Raised in Canada, Cartmel returned to England in order to complete his education. He took a post-graduate course in computer studies and worked on
computer-aided design for Shape Data Ltd (now
UGS Corp) in
Cambridge, England during the mid-1980s. He then turned more to writing and managed to gain an agent on the strength of two unproduced scripts, also attending workshops run by the
BBC Television Drama Script Unit. In late 1986, when he was in his late twenties, Although hints were dropped in the two final series Cartmel edited, the proposed revelations never materialised on screen because the programme was taken off the air in 1989. When production of
Doctor Who was placed on indefinite hold, Cartmel became script editor on the BBC's popular medical drama series
Casualty for one season. In the 1990s he wrote comic strips for
Judge Dredd Megazine and
Doctor Who Magazine and three
Doctor Who novels for
Virgin Books in their
New Adventures series. This series had used elements of the "masterplan" as part of their overall story arc for the Doctor, particularly in the last Seventh Doctor novel
Lungbarrow, written by
Marc Platt. In 1999 his first original novel,
The Wise, was published in Virgin's short-lived series of new science-fiction novels,
Virgin Worlds. That same year he became editor of the science-fiction magazine
Starburst, although the appointment was a short one and he left the magazine in 2000. Since then he has written several pieces of
Doctor Who fiction: in 2000
Winter for the Adept, an audio drama for
Big Finish Productions; in 2003
Foreign Devils, a
novella for Telos Publishing; and in 2005
Atom Bomb Blues, a novel for
BBC Books. He developed a script for the third series of
Torchwood entitled 'The Jinx', but it was dropped when the show's format was reworked. In 2010 Cartmel worked as script editor for
Big Finish Productions'
The Lost Stories line, overseeing the adaptation of story ideas created for
Doctor Who's unmade
27th series into audio dramas (released in 2011). In addition to script-editing the four "Season 27" stories, Cartmel wrote two scripts (
Crime of the Century and
Animal) and co-wrote a third,
Earth Aid, with
Ben Aaronovitch. As well as
Atom Bomb Blues, 2005 saw the publication of:
Script Doctor – The Inside Story of Doctor Who 1986–89, an account of his work on the
Doctor Who television series;
Through Time: An Unofficial and Unauthorised History of Doctor Who; and two
2000 AD spin-off novels,
Judge Dredd: Swine Fever and
Strontium Dog: Day of the Dogs. Cartmel has also written a novel set in the world of
Patrick McGoohan's
The Prisoner television series for
Powys Media. The novel, released on 15 February 2008, is entitled
Miss Freedom. Common themes and techniques in Cartmel's novels include: animal rights; the use of animal perspectives; and extended metaphors of animal behaviour. These elements appear in the three Virgin New Adventures novels, the original novel
The Wise, the Judge Dredd novel
Swine Fever and the audio play
Animal. In 2001 Cartmel briefly returned to television as script editor on the second season of
Channel 5's fantasy / adventure series
Dark Knight, writing what proved to be the final episode of the series. His first stage play,
End of the Night, a thriller with gothic overtones, was produced by Long Shadow Productions in the summer of 2003. ==Bibliography==