The next instalment in Big Finish’s popular series of Doctor Who audio novels takes us back to the Third Doctor’s debut season, broadcast in 1970, with an exciting new adventure for the Doctor, Liz Shaw, and the Brigadier. 

This classic UNIT trio have a serious challenge to contend with in The Mirror Matter. The title refers to a theorised counterpart to ordinary matter, and in Kate Orman’s hard-edged thriller, a sinister organisation are plotting to unleash it in the form of dangerous spores. 

Like the original Season 7 stories, The Mirror Matter is divided into seven episodes. Each is fifty minutes long, so the audio novel has a total running time of approximately five hours and fifty minutes. It’s read by impressionist Jon Culshaw, who brings to life the Third Doctor and his friends. 

Doctor Who – The Audio Novels: The Mirror Matter is now available to pre-order as a digital download to own for just £19.99, exclusively here. 

The Doctor, Liz and the Brigadier investigate the alien “spores" – blobs of deadly mirror matter from the dawn of time. Liz summons fellow scientists to help the investigation. But one is secretly working for the BNKR, an organization preparing to take over the world. 

The BNKR unleash a killer spore. Meanwhile the Doctor and Liz race to stop another spore, locked in a countdown to destruction. 

Can the Doctor and his friends prevent the entire Earth being converted into mirror matter? 

Writer Kate Orman is an accomplished Doctor Who novelist, with several books in the acclaimed Virgin New Adventures and Eighth Doctor Adventures series under her belt. She previously contributed 2023's The Dead Star to the Big Finish Audio Novel range. 

Producer David Richardson added: “Kate Orman is one of my favourite authors of Doctor Who fiction, and after the success of The Dead Star, I was keen to sign her up for another as soon as possible. 

“In The Mirror Matter, she has written a truly authentic Season 7 story – it’s the exiled Doctor, Liz and the Brigadier investigating an alien incursion with a difference, told over (naturally) seven episodes! Once again, Kate has blended two of her passions – Doctor Who and real science – into a truly compelling yarn.” 

Orman added: “Season 7 is a terrific season to play in. The stories are about what would have been contemporary scientific issues, like nuclear power and early space travel. There’s some playfulness around the scientific ideas, but the science helps to give it a very concrete, realistic feeling. So, this inspired me to get a genuine piece of science to base my own story on.  

“One of the other reasons it’s such a brilliant season is those huge seven-episode stories. Writing a seven-episode story is great. You have six cliffhangers for a start. But you also have depth; you have time and space to expand on the scientific ideas, on the characters and their relationships, which I particularly enjoyed doing when it came to Liz Shaw.” 

Big Finish listeners can save money by pre-ordering The Mirror Matter in a multi-buy download bundle of four Doctor Who audio novels – including January 2025’s release The Lord of Misrule plus two further releases yet to be announced – for just £70, exclusively here. 

All the above prices include the special pre-order discount and are subject to change after general release.