record reviews for the NME and worked on The Guinness Book of Records. In the early 2010s he was a script development executive for a Hollywood director/producer and in 2018 he graduated with an MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University. He also lectured at Bath Spa for three years and for four years was a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of Bristol.

He is the author or co-author of eight novels, a number of audiobooks and audio plays, and eight non-fiction books, mostly concerning television in general and Doctor Who in particular. In his parallel career as a scriptwriter, Martin has written for the Channel 5 show Family Affairs and for RTÉ’s Fair City and was lead writer on CBBC’s Crisis Control. For nine years he was a regular contributor to BBC1’s Doctors. Martin has also written comic strips, short stories, journalism and poetry. In more recent times, he has been working on a series of spy thriller books and, encouraged by his late mentor Fay Weldon, a literary fiction novel.

Publications

Scripts
The Time Tunnel: Big Finish CD – ‘The World, the Flesh and the Devil’ (60 minutes, 2025)
Doctor Who: The Companion Chronicles: Big Finish CD – ‘The Phantom Piper’ (2 x 30-minute episodes, April 2022)
Fair City: RTÉ – two 30-minute episodes (July – October 2015)
Doctors: BBC1 – 13 30-minute episodes (January 2005 – November 2013)
Bernice Summerfield: Missing Persons: Big Finish CD – ‘The Revenant’s Carnival’ (60 minutes, December 2013)
Crisis Control: CBBC – lead writer on 13 x 30-minute episodes (January – March 2009)
Doctor Who: Big Finish CD – ‘No Man’s Land’ (4 x 35-minute episodes, November 2006)
Family Affairs: Channel 5 – nine 30-minute episodes (February 2000 – February 2001)

Novels and audiobooks
Doctor Who: The Sleeping Blood (audiobook, read by Carole Ann Ford), Big Finish, 2015
The Sarah Jane Adventures: Children of Steel (audiobook, read by Daniel Anthony), AudioGO, 2011
Doctor Who: The Jade Pyramid (audiobook, read by Matt Smith), AudioGO, 2011
Merlin: Lancelot and Guinevere (novelisation), Random House, 2010
Doctor Who: Wooden Heart, BBC Books, 2007 (also abridged audiobook, read by Adjoa Andoh)
Doctor Who: The Sleep of Reason, BBC Books, 2004
Doctor Who: Bunker Soldiers, BBC Books, 2001
Another Girl, Another Planet, with Steve Bowkett, Virgin Publishing, 1998
Doctor Who: The Hollow Men, with Keith Topping, BBC Books, 1998
Doctor Who: Devil Goblins from Neptune, with Keith Topping, BBC Books, 1997
Doctor Who: The Menagerie, Virgin Publishing, 1995

Non-fiction books
Shut It! (an episode guide to The Sweeney and The Professionals), with Keith Topping, Virgin Publishing, 1999
The Avengers Dossier, with Paul Cornell and Keith Topping, Virgin Publishing, 1998 (Gollancz eBook, 2013)
X-Treme Possibilities (an episode guide to The X-Files), with Paul Cornell and Keith Topping, Virgin Publishing, 1997 (completely revised 2nd edition, 1998; Gollancz eBook, 2013)
The New Trek Programme Guide, with Paul Cornell and Keith Topping, Virgin Publishing, 1995 (reprinted by VGS, Germany, 1996; Gollancz eBook, 2013)
The Doctor Who Discontinuity Guide, with Paul Cornell and Keith Topping, Virgin, 1995 (reprinted by MonkeyBrain Inc., USA, 2004; Gollancz eBook, 2013)
Classic British TV, with Paul Cornell and Keith Topping, Guinness Publishing, 1993 (completely revised 2nd edition, 1996; telefantasy chapters reprinted as Gollancz eBook, 2015)

Short stories and poems
‘The Hairstyle of the Devil’, short story, read by Arthur Darvill, in Thirteen, Spoken World Audio, 2013
‘It’s a Lovely Day Tomorrow’, short story, in Doctor Who: A Christmas Treasury, Big Finish, 2004
‘The Garden of Whispers’, short story, in Life During Wartime, Big Finish, 2003
‘The White Car in Europe’, poem, in Dreams from the Strangers’ Café, 1996

Comic strips
‘The Alice in Wonderland Circuit’, in Doctor Who Adventures 83, BBC Magazines, 2008
‘By Order of the Bonemenders’, in Doctor Who Adventures 80-82, 2007
‘Attack of the Mange Mites!’, in Doctor Who Adventures 78 & 79
‘The Old Kings of Skarab’, in Doctor Who Adventures 52 & 53
‘The Halls of Sacrifice’, in Doctor Who Adventures 50 & 51
‘The Last Soldier’, in Doctor Who Adventures 34 & 35
‘The Green, the Bad and the Ugly’, in Doctor Who Adventures 30 & 31

Journalism
Over fifty articles and reviews for UK Writer, ScriptWriter, Times Educational Supplement, Cult TV, DreamWatch, Hammer Horror, Doctor Who Magazine, NME, etc., 1989 to date
Essays in Brewer’s Cinema (edited by Jonathan Law), Cassell, 1995