Angel: The Longest Night

Buffyverse Novels #71

by Pierce Askegren, Scott Ciencin, Denise Ciencin

Even if it takes an eternity, he will make amends...

FROM DUSK UNTIL DAWN

December - sure, 'tis the season and all that, but evil generally isn't up for a holiday. And December 21 - well, that's usually the winter solstice.

A.K.A. the longest night of the year.

It's easy enough to see why this night would practically be the undead's New Year's Eve, which means, visions or no, it's a crunch time for Angel Investigations.

Now, in the first-ever Angel short story collection, follow our gang hour by hour, evil by evil. From twilight to daylight, Angel, Cordelia, Wesley, Gunn and Fred have to keep the forces of darkness at bay - even when black magick has a head start...

With Contributions from:

Pierce Askegren, Scott and Denise Ciencin, Doranna Durgin, Nancy Holder, Christie Golden, Christopher Golden, Jeff Marriotte, Yvonne Navarro and Emily Oz

Genres: Fantasy, Vampires, Fiction, Young Adult, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Urban Fantasy, Supernatural

412 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published December 2, 2002

About the author

As a young man, Mr. Askegren took part in his parents high-wire circus act until an accident stopped that career for him at age 11. He acquired a love of comic books and of writing in general, which he turned into a profession. In addition to the Alias book, he wrote several books based on comic book series such as Spider-Man and Iron Man. He died of a heart attack at age 51.

Reviews

[Craig · Rating 4 out of 5]

I believe that this was the only anthology of short fiction based on the Angel television series that Pocket published in their long run with the Buffy the Vampire Slayer universe. It contains a dozen stories, the authors being Pierce Askegren, Scott and Denise Ciencin, Doranna Durgin, Nancy Holder, Christopher Golden, Christie Golden (not the same person as the preceding), Emily Oz (I believe that's a pseudonym), Jeff Mariotte, and Yvonne Navarro, almost all of whom also wrote Buffy or Angel novels. (Annoyingly, no editor is credited on the book.) The book has a very neat concept, but it completely falls apart when you try to analyze it. The idea is that the book is set on the Winter Solstice (hence the title), and there's one adventure per hour starting at sunset at six P.M. and concluding with sunrise. As can be expected, some of the stories are quite good and some less so, but there's just no way that all 405 pages transpired in one night... Nonetheless, this one is probably my favorite of the Angel books, and we get to see different sides of some of sidekick characters in intriguing pairings. It was an ambitious undertaking, and a fun read. Happy Holidays!

[clumsyplankton · Rating 3 out of 5]

When I first read this and the other angel books as a kid I seemed to love them but now they just aren’t as impressive as I once thought they were

[Maggie Carter · Rating 5 out of 5]

“If you exist, you have reason to celebrate. If you exist, you have the right to renewal. No one can take that away from you.”

I’ll be honest, the seasonal demon orgy hit me a little out of left field, but I got a caroling Angel out of it, so.

Give it a read if you want the Angel Investigations team to give you a warm hug and remind you of the true meaning of the holidays: love, light, and Cordelia Chase.

[Caroline · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think this is the only Btvs or Angel book that followed a short story structure depicting the events of one night with multiple writers writing each of the short stories, some of them cross-referenced but most are stand-alone, I did like the short story expanding on Cangel friendship/relationship, but overall this book was meh.

[Rebecca · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unfortunately not much. To be honest, I am not much of a fan of short story collections. For me there is never enough substance to them, it's bare bones with no meat on them and I always end up feeling a little bit short changed with them. Sometimes they feel they could have led to something if they have been a bit longer and padded out but the majority of them are just quite pointless.

This collection of short stories has done little to change my mind. There was one or two in there that were not half bad for what they were, but some of them even for short stories were actually quite bad.

It was based on the night of the winter solstice which is the longest night of the year - and sorry for the punning, but this book was actually starting to feel it as well due to how bad some of the stories actually were, even though they were "short" stories they felt like they would never end - not a good sign in anyone's book!

The authors (aside from Christie Golden and Emily Oz) have all had tie-in novels for either Buffy or Angel and had the characters down okay. In fact there was one which had a character which had a part to play in one of the Buffy/Angel crossover novels Monster Island later. But aside from that some of the story lines were down right ridiculous and others were just completely pointless.

I really could not justify giving it any more than 2 stars and for me this is even for an Angel fan one I would consider giving a miss unless you are completest and feel like you have to read them all like me!

[Cherilyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

J'ai lis ce roman en français. - C'est un roman d'histoires courtes qui décrit les activités d'Angel Investigations pendant les premières heures du solstice d'hiver - Je ne peux pas attendre de lire la conclusion dans le Volume II.

J'ai fini le Volume II en decembre - je l'aime - pas beaucoup mais c'était bon.

[MarylineD · Rating 4 out of 5]

really good story