For the “Buffy” series’ first hardcover novel, Pocket Books makes “Immortal” (October 1999) worthy of the format with cleaner copy than what was found in the paperbacks, particularly the previous error-packed entry, “Obsidian Fate.” Christopher Golden and Nancy Holder, the best “Buffy” authors to this point, take the reins for this Season 3 tale of a vampire who can transfer her essence to a new vampire every time she is staked.
The most memorable part of “Immortal,” though, is that Buffy’s mom is hospitalized and has surgery to remove a lump on her lung. On my first reading, I couldn’t really get into this storyline, because I knew Joyce would turn out to be fine – after all, no mention of her sickness is made in the TV show. On this reading, it plays nicely as a foreshadowing of her brain aneurisms in Season 5 and Buffy’s fear of losing her mother.
Although I doubt the TV writers mined the books for ideas, when reading “Immortal” my confidence in that theory is shaken a bit. Notably, on page 132, Golden and Holder presage a Season 5 episode title, “Listening to Fear.” Buffy is departing Joyce’s hospital room:
“That was when her mother started sobbing. Buffy stopped herself from going to her. Listening to the fear, and maybe the pain, she knew, somehow, that this was not the time for comfort. This was the time for naming the monster.”
As she’s still in high school at this point, the issue of Buffy’s guardianship comes up, and Giles says he’d be honored to be her guardian. Hank Summers’ existence is acknowledged but brushed off, although “Immortal” gives us slightly more insight than the TV show, which generally forgets he exists by this point: He’s a good guy, and Buffy can move in with him if worse comes to worst, but he’s just so busy all the time.
In another example of the books beating the TV show to the punch, Angel reflects on Leah Coleman, a doctor who gave him a smidgen of hope during his rat-eating days in 1944 Manhattan and is now Joyce’s oncologist. This calls to mind “Are You Now or Have You Ever Been?” (“Angel” Season 2, episode 2), when Angel finds in the Hyperion Hotel a woman, Judy, whom he knew in 1952 in L.A. “Immortal’s” peek into Angel’s past is much sparser than that classic episode, but it does lay the groundwork for this type of yarn.
Tergazzi, a demon informant in Sunnydale, reminds me of Merl, a demon whom Angel shakes down for information in “Angel” Seasons 2 and 3. And the Triumvirate – the demon that Veronique aims to resurrect – reminds me of the multi-headed Hellmouth Spawn that breaks through the floor of the library in “Prophecy Girl” (1. 12) and “The Zeppo” (3. 13).
“Immortal” has the series’ usual problems of feeling slightly off from the concurrent events in the TV series. Since Buffy makes a reference to Willow having an “evil twin,” “Immortal” takes place after “Doppelgangland” (3. 16). Since Faith is not mentioned in the book, I place it before “Enemies” (3. 17) – that’s the episode when the gang learns Faith is working for the Mayor, and those two Big Bads become the gang’s focus for most of the rest of Season 3.
We have to assume “Immortal” is one of those quick non-Faith episodes, even though it seems rather epic. That’s the nature of the book format and the fact that Golden and Holder tell such rich backstories about their villains. In this case, it’s the appropriately named Veronique. This unique body-jumping vampire’s story dates back a millennium, but the most interesting aspect is her rivalry with 1862 Slayer Angela Martignetti. As Veronique becomes increasingly unhinged, she conflates Angela and Buffy, suggesting that “the Slayer” is likewise “immortal,” even though each individual Slayer is not.
Angela’s romance with her Watcher, Peter Toscano, adds a wild new wrinkle to Slayer-Watcher dynamics, and the story feels like an embryonic “Tales of the Slayer”; perhaps this was the spark for that later series of short-story collections. “Immortal” is also where Buffy meets the ghost of 19th century American Slayer Lucy Hanover for the first time, as assistance from spirits will be essential to winning the battle against Veronique and the Triumvirate.
Although the conclusive fight is overblown, and while a reader is a step ahead of the characters in understanding the Veronique mystery, “Immortal” is a solid page-turner. It breathes more than Golden and Holder’s previous works, and in a refreshing break from the supernatural, it intriguingly delves into Buffy’s fear of losing her mom – a fear that will come back in full force two seasons later.
Click here for an index of all of John’s “Buffy” and “Angel” reviews.