Slayer

I am a Buffy fan. I'm not the biggest Buffy fan I know - that honor goes to a friend of mine, who I just gave a giant box of Buffy comic to, since we're downsizing in preparation for the move to the new house. I haven't seen anyone that happy in a while, and it made my day. (And hers, judging from the bouncing and squeeeeing and hugging!) But I am still a Buffy fan. I own DVDs of the entire show, plus Angel, plus the original movie. The box of comics I just gave away was Season 8 and some spin offs. Slayer takes place after all of that.

First I'm going to say, if you're not a Buffy fan, seriously don't bother with this book. You won't understand a lot of what goes on, and while there are cursory explanations given in the book, it's really not meant for people that haven't watched/read the rest of the world. You'd be okay not knowing much about Angel, but you really do need to have watched the TV show of Buffy, especially that last season. While the book takes place after the comics, they're not necessary to understand the plot as that, at least, is explained.

So, for the rest of us Buffy fans, this is a great continuation of the Buffy-verse. Nina is the daughter of Watchers - in fact the daughter of Buffy's first watcher, the one before Giles. Given what befell the Watchers, the ones that are left are kind of antagonistic towards Slayers in general and Buffy in particular. So when Nina becomes a Slayer, her world goes sideways.

The world is mostly the same, but with a twist due to events in the comics. (It's explained. You don't need to have read them.) The book expands on how Slayer powers work, a bit, especially their dreams now that there's more than one of them alive at a time. We do see mentions of familiar characters, with one notable scene where an old favorite appears briefly.

I really enjoyed the book, and I'm eager to read the second half of the duology when it comes out. I need to know how Nina's story ends! The book ended on a subtle cliffhanger; the main conflict has been resolved, and the characters think it's over, but we know it's not. Similar to how many episodes of Buffy ended, actually.

So yeah. If you're a Buffy fan, pick up this book, it's pretty great. If you're not - take a pass. Or start with the TV show and get yourself a new fandom if you're feeling bored!

You can find all my reviews at Goddess in the Stacks.

I'm gonna be honest with you, the first third or so of this book is DULL. Nina, is winy and her personality can be summed up with some serious family issues and a constant hatred of one (in)famous Buffy Summers, and then things finally get interesting and I started to slowly and ever so surely warm up to it over the course of the rest of the book.

It's fun y'all, like genuinely fun, but it's also kinda basic too. It feels like there's a lot of diversity for diversity's sake thrown in like Artemis/Honora (who I COULD have totally rooted for, if y'know, Kiersten White had actually had them together for more than five pages) and Rhys/Cillian who....well we just don't actually know much about them really.Slayer is full of a ton of background characters who unfortunately are sidelined in order for Nina to receive her own arc. The good news is that this is the first book in the series so this problem can be rectified in future books, however the bad news is that sometimes when the inevitable bad things happen and stakes are high for any of the supposed main characters, part of you might be left wondering ‘do I actually care as much as I know I'm meant to?'

It's definitely not all bad though. There's a lot of action, and this is definitely written by someone who is a fan of the Buffyverse thanks to the namedrops of (off the top of my head) Pylea, Angel Investigations, Wesley Wyndam-Pryce and Robin Wood oh and maybe some cameos by none other than Faith Lehane and Buffy Summers herself.

There's definitely the basis for a good series, but an obvious villain and lack of character development for supposed main characters means I can't rate this any higher than a four. Definitely looking forward to seeing where Kiersten White takes this next though.