12+: Buffy the Vampire Slayer Vol 1: Night of the Living Rerun, Coyote Moon, Portal Through Time

Release Date: 02/09/10

BOOK BLURB:

As long as there have been vampires, there has been the Slayer. One girl in all the world, to find them where they gather and to stop the spread of their evil and the swell of their numbers...Night of the Living Rerun ~ As if real life wasn't already overflowing with vampire-staking, Buffy is now dreaming about slaying! Night after night, it's the same thing...What could it mean? When Xander and Giles start acting like they have ancient alter egos, Buffy begins to realise what's going on. Can Buffy prevent the Master from escaping his supernatural prison before Sunnydale becomes history! Coyote Moon ~ The seedy carnival looks like just the thing to give Buffy and her friends, Xander and Willow, a break from staking bloodsuckers. Some greasy food, a few cheap thrills - what more could a Slayer ask for? But then Buffy senses something evil behind this carnival. Could it be connected to the corpses that are turning up around Sunnydale. Can Buffy find out what's going on in time to save her friends? Or has the Slayer become the prey? Portal of Time ~ The Master, Buffy's nemesis, may be gone, but he is by no means forgotten. One of his devotees has set out to alter the past, killing off Slayers in order to change the future. With the Slayer line extinguished, there will be no Buffy. And without Buffy, no one will be able to prevent him as he resurrects The Master. Having opened a portal through time he is about to send his minions into the past to murder the most influential Slayers in history. Buffy is forced to follow them through the portal in a race against time and evil. But the problem is...you can't change the past without altering the present...


REVIEW:

A compendium of tales revamped (if you’ll pardon the pun) in this offering by Simon and Schuster Children’s Publisher. The stories within are pretty average and if you’re a long term Buffy fan, you’ll have seen these tales in one form or another in the TV series. Whilst I had a bit of fun revisiting and getting my Buffy fix, the Buffy within the stories was different to the Buffy that many fans are more familiar with as she came across more as a ditzy airhead (like the character played by Kristy Swanson in the 92 film instead of the Sarah Michelle Gellar Buffy of TV fame.) Add to that, a mismatching Willow and Xander which also felt awkward with Willow getting her magical gift earlier than she did in the series and you can also understand why this failed to impress, especially with the authors making some glaring errors such as “Angel” being referred to as a boy when he was turned at 26.

Whilst the publishers have done well to bring the tales together, a personal gripe of mine is to do with paper quality which whilst having to compress so much into one volume felt that they’d found the cheapest paper that they could get and one that I fear won’t survive multiple readings. Finally, the other problem is that these books feel more like they’ve been written for a much younger audience than those who originally enjoyed the TV series, which seems a bit silly to be honest. Whilst this may come across as pretty harsh I have been a Buffy fan since it originally arrived on UK TV and felt a little let down. That said, if you have a Buffy fan in the house and want something to help them get some additional fixes (and if they don’t own any of the novels currently) they’re some of the better TV to book conversions.