Doctor Who: Cry of the Vultriss

The premise of this is, perhaps, not an especially unusual one - the TARDIS crashlands on an alien planet and the crew become involved with the local politics. It runs here the problem identified by Russell Davies that “nobody cares about the planet Zog”. Yet, in this case, Jones produces something that's rather better than we might expect.

Obviously, an advantage of this being on audio is that it can do things you couldn't on TV. For a start, all of the characters other than the regulars are visibly alien, and not even especially humanoid. Prosthetics and effects aside, that might make it difficult to tell them apart, which is less of an issue when you're identifying them by their voices anyway - and the sensible decision is taken here not to give most of them “alien” voices, making it easier for the listener to empathise with them. The presence of plenty of alien animals (such as giant dodos) and dramatic architecture and scenery might also be harder to convey if you had to do it visually.

It's also really good to see Constance and Flip back as companions; they work really well together and both get plenty to do here. Six, oddly, seems to work better when combined with companions he never had on screen...

But the main strength is in the story, which weaves in a number of apparently disparate elements to make the whole. There are plenty of twists along the way, with it taking some time for it become apparent who the real villains are and what all this has to do with the TARDIS crashing in the first place. The first cliffhanger is a little spoiled by the dramatic revelation being shown on the cover, but once it's out of the way it all adds to the complexity of the plot. Add to that some strong worldbuilding and you've got an illustration of how a good writer can overcome the limitations of the Planet Zog and craft something that, while not a true classic, is nonetheless better than it has any right to be.