Buffy The Vampire Slayer

[dem]

Wasn't really sure how to go about introducing a Buffy thread but Slayer merchandise is as much a fixture of London Charity shops just now as the far less appealing works of J. Archer and T. Parsons. Admittedly, the only Buffy fiction I've read to date is the pre-Sarah Michelle Gellar movie novelisation, and the Pocket Paperbacks listed below have been purchased as an alternative to leaving the shop empty handed. A whole raft of authors have turned their hand to churning out this stuff - even Ray "Live Girls" Garton's had a crack - so am guessing some of it possibly captures the spirit of the show? So, if you're familiar with any of these, or you're a fan of the series, where should I make a start and which other titles should we look out for?

N. E. Genge - The Buffy Chronicles: The Unofficial Companion to Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Boxtree, 1999)

Blurb

The Buffy Chronicles: The Unofficial Companion to Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a fun and informative look at the first season and a half of the series. From body snatchers and poltergeists to werewolves and mummies, it provides the inside track on the show's strange yet seductive characters and topics. The Buffy Chronicles includes a retrospective of the film that started it all, a history of vampire legends, cast information, plot synopses, and behind-the-scenes trivia. From 'The Death Toll', a roster of who's been killed by whom in each episode, to 'I Fall to Pieces', a guide to the alternative music and bands that add so much atmosphere, this book has everything Buffy's fans could want.

N. E. Genge is the author of three companion books to The X-Files, including The Unofficial X-Files Companion and The X-Files Lexicon: X-References from Anti-Walton to Zuni, as well as The Unofficial Millennium Companion. She lives in Newfoundland, Canada.

This book has not been prepared, endorsed or in any way authorized by any entity that created Buffy The Vampire Slayer


Richie Tankersley Cusick – Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Archway, 1992)

The Fourth teenage girl in L. A. has disappeared in less than two months! But Buffy’s oblivious. She’s brainstorming a theme for the senior dance. One nightmare later, she meets a stranger named Merrick who tells her she bears the mark of the order: only she – the Pom-Pom Princess of California cheerleaders – can stop the vampires before they engulf L. A. They’re everywhere … she can’t even trust her best friends! Merrick has brought her knowledge, physical and mental powers beyond her wildest dreams, and a terrifying enemy: Lothos, King of the Vampires, who is determined to have Buffy for himself! All she has are a stake, a cross and a mission: destroy the evil – even if it takes her own life!

Elizabeth Massie - Powers Of Persuasion (Pocket, October 1999)

Blurb
DANGEROUS DIVAS

When the female population of Sunnydale starts strutting its girl power, the push for gender equality seems like a normal expression of '90s feminism. After all, a girl trying out for the football team isn't usually a sign of imminent danger. But when the guys start acting like powerless pawns and a few even turn up dead, Buffy Summers notices that the local women's movement has reached a feverish — and probably unnatural — pitch.

The Slayer is the only one who can see straight during the ultimate battle of the sexes. Her friends — including Giles — are spellbound by the malignant muses permeating the school. Even the local vampires are acting strange. Alone in her search for answers, Buffy must figure out who's behind the sinister sisterhood ... and close the gender gap before the feminist revolution goes too far.

Christopher Golden & Nancy Hodder - Blooded (Pocket, August 1998)

Blurb
THE KINDEST CUT

Qhirayoju, a vampire of Chinese lore, and Sanno, the legendary Japanese Mountain King, have been locked in deadly battle for centuries. Literally. An ancient curse imprisoned the spirits of these two warriors in an antique sword.

Until the sword arrives in Sunnydale.

Freed by accident, Qhirayoju searches for a host body that will allow him to continue wreaking havoc among the living and the dead.

Now Buffy's on the trail of this legendary vampire ... a bloody trail that leads straight through the heart of the Buffy-Xander-Willow triangle.

Mel Odom - Unnatural Selection (Pocket, June 1999)

Free with Bliss November 2000 issue.

Blurb
Fairie Tale

Willow's trying to earn a little pocket change by taking the usual teenage part-time job — baby-sitting the neighbour's kid. But her child-care chores turn into a scene from a horror movie when the baby gives her the evil eye and attacks. Barely escaping the tiny terror, Willow can't forget the missing human child — or the monstrous thing left in its place. The childish changeling keeps coming back to haunt and taunt her.

