Original Sins

Rating:
Summary: The Series Creaks to a Finish
Review: Well, I have to say that out of all the novelisations based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Christopher Golden's "The Lost Slayer" has *not* been by favourite. Beginning with 'Prophesies', and moving through 'Dark Times' and 'The Vampire King' Golden gives himself the freedom to do what he likes with the characters (including killing them) by instigating a plot device that has nineteen year old Buffy hurtled into the future to her twenty-five year old body, fighting in an post-apocalyptic Sunnydale ruled over by Giles, the Vampire King. All this is due to a fatal mistake she made in her college years, and the course of 'Original Sins' can be divided into two: Buffy going up against Giles, and Buffy attempting to rectify her long-ago mistake.

Also on the scene are her former friends - the powerful sorceress Willow (who plays the largest part in the story after Buffy herself), the hardened warrior Xander, and the werewolf Oz hovering between humanity and animalistic tendencies. Along with the Watcher's Council and the latest Slayer Anna Keui (who doesn't play any sort of meaningful part in the action) they go up against Giles and the demon-god Camazotz, previously a dangerous foe, now just a battery for the Kakchiquels (vampires that fed on his mystical energy). Despite a rather potent scene that has Buffy fighting between what Golden describes as "the two men she loved most" - the vampiric Giles and a trapped Angel, the final showdown with her former Watcher is somewhat anti-climatic, and all that follows with Willow and former-Slayer Lucy Hanover sending Buffy back into the past has absolutely no edge to it, simply because everybody *knows* that things will get back to normal. Such is the problem with writing a book set in an already-established plot line - you can't develop anybody or anything.

"The Lost Slayer" was a vaugely entertaining read, but after volume one, there was no way you could read them out of order without becoming utterly lost. I suggest the publication that has all four books in one volume so that one doesn't have to hunt all over the place for the next installment in the series (one of the things I hate about any kind of book that isn't self-contained). There's an interesting look in the future of what *could* one day happen, but nothing we haven't seen in episodes in television such as "The Wish" in Season Three, and eventually Golden's killing off of practically every character for no other reason but simply because he *could* got tiring. By the end, I was skim reading in order to get to the finish. By all means, give it a try, but don't feel bad if you have to return it to the library before you're done.

Rating:
Summary: The Series Creaks to a Finish
Review: Well, I have to say that out of all the novelisations based on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Christopher Golden's "The Lost Slayer" has *not* been by favourite. Beginning with 'Prophesies', and moving through 'Dark Times' and 'The Vampire King' Golden gives himself the freedom to do what he likes with the characters (including killing them) by instigating a plot device that has nineteen year old Buffy hurtled into the future to her twenty-five year old body, fighting in an post-apocalyptic Sunnydale ruled over by Giles, the Vampire King. All this is due to a fatal mistake she made in her college years, and the course of 'Original Sins' can be divided into two: Buffy going up against Giles, and Buffy attempting to rectify her long-ago mistake.

Also on the scene are her former friends - the powerful sorceress Willow (who plays the largest part in the story after Buffy herself), the hardened warrior Xander, and the werewolf Oz hovering between humanity and animalistic tendencies. Along with the Watcher's Council and the latest Slayer Anna Keui (who doesn't play any sort of meaningful part in the action) they go up against Giles and the demon-god Camazotz, previously a dangerous foe, now just a battery for the Kakchiquels (vampires that fed on his mystical energy). Despite a rather potent scene that has Buffy fighting between what Golden describes as "the two men she loved most" - the vampiric Giles and a trapped Angel, the final showdown with her former Watcher is somewhat anti-climatic, and all that follows with Willow and former-Slayer Lucy Hanover sending Buffy back into the past has absolutely no edge to it, simply because everybody *knows* that things will get back to normal. Such is the problem with writing a book set in an already-established plot line - you can't develop anybody or anything.

"The Lost Slayer" was a vaugely entertaining read, but after volume one, there was no way you could read them out of order without becoming utterly lost. I suggest the publication that has all four books in one volume so that one doesn't have to hunt all over the place for the next installment in the series (one of the things I hate about any kind of book that isn't self-contained). There's an interesting look in the future of what *could* one day happen, but nothing we haven't seen in episodes in television such as "The Wish" in Season Three, and eventually Golden's killing off of practically every character for no other reason but simply because he *could* got tiring. By the end, I was skim reading in order to get to the finish. By all means, give it a try, but don't feel bad if you have to return it to the library before you're done.