Damaged Goods is an original Doctor Who novel, released by Virgin Publishing in their New Adventures range of Doctor Who books in 1996. It was the first piece of full-length prose fiction to have been published by the television scriptwriter Russell T Davies, who later became the chief writer and executive producer of the Doctor Who television series when it was revived in 2005. Davies's first professionally published fiction, a novelisation of his children's television serial Dark Season, had been released by BBC Books in 1991. In July 2014 it was announced that Big Finish Productions were to produce an audio drama adaptation of the novel, as part of their licensed Doctor Who range. The adaptation was released in April 2015, available as a standalone title, or in a special box set with an adaptation of Gareth Roberts's Fourth Doctor novel The Well-Mannered War. Plot The novel is set in Britain in 1987, and involves the Seventh Doctor and his companions Chris Cwej and Roz Forrester living on a working-class council estate while attempting to track down an infinitely powerful Gallifreyan weapon before it falls into the wrong hands. A young boy living on the estate, Gabriel Tyler, appears to be the focus of strange powers, and also for the attentions of Eva Jericho, whose own grievously ill young son seems to be linked to Gabriel in some way, through a secret Gabriel's mother Winnie has long tried to hide. Background Davies had already established himself as a successful writer of children's television by 1996, having penned well-received serials such as Dark Season (1991) and Century Falls (1993), and winning a BAFTA Children's Award for an episode of Children's Ward, a series he both wrote for and produced from 1992 to 1995. A staff scriptwriter at Granada Television, he was beginning to move into adult television, writing for soap operas such as Families and Revelations, the latter of which he created. Despite being a professional writer and long-time Doctor Who fan, Davies had no initial interest in writing for Virgin's Doctor Who novel series, concentrating instead on his television career. However, in 1995 he was interviewed about Dark Season and Century Falls by journalist David Richardson of TV Zone magazine, who later wrote about their meeting. "When we first spoke back in 1995, Davies's interest in writing for the series was evident. With Doctor Who out of production, I suggested