Buffy and her posse soon discover a possible connection between Willow's infant interloper and some strange artefacts Giles found at a local archaeological dig. The evil plaguing Willow was once trapped underground.

Now that it has been unearthed by new construction on the property, it's ready to cause some major mischief ... and worse.

[Steve]

Aug 15, 2009 9:26:29 GMT dem said:

Wasn't really sure how to go about introducing a Buffy thread but Slayer merchandise is as much a fixture of London Charity shops just now as the far less appealing works of J. Archer and T. Parsons. Admittedly... the Pocket Paperbacks listed below have been purchased as an alternative to leaving the shop empty handed, but a whole bunch of authors have turned their hand to churning out this stuff...

You should never feel anything less than proud to introduce a thread on anything to Vault, dem - surely we are The Board That Knows No Shame?

That blurb for Power Of Persuasion, "Buffy must figure out who's behind the sinister sisterhood... and close the gender gap before the feminist revolution goes too far" is priceless.

Mel Odom, as well as having a couple of Buffy books to his name, is another of those largely unsung jobbing writers who's knocked out no end of TV & film tie-ins, Young Adult and Men's Adventure titles and doubtless given pleasure to millions of readers in the process. For Gold Eagle he's been both a 'Don Pendleton' and a 'James Axler' - two names anyone should be proud to write under.

[andydecker]

Buffy books are very hit and miss. Especially when they started to differentiate between YA and Adult novels.

As a rule of thumb, the larger ones are the better ones. Especially the later Christopher Golden novels - sometimes co-written by Nancy Holder - are quite ambitious and well written.

IMMORTAL was a good one. Same goes for SPIKE AND DRU:PRETTY MAIDS ALL IN A ROW and WISDOM OF WAR, maybe his best. I am biased, WISDOM incorporated some lovecraftian themes which was fun at the time.

Mel Odom is a writer I kind of like; he is better than most of the current Executionier hacks. But his Buffy and Angel novels were kind of strange. When you have Vampires with automatic weapons you know something weird is going on

[dem]

Aug 15, 2009 20:52:24 GMT andydecker said:

As a rule of thumb, the larger ones are the better ones.

Oh, that's a little disheartening, but will keep an eye out for your recommendations, Andy.

There was no shame involved, Steve - just couldn't think how to start the thread, so the 'dump a pile of covers and leave it to the Gods' approach seemed the best option. Thing is, I was a big fan of the series, but never felt inclined to try the original fiction, most likely because there's so much of it.

Anyhow, no sooner had I posted the above than I set off for a car boot sale at the local Catholic School, and what do you know, there's a guy empties out his suitcase on the deck and it's a Watchers t-shirt, Peter Haining's Television Late Night Omnibus, Marvin Kaye's Masterpieces Of Terror & The Supernatural and three Buffy video box sets, all in looked after nick. Passed on the t-shirt, he did me the rest for £2.50 all in which was mighty civil, cheered me up no end. Have made a start on -

Elizabeth Massie - Power Of Persuasion (Pocket, Oct. 1999)

- the 'Girl Power' one.

Despite the fact he's a crummy cook, it's always been Mr. Gianakous's dream to open his own restaurant. This is rotten luck for his daughter, Allison, a student at Sunnydale High, as now she'll have to spend her free time slogging in a smelly, smoky, doomed joint called 'The Laughing Greek.' Leaving the old man to cluelessly hack away at a chicken, a desperate Allison (who has obviously been at the Dennis Wheatley novels) looks up 'help, call for' in a Greek dictionary, gathers some leaves about her, changes into a toga and summons a Goddess - any Goddess, she's not fussy, just so long as it will liberate her from selfish men.

Fellow Sunnydale pupil Brian Andrews has been dumped in the road by his boorish Jock mates after complaining that their car stinks of gym clothes and dog crap. As it is beneath him to walk anywhere, he waits for a good Samaritan to offer him a lift. As luck would have it, a beautiful girl stops for him and before long, she's humming sweetly in his ear. "This is great. I'm a stud. I'm a hot exhaust pipe" beams Brian, even as the numbness takes him. The mystery girl dispatches him in the slimy, reeking lake with a cheery "Give my regards to Charon!"

