Genius Loci
Main character(s):	Bernice Summerfield
Main enemy:	Spiders
Main setting:	Jaiwan, 2562
Key crew
Publisher:	Big Finish Productions
Writer:	Ben Aaronovitch
Cover by:	Adrian Salmon
Release details
Release number:	8
Release date:	June 2006
Format:	Hardback Book, 208 Pages
ISBN 1-84435-239-0
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Genius Loci was the eighth full length novel published as part of Big Finish Productions' Bernice Summerfield series. It is also the first novel to explore (and is set) during Bernice Summerfield's early life before she met the Seventh Doctor in PROSE: Love and War.

Publisher's summary Edit

One day she will bring down empires and decide the fate of the universe. One day she will be feared by the creatures of evil and revered wherever people have had just a little bit too much to drink.

But all that is yet to come...

Right now Bernice Summerfield is 21 years old and living hand to mouth and drink to drink. Offered a job beyond her qualifications she is lured out to the backwater planet of Jaiwan where nothing has ever happened -- ever.

There she joins a disparate team of archaeologists who have just discovered that the planet of Jaiwan may have been just a tad more interesting than people thought. This could be Benny's big break and her ticket to a proper career in archaeology.

That's if archaeology doesn't kill her first.

Plot Edit

to be added

Characters Edit

• Bernice Summerfield
• Professor Mariela Ankola
• Pilar Hidalgo
• Simone Agani
• Heidi Maputo
• Chayana Lopeti
• Shawnee
• Lola

References Edit

Culture Edit

• Professor Mariela gives Bernice a copy of her personal database, which included a lot of files on 20th century Earth.

Individuals Edit

• Bernice Summerfield is twenty-one when she arrives on Jaiwan.
• Whilst on Jaiwan Bernice:

• Gets her foot ripped off by a pot fish spider. She gets a new one on her second birthday.
• Is nearly drowned.
• Shot in the back (she had a lined protective jacket on).
• Escapes a nuclear blast.

• Bernice is known to the spiders (after fist contact) by the name "Fools Rush In".
• Bernice kills Lola; this is the first time she's killed anyone.
• Pinky and Perky were two artificial intelligences, one built the railways (Perky) and the roads and town plans (Pinky). They fell in love and started to share programming.
• Professor Mariela Ankola is known as the Professor by everyone.

Foods and beverages Edit

• Krill is part CO2 scrubber, part additional protein source. Benny 'slings' it (and more notably knows how to make it taste palatable) to travel on spacecraft for free.
• Vodka is Russia's greatest contribution to interstellar travel (in Bernice's opinion).
• There is a Kwik-Kurry at General Layfeyette's army base.

Literature Edit

• Archaeology for Primates was published by Martian University Press in 2534.

Organisations Edit

• Benny dropped out of Spacefleet and is now on the run from it.

• There is a draft in place.

• TMF (Too Mad to Fight) is a suffix pertaining to the draft, meaning psychologically unfit for duty, Bernice has a fake one on her passport.

Planets Edit

• In January, 2562 Benny decides to head for Earth.
• The Professor encountered lethal toxins while excavating an industrial site on the planet Cray.
• The planet Heaven is becoming a popular planet to be buried on, but the Professor has a Last Ticket for burial on Earth in the Rift Valley, Tanzania.
• Pilar Hidalgo is from the planet Shantak

Science Edit

• Benny calls her group of archaeologists Combat Archaeologists.
• Nuclear dampeners create a field inhibiting chain reactions.
• Nuclear blasts have some sort of effect on hyperspace.

Species Edit

• Martians are known as some of the best archaeologists in the galaxy.
• A team is sent to discuss the ramifications of the spiders being sapient. It is made up of a human, an Earth Reptile and a Martian.
• Benny still calls Draconians 'Dragons'.
• Earth Reptiles never forgave humans for usurping them and taking over their planet.

 :Category:Technology Edit

• Continuous Active Recording units are used at the archaeological digs.

Vehicles Edit

• Fulcrum is a VTOL capable troop carrier.

Notes Edit

• This is the first novel which sees Benny at the beginning of her career.
• At the end of the book it says To be continued in Bernice Summerfield: Old Friends.

Continuity Edit

• Draconians (and the Draconian War) were first mentioned/appeared in TV: Frontier in Space.
• Earth Reptiles first appeared in TV: Doctor Who and the Silurians and The Sea Devils.

External links Edit

• Official Genius Loci page at bigfinish.com
• Detailed synopsis of Genius Loci at the Doctor Who Reference Guide