Sins of the Father

 Sins of the Father

-Christopher Golden
-289 Pages
-November 1999
  Summary: Buffy's old boyfriend from Hemery High in LA, Pike, makes a surprise appearance in Sunnydale, much to the everyone's shock, particularly Buffy's. Only Pike hasn't come to catch up with Buffy; he's being pursued by a rock demon known as Grayhewn. Pike had originally killed the demon's mate after it had killed his friend and now the demon wants Pike dead in the most painful way possible. As soon as Pike makes his appearance though, Buffy struggles to deal with her old feelings for Pike as well as her love for Angel, creating nothing but confusion within herself. Meanwhile, Giles appears to be dating a new teacher named Miss Blaisdell. But since Giles has been seeing her he seems to waver in and out of consciousness and doesn't appear to care at all about Buffy or her struggles. Miss Blaisdell, as it turns out, is working for a man from Giles' past, a man from his very personal past, who wants nothing more than to painfully torture the Watcher and make him suffer.
   
  Rating: 4.5/5
   
  Review: I loved the idea of bringing Pike into the mix. Well... loved into until Buffy started to wonder about her feelings for him as well as Angel, and then I didn't like it as much. However, it was nice for an author to bring bits of the Buffy movie into the current series. I may be one of the few people that actually enjoyed the movie as well as the series. Anyway, Chris Golden managed to combine the angst and teenage despair as well as humor and darkness that the series combines, and it always amazes me how well he does it. One thing I was slightly skeptical about was bringing Giles' vamped father. It was a little too close to the series and I felt if he were wrong about this then it'd cause a big continuum problem with the series. Fortunately, he opted for the easy way out and made "Giles' father" into a shapeshifter so it had a decent ending that didn't infringe on the series. Good call.
   
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