The luckless Buffy, Xander, Willow and Oz (werewolf and guitarist with the legendary Dingoes Ate My Baby) are the first to sample the delights of The Happy Greek and leave with their inedible dinners in doggy-bags to feed the town skip. Buffy reluctantly sets out on vampire patrol and very nearly drives a stake through her friend and Watcher, Giles the brainy Brit Librarian. Now how could that happen? whatever the circumstance, she can always distinguish between friend and foe. Perhaps it has something to do with Giles companion, Ms. Moon, the new supervisor of Sunnydale Library who plans to strip the High School of all occult literature?

OK, so it's only twenty pages, but there's already a kind of Marilyn Ross-Barnabus, Quentin ...-for-the-'nineties feel to it, and mercifully, no guest appearance from Ginger, Posh, Sporty & Co.

[chastel]

I have always felt Buffy as boring. ;D

[dem]

Anonymous (ed.) - Tales of the Slayer: Vol II (Simon Pulse, Jan. 2003)

Todd A. McIntosh - All That You Do Comes Back Unto Thee, Sunnydale, California, 2000
Kara Dalkey - Lady Shobu, Sagami Province, Japan, 980
Laura J. Burns & Melinda Mertz - Abomination, Beauport, Brittany, France, 1320
Greg Cox - Blood and Brine, The Caribbean, 1661
Scott Allie - The Ghosts of Slayers Past, London, England, 1843
Kristine Kathryn Rusch - The New Watcher, Atlanta, Georgia, 1864
Michael Reaves - House of the Vampire, London, England, 1897
Rebecca Rand Kirshner - The War Between the States, New York City, New York, 1922
Max Allan Collins & Matthew V. Clemens - Stakeout on Rush Street, Chicago, Illinois, 1943
Jane Espenson - Again, Sunnydale, California, 1999

From the blurb:
Buffy the Vampire Slayer has always held an irreverent attitude toward her calling, but ultimately she understands the ramifications of her destiny and is prepared to die to protect the world from Evil. In fact, she has died. Twice.

It's an ancient tradition, steeped in lore, mythology, and fateful prophecies. Slayerdom consists of a Council of Watchers, a continuum of slayers, an archive of journals, and even a handbook.

But first and foremost, it begins with a girl. One girl in all the world. A Chosen One. Now, catch up on other Slayers past and present, in the second short-story collection, Tales of the Slayer, Vol. 2!

With contributions from Scott Allie, Laura J. Burns and Melinda Metz, Max Allan Collins and Matthew V. Clemens, Greg Cox, Kara Dalkey, Jane Espenson, Rebecca Rand Kirshner, Todd McIntosh, Michael Reaves, and Kristine Kathryn Rusch.

Picked this up in charity shop this morning, mostly because the Michael Reeves story pits the Victorian chosen one versus Springheel Jack, but looks like a couple of the others might be fun in a vampire pantomime kind of way. Greg Cox's Blood And Brine is shaping up like Pirates Of The Caribbean meets Carry On Jack as Buffy's predecessor, Cap'n Robin Whitby, disguises herself as a bloke to lead a gang of cut-throats on the high seas. Scott Allie's The Ghosts of Slayers Past is A Christmas Carol retold with stuck-up watcher Charlton Muzzelwit cast as Scrooge and tormented accordingly.

[dem]

tried a couple of these last night and ... um

Michael Reaves - House of the Vampire, London, England, 1897: Our slayer for the occasion is Angelique Hawthorne, a match-girl raised in the poverty-stricken East End slums until Professor Peter Van Helsing removed her to the more salubrious surroundings of Regent Street. The Prof is in a bad mood with his charge as she's taken a boyfriend, Gordon Mycroft, rubbish poet and dandy about town, and recruited two street urchins, Molly Carrington and Patch, as her proto-Scooby gang. Van Helsing reminds her that the Slayers' path is a lonely one - those she gets too close to will inevitably die in the never-ending battle versus the undead. That Angelique chooses to ignore his wise words is bad news for Molly who is whisked away by Dracula to his new base of operations - the chamber of horrors at Madame Tussauds. Angelique arrives too late to save her and falls straight into the clutches of the most powerful vampire of them all. But Dracula never learns. Instead of drinking the slayers blood and having done with it, he must have his long-winded preamble, during the course of which Angelique slips free and lures him to his final doom again, this time in a vat of molten wax laced with Holy Water. A quick grieve over Molly - Angelique had to stake her - and our heroine is back out into the night to pursue the latest Tethyrian demon masquerading as Spring-Heel Jack. And from this day she works alone.

