What do you think?
Rate this book
The Angel Chronicles #3
Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Angel Chronicles, Vol. 3
""She's stronger than any Slayer you've faced. Force won't get it done. You gotta work from the inside. To kill this girl...you have to love her."" For Buffy the Vampire Slayer, birthdays aren't all parties and cake -- hers tend to involve a life-or-death battle with a big evil. Her seventeenth celebration isn't an exception. While Buffy's friends organize a festive gathering in honor of the special day, Spike and Drusilla are planning their own surprise party for the Slayer -- with a devastating demon as the grand finale.
But a passionate night with Angel changes everything. Suddenly, Buffy must deal with "two" forms of ultimate evil: the almost-indestructible Judge -- and the legendary vampire Angelus, who is determined to exact his special brand of revenge on the young woman who showed him true love.
"Now, collected for the first time, are three stories from the hit TV series chronicling Angel's darker side."
But a passionate night with Angel changes everything. Suddenly, Buffy must deal with "two" forms of ultimate evil: the almost-indestructible Judge -- and the legendary vampire Angelus, who is determined to exact his special brand of revenge on the young woman who showed him true love.
"Now, collected for the first time, are three stories from the hit TV series chronicling Angel's darker side."
Library Binding
First published August 1, 1999
3 people are currently reading
578 people want to read
About the author
Nancy Holder
352 books2,407 followersNancy Holder, New York Times Bestselling author of the WICKED Series, has just published CRUSADE - the first book in a new vampire series cowritten with Debbie Viguie. The last book her her Possession series is set to release in March 2011.
Nancy was born in Los Altos, California, and her family settled for a time in Walnut Creek. Her father, who taught at Stanford, joined the navy and the family traveled throughout California and lived in Japan for three years. When she was sixteen, she dropped out of high school to become a ballet dancer in Cologne, Germany, and later relocated to Frankfurt Am Main.
Eventually she returned to California and graduated summa cum laude from the University of California at San Diego with a degree in Communications. Soon after, she began to write; her first sale was a young adult romance novel titled Teach Me to Love.
Nancy’s work has appeared on the New York Times, USA Today, LