MY THOUGHTS Review of Revenant (by me).

I read Revenant a Buffy fiction book by Mel Odom about a week ago and I recommend it.

It's set in late-ish season 3 (the gang knows that the Mayor is evil) and this is the product description taken from amazon.com;

When a Chinese gang hits Sunnydale, racial tensions in the community are sparked. Buffy has seen the baddies shake down Willy the Snitch, so naturally her Slayer senses are up. But to Willow, the situation poses a more personal threat. Her new friend Jia Li has been feeling the backlash from this cross-cultural hostility -- and it's tearing her family apart. Jia remains true to her ancient cultural heritage, but her brother, the angry, outspoken Lok, is ready to toss out old Chinese customs for the modern American lifestyle. And he's willing to use the occult for just that purpose.

Suddenly, a beautiful martial-arts warrior arrives on the scene. It's impossible to tell where her allegiance lies, but Xander -- whose romances are becoming habitually complicated -- is smitten, Giles is in full research mode, and before long, Buffy is wondering who's behind the gang warfare. Is supernatural evil brewing?
So, basically, one of Willow's friends have a troubled brother, Buffy is a target, Xander has a mayor crush on another... special women (poor Xander) and another Big Bad wants to rule the world.

What I love about this book is how the writer ”torture” the readers. We can be reading about how character A gets into trouble, and when he/she is about to get shot, Odom switches perspective, takes us across town and we read about character B who is doing something entirely safe. Sounds annoying doesn't it? But then characters B gets in trouble too and is about to get his/her butt kicked then the scene changes to character C, who laters get in trouble. Then we change back to character A, our blood still pumping, and we get a lot of action. Then it calms down for a bit, and we get ”deeper” moments.

I'm not sure if I'm explaining the "torture-writing" well, but trust me, it's a good thing. I did want to hit the writer a couple of times, but I never felt like putting the book down.

And although I would put this book in the action category, it has a plot and character development. We're not always thrown from one action sequence to another, there is some talk and feelings as well. For example, there are some bittersweet Buffy & Angel moments in there (with more handholding than on the show, but still nice realistic moments) and some friction between Xander & Buffy.

Another thing I like with this book that in every stanza/paragraph, we only get one characters point of view. I find it soothing not having to change from one characters perspective and thoughts to another ones within a few sentences.

I wouldn't say that this book will change my life, but it's an easy read. It's a feel good book, with adrenaline pumping (the fight scenes are very well written), some romance, endearing character moments and humor. I do wish that there would have been some friction between Xander & Oz in there ”scenes” tough, because of the cheating. But Oz is a cool guy, so I guess he's over it.

Also, Faith-fans, I should tell you that we see nothing of Faith in this book, in case you were thinking about buying the book, hoping to see Faith. I'm not even sure if she's mentioned.

Since I've only read about 5 of these non-canonical fiction Buffy books, I can't compare Revenant to that many Buffy-books, but I say; Read it.