The East End of Mr. Reaves' story at least has a touch of Dr. Jekyll & Sister Hyde/ A Study In Terror camp about it, whereas I got a bit irritated reading this next, to be honest with you.

Scott Allie - The Ghosts of Slayers Past, London, England, 1843: When chirpy cockney Catherine Hogarth returns home after a hard night's slaying, it's to the damp and freezing room in a decrepit Whitechapel slum which she shares with her three little brothers, none of whom are likely to see adulthood. By contrast, her watcher, Charlton Muzzlewit, resides in a lavish mansion over Regent's Park way. No drab bonnet with chinstrap for him! Muzzlewit is the man in brown, quite the fop for a misogynistic, xenophobic snob who has no appreciation of what a slayer's lot entails until he's visited by the spectre of his father. The old man, dead thirty years, warns him that before the night is out he will be called upon by three further apparitions, the last of whom you've most likely already guessed.

[stuyoung]

I'm interested to hear what the Rebecca Rand Kirshner story and the Jane Espenson story are like as both women wrote for the Buffy TV series.

[redbrain]

Mar 7, 2012 15:55:48 GMT stuyoung said:

I'm interested to hear what the Rebecca Rand Kirshner story and the Jane Espenson story are like as both women wrote for the Buffy TV series.

I recall Jane Espenson, in particular, as one of the better Buffy TV series writers. You can hear her voice, as I recall, in more than one of the DVD audio commentaries.

Amongst the Buffy books, the script books are well worth a look. The TV scripts are very readable, and show interesting differences from the episodes as actually made.

[stuyoung]

I like Jane Espenson. She's written some of my favourite episodes of Buffy.

[cauldronbrewer]

Mar 25, 2012 23:06:55 GMT redbrain said:

Mar 7, 2012 15:55:48 GMT stuyoung said:

I'm interested to hear what the Rebecca Rand Kirshner story and the Jane Espenson story are like as both women wrote for the Buffy TV series.

I recall Jane Espenson, in particular, as one of the better Buffy TV series writers.

Indeed--looking at her credits, I see that she wrote "Band Candy," "Gingerbread," "Earshot," Conversations with Dead People," "Doublemeat Palace," (which many fans seem to hate but which I liked) and "Storyteller," among others. She also wrote one of the best Xander-centered episodes: "The Replacement."

On a not-entirely-unrelated note, my wife and I named our son Xander.

[andydecker]

Mar 26, 2012 11:11:07 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

Doublemeat Palace," (which many fans seem to hate but which I liked) and "Storyteller," among others. She also wrote one of the best Xander-centered episodes: "The Replacement."

On a not-entirely-unrelated note, my wife and I named our son Xander.

So he will have a lot of heart

I also quite liked Doublemeat Palace; it was one of the better eps in a very uneven season.

[stuyoung]

She's also written episodes of Angel, Firefly, Dollhouse and Battlestar Galactica as well as co-creating Warehouse 13. She also worked on Torchwood: Miracle Day but we'll ignore that.

[redbrain]

Mar 26, 2012 11:11:07 GMT cauldronbrewer said:

Mar 25, 2012 23:06:55 GMT redbrain said:

I recall Jane Espenson, in particular, as one of the better Buffy TV series writers.

Indeed--looking at her credits, I see that she wrote "Band Candy," "Gingerbread," "Earshot," Conversations with Dead People," "Doublemeat Palace," (which many fans seem to hate but which I liked) and "Storyteller," among others. She also wrote one of the best Xander-centered episodes: "The Replacement."

On a not-entirely-unrelated note, my wife and I named our son Xander.

I liked Doublemeat Palace, too. It touches on areas we don't often see covered in TV drama. Also, I have a horror of burger joints.

Good call, naming your son Xander. Quite apart from the Buffy connection, there's something very cool about names beginning with an X. Would Xena have been as much of a hit, if they'd named her Zena?

[cauldronbrewer]

Mar 27, 2012 19:35:41 GMT redbrain said:

Good call, naming your son Xander. Quite apart from the Buffy connection, there's something very cool about names beginning with an X. Would Xena have been as much of a hit, if they'd named her Zena?

Thanks (and he does have a lot heart)! One thing we've discovered is that people who hear the name tend to spell it Zander (which is a legitimate spelling, but misses the coolness of the X). Also, people who read it sometimes try to pronounce it Eks-ander.

We've talked about naming a daughter Xena if we have one but have decided that would probably be pushing the theme too far.