More attention for the Subscriber Short Trips releases as I take a listen to the four stories provided to main range subscribers in 2014. Covering four different incarnations of the Doctor, the first three are read by Hugh Ross, the fourth by Stephen Critchlow. Running times are from around twenty minutes and up. This is much less than either 2015 or 2013.

The 2014 Subscriber Short Trips

Paul Dale Smith starts of the year with a Second Doctor story called The Piltdown Men. This story has the Doctor with no companion, something I found unusual. Without spoiling too far, it did leave plenty of room for the narrative lead, a certain Herbert George Wells to give the listener his point of view. While the story centres on the Piltdown Men of the title, their nature and origin, it is really about Wells himself, and how he finds his centre through the experience with the Doctor.

Matt Fitton lightens the mood with Late Night Shopping. This is an Eighth Doctor and Lucie Miller story set in a supermarket and involving alien tomatoes and much other madness. Very entertaining and one to make the listener smile.

John Dorney’s Waiting for Gadot is a superb tongue-in-cheek shaggy dog story with a great ending. It centres on the trials and tribulations of an interplanetary wildlife photographer, his quest for the gadot bird and his encounter with the Fourth Doctor. For those familiar with John’s writing this is pure Dorney.

Nick Wallace rounds off the 2014 titles with Home from Home. This is a Third Doctor story told from the point of view of Liz Shaw. The story starts with Liz looking for the Doctor (she believes he is in trouble). It turns out he is on holiday in the Scottish version of Trap Street and predating the idea used as the setting for Face the Raven. In itself that is enough for a decent story, but there is more going on and this is a great example of the law of unintended consequence with Liz herself being the accidental catalyst for change.