Endangered Species (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) [Paperback]

Nancy Holder (Author)

Book Description

Series: Buffy the Vampire Slayer | Publication Date: August 4, 2003

When a mysterious hunter asks for his help, a twist of fate offers Angel the chance to atone for his years of evil once and for all -- but only at the cost of his own destruction. Courtesy of The Powers That Be, Cordelia Chase has grown used to her excruciatingly painful visions, but that doesn't mean that they leave her unmoved. So when her latest vision shows her someone she knows, and not just another anonymous stranger, she finds it more than usually disturbing -- especially since the subject of her vision is rogue slayer, Faith. Faith is in jail, but if the vision comes true, that could turn out to be the least of her problems...Then hunter Chaz Escobar shows up at Angel Investigations, asking for their help. He wants to track down his wife, Marianna -- and she's a vampire. Alone with her on a small and distant island, Escobar had been working to find a cure. Before he could succeed, however, she escaped him, and now he suspects that she is the creature stalking Faith. But Escobar has a hidden agenda, and before long Angel, Cordy, Wesley and Gunn discover that his real aim is to rid the world of vampires -- all of them, forever; even those who possess a soul. If Angel is willing to sacrifice himself in order to help the hunter achieve his goal, then his atonement will truly be complete...

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 8 Up-Angel the vampire and his surreal cohorts set out to save one of their compatriots from the clutches of the evil Marianna in this convoluted series entry based on the television spin-off of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The plot and characters will be of interest only to those who are already familiar with the previous books or with the television series. The story does not stand on its own.
Sharon Grover, Arlington County Department of Libraries, VA
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

NANCY HOLDER is the author of numerous Buffy and Angel bestsellers and co-author of The Watcher's Guide volumes One and Two. JEFF MARIOTTE is Senior Editor at DC Comics. In addition to tie-in novels for both Buffy and Angel he is co-author of The Watcher's Guide Volume Two.

Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books (August 4, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743467809
• ISBN-13: 978-0743467803
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #554,738 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hunted into Extinction, October 28, 2002

By 

Marc Ruby™ "The Noh Hare™" (Warren, MI USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Endangered Species (Hardcover)

For Buffy and Angel fans, this year has been a bit lackluster. While I couldn't point to any particular book and say that it was a total flop, nothing comes to mind as really outstanding. Part of the blame no doubt rests with the changes both television series have gone through. It says much that Dark Horse has decided to shift the BTVS comic series to Buffy before Sunnydale. I cannot say that I am sympathetic, but I do understand.

The best of the Buffy books this year is Chris Golden's 'Wisdom of War.' Andy the politest thing one could say about the Angel series this year is that there was nothing one could identify as 'the best.' Now, Nancy Holder and Jeff Mariotte have come to the rescue with their latest, 'Endangered Species.'

The book's plot is something of a tag team action story. There are three teams of bad guys. The first is Marianna Escobar a vampire who runs an elite hunting island and has a plan for making Faith the next animal on the agenda. Next up is Benedicta, made by Drusilla and every bit as crazy. She and her nasty druid sidekick want to raise the original vampire and have little super vampires by it. And no one should leave out Wolfram and Hart, who manage to collect fees from everyone while working their own agenda.

On the good side is the regular team, plus the Host, Fred, and Faith. New faces are Chaz Escobar - the vampire's estranged husband, and Lohiau, an Hawaiian revolutionary and Kahuna. Between kidnappings and holdups, the good guys are every bit as fragmented as their enemies, as everyone careens around trying to assemble the components of a spell that will either destroy all vampires or end the unlives of vampires everywhere.

This is obviously a story heavy on the action and light on character depth and angst, but it is just what the doctor ordered. Even so, Faith gets a lot of attention and Fred makes her first major appearance in an Angel novel. Both characters are handled honestly, although I think Fred's weaknesses are overplayed. So, lots of action, decent character development, and tight, effective writing. Making this the season's must read for Angel fans.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Who is the Real Endangered Species Here?, February 3, 2003

By 

J. Boccanfuso (United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Endangered Species (Hardcover)

Endangered Species is entertaining and action-packed fun. Not surprisingly, it's very high on the action and fighting, but pretty low on the character development. But in this story, it seems like it doesn't really matter.

The gang is out patrolling one night when they are cornered by mutated demons... and soon rescued by their creator, Chaz Escobar. Chaz reveals that he was on his private island with his wife, Marianna, who was recently turned into a vampire. The two loved to hunt; they sponsored special gatherings in which a breed of demon, or even human, would be the prey. Marianna, however, escaped from the island and Chaz believes she may be in Los Angeles fulfilling her deepest wish: to capture and then hunt a Slayer. The Slayer in question is Faith, who is still serving her sentence in prison.

Chaz soon reveals, though, that he is searching for a way to cure his wife of her vampirism. To do so he needs the Book of Interregnum, the most evil book ever made. But the way he plans on curing Marianna isn't what's expected: he wants to destroy all vampires. And he's not the only one after the Book... another vampire (incidentally sired by Drusilla) is looking for it to raise the Beast of the First Blood... AKA the first vampire.

Endangered Species has several high points: the return of Faith, who was been absent from the Buffy-verse for years now, several flashbacks to Darla and Angelus's past, and a wonderfully written Hawaiian character who comes to Angel's rescue. There are also a fair share of low points: Faith is actually hardly in the novel, the final battle drags on for too long, and most of the outcomes are very predictable.

Overall, I would recommend Endangered Species. If you're a die-hard Angel fan, you might want to get it right away. If you're just a reader who enjoys the novels, you may want to wait until this one's available in paperback.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars What Should Be Endangered is This Lackluster Book, October 27, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Endangered Species (Hardcover)

This book had the potential to be very interesting, but it did not live up to this potential in the slightest. It baffles me that the publishers choose this particular book to be published in hardcover no less!

The main plot sounds interesting enough. Enter a wicked vampire "queen" that was once a chaste nun(much like pre-vamp Drusilla) with aspirations of world domination via mating with the beast that is the origin of all vampires on Earth. Team that with a world-class hunter hoping to find a cure for his beautiful, vampire wife--or at least take revenge on all vampires for the tragedy that befell his wife. Add Angel and friends--even rogue slayer Faith into the mix and it still ends up being one big snoozefest.

First of all, the character assassination of Angel in this book is the worst I have ever seen in these tie-in novels. One minute he is saying Buffy is his soulmate and true love. The next he is drooling over how beautiful Cordelia is. And just to make sure everyone is as confused as possible, Angel then mentions his obsession with Darla as well. Geez--why didn't they throw in some more women to the mix so that everyone can see how fickle Angel really is. Why focus on building a good storyline when you can just mention in every paragraph how many women Angel has had in his life? The authors also tried to pick up where the season 2 episode "Darla" left off. In flashbacks they try to show what happened with Darla after Angel got his soul back. This was the most horrific characterization of Angel ever! Totally implausible and inconsistent. If Angel was written like this on the actual show I would never watch an episode. Terrible!

The next problem was how little Faith was actually in this book. One of the reasons I picked up this book was because of the lack of Faith on the show the last couple of years. While the writing of Faith seemed pretty consistent with the show(unlike Angel), Faith was not really used to the fullest potential. She was actually in the book very little. And when she was it was usually to say she was a slayer and strong. Big deal. Another wasted opportunity.

The other major problem was the lack of a good climax to the story and a boring ending. The villians were original and showed promise, but the whole book felt like it was building to some great finish, but it never got there. The book was set at a sluggish pace and then the "grand" finish was in a few pages and was very anti-climatic. Usually these type of books suffer from a convulted plot so dense with characters one needs a chart to keep track. This book was quite simple to follow, it was just too boring to be worth caring about.

So, in closing I do not recommend this book. I gave it 2 stars because the premise was an interesting one, but it never paid off. Save yourself the time and money. If you read the summary on the dust jacket, you will basically know all you need to know about this book. Very disappointing.