David J. Howe - Biography

Biography

David Howe was born August 24, 1961 and established himself (in the early ‘80s) as an authoritative media historian through writing articles for fanzines (notably The Frame) and other publications. In the early 1990s, he began to write the first in-depth critical texts of the British television series Doctor Who, and as a result has become closely associated with the show's history. He has written or co-written over twenty titles about the show, and continues to be involved with a variety of publications, often acting as consultant or reviewer.

In particular, Howe collaborated on some of the key texts in Virgin Publishing's range of Doctor Who reference works, including the three Decades books (with Stephen James Walker and Mark Stammers), considered to be some of the most in-depth works about the production history of the show. The same authors followed these with guide books which covered the individual tenures of each Doctor in turn.

Howe and Stephen James Walker set up the publishing house Telos Publishing Ltd. in 2002, which initially published Doctor Who novellas until the licence was withdrawn by BBC Worldwide in 2004. Telos continues to publish non-Doctor Who works and unofficial Doctor Who reference works, including the well-regarded 2003 book The Television Companions (by Howe and Walker, and previously released as Doctor Who: The Television Companion in 1998 by BBC Publishing) and The Handbook, collecting the previously written Virgin Publishing guide books Doctor Who The Handbook in one volume in 2005. In 2007 and 2008, Howe also is serving as the editor for Time's Champion, an independent Doctor Who novel based on the late Craig Hinton's final unpublished novel and completed by his friend Chris McKeon, which features the Sixth Doctor and the Valeyard.

Howe also wrote Daemos Rising, an original film directed by Keith Barnfarther, and is planning to write further adventures for the screen. He also wrote a story for the first Virgin Decalog short story collection, his only piece of official Doctor Who fiction to be published. He continues to work as co-director of Telos Publishing, which has expanded to publish a wide range of classic and new science fiction stories.

Howe also has one of the largest collections of Doctor Who merchandise in the world.

Aside from his Doctor Who work, Howe is the reviews editor for the horror film magazine Shivers. He was also a contributing editor to Starburst magazine and edited the book reviews column for that magazine for sixteen years. He edited the British Fantasy Society's bi-monthly newsletter for several years in the 1990s, and was the chair of that organisation from September 2010 to October 2011.