Spike & Dru: Pretty Maids All In A Row
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This is by far the best Buffy read I have come across. It delves into the lives of Spike a.k.a William the Bloody and Drusilla, the insane seer turned vampire before our beloved show came about.
It is alot darker then most books might read, but it has a certain quality, as I'm sure is a tribute to the writer, that is captivating, making this book a must-read for all Buffy fans.
The journey with which the two vampires set themselves on, is a long one, but time does not matter to them as they are immortal. Spike, who has always felt desperately inferior to Angelus, although he would never truly admit it, wants to give Drusilla the Necklace of the Brisings, which will allow her to take on any shape she chooses, as well as give her a, albeit faint, reflection.
The necklace is for her eightieth year as a vampire, and it is a tradition that is begun by Angelus, back in the days when he was soulless. But what begins as a simple quest for a present for his beloved, turns into a murderously bloody journey, that ends with many casualties on the side of good.
If you are a Buffy fan, particularly a Spike fan, this is the book for you. You cannot continue loving the show, until you've read this, as it gives some insight into the background of everybody's favourite vampire.
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Highly Entertaining and Very Well Written
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i have read many of the other books from the buffy the vampire slayer series and have had my different opinions on all of them,but i always preffered reading of the past (e.g 1880).
i saw 'Spike and dru-pretty maids all in a row' advertised on the interenet and wanted to buy it striaght away as Spike+Dru are my favourite characters from the buffy series. i was glad to see that it was written in the past of 1940 and hoped it would be as good a read as i was expecting it to be.
I was first glad that many main buffy characters were not in the book at all, as i don't really find them much of an interest to read about, as i always seem to get bored of reading about Buffy's battle scences. Once i read this book, i was glad that it had been as high as my expectations for it were.
Now, i'm just 13, but i have to say, i'm not really of the faint hearted and enjoyed this book and its horror scences very much.
i was very glad to see Spike and Dru together and the way they had been written in was very good and detailed by Christopher Golden, who i very much agree is an amazing author. i would highly recommend this book to any Spike and Dru fans who love a bit of horror to read about, but it is not really recommended to Buffy fans who prefer reading of modern day and Buffy's battle scences.
it is very well written and strechs well from day to day and scence to scence. Definatly a 5 Star Book :) Gemma Crowley xx
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What Spike and Dru did during the War (World War II)
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When a Buffy the Vampire Slayer novel appears in hardback you know it has to be pretty special, even if Buffy herself is never even mentioned in the book, as is the case with Christopher Golden's "Spike and Dru: Pretty Maids All In A Row." The "Pretty Maids" of the title are the Slayers in waiting, those young girls who have been identified by the Watchers Council as potential Slayer and trained so that when the time comes they can handle the responsibility. Hitler's Germany is about to invade France and for once in her un-dead life Drusilla has something in mind for her birthday: The necklace of the Brisings, known also as Freyja's Strand. Spike has promised her the trinket, which is supposedly in the possession of an ice-demon named Skyrmir, who is too powerful for the vampires to overcome. But Skymir is willing to make a deal: if the vampires can find out the names of all the Slayers in waiting and kill them, Dru will get her happy birthday gift. The Slayer in this novel is Sophie Carstensen, a native of Denmark, who is forced to fleeter country when her Watcher, Yanna, is also a seer. However, with the outbreak of war on the continent, all of the Vampires in Britain head for the battlefield where the pickings will be easy, and the Council orders the Chosen One to follow them, even though the bullets that cannot kill the vampires can certainly kill the Slayer. Meanwhile, Spike and Dru are starting to knock off the pretty maids one by one. When the Council sends the Slayer after the two vampires while the demon Skymir attacks the very stronghold of the Watchers with his horde, Golden's narrative arrives at a most fateful confrontation. I had a little bit of trouble getting into the book, but once the situation was laid out for me I was hooked and the conclusion is as good as anything you will find in any other Buffy novel. Readers have to remember that the Spike they encounter within these pages is the Spike of the old days, paired up with Drusilla, and not the character's current persona on the television series. His characterization is much stronger in the second half of the book than the first, but it is Drusilla that is really fleshed out in this book. Golden provides an insane sort of logic to her wild visions and ramblings much more so than the series ever had time to develop. Sophie the Vampire Slayer is not Buffy to be sure, but she is certainly a Slayer appropriate to time and place with a very unique relationship with her Watcher. Plus she uses the family broadsword to cut off the heads of the vamps when she dusts them. There is even a reference or two to the Giles family's association with the Council for those who like to see the past tied up neatly with the present. I am one of those readers who think that the very best Buffy stories are penned by Golden and Nancy Holder writing in tandem, but each has proven capable of hitting the mark without the other. "Pretty Maids All In A Row" is certain Golden's best solo effort, richly deserving the hardback treatment. Final warning: do not expect this story to neatly mesh with the mythology of Spike and Dru's background as revealed on this year's cross-over episodes.
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Unrelenting
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Before I settle in to critique, I want to say that this is a very well written book. Golden's talents are well showcased here. However, the book is plagued with problems which writing cannot conceal. To my disappointment, this really isn't a Buffy book. Other than the appearance of Spike, Dru and the Watchers there is no real Buffy presence. Which makes sense, all the action in the book takes place in World War 2. Nowadays, with Spike become the hero that he has, he is a popular subject. But this isn't the complicated hero Spike, or the archly evil Spike - It's the basicly unpleasant and gruesome Spike. Ditto for Dru, who lacks all her usually chilling charm. If it weren't for the slayer mythos that it borrows, the this volume could be any occult serial killer book that has ever been written. And serial killers are what we have here. Spike & Dru are remarkably unsympathetic characters. At first their antics add a bid of humour, but as the grotesque body count mounts Spike's nastiness and Drusilla's evil hippy princess act lose their luster. For the most minor of reasons they set out on a slay ride of horrific proportions. As is often the case with the serial killer genre, the book presents an unrelieved picture of violence against women. There were points where I felt that Golden was using female people as plot gimmicks to make Spike & Dru look worse. We tolerate the violence in Buffy's books because it often serves a purpose. In this book the violence is sadly unanswered. As such this is truly noir writing. The plot gets grimmer and grimmer, with no letup or relief. Just about everyone dies, and few, if any, of the deaths serve a purpose other than to upset our digestion. While Buffy herself is a difficult heroine, mixing violence and anti-intellectualism in with her positive traits, Spike and Dru are simply Hannibal Lecter without class. Hopefully this is a short term aberration.
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Good, but not great.
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I enjoyed this book. I pretty much enjoy anything to do with the Buffy-verse. It's a decent (albeit rather contrived) storyline, the characters are pretty cool (well Spike is anyway) and I read it in a couple of sittings. On the flip side though, there are inconsistancies. Most notable Spike's constant bragging in the TV series (well up until he fell in love with Buffy anyway) about his killing of two former slayers. This story kinda uses that idea then blatently forgets about it. If Spike and Dru had really done everything this book claims they had then surely Giles would have known more about them from the Watcher's records when they first showed up back in Sunnydale in series two? Anyway, quibbles aside, it's still a good read, especially for someone not too hung up on details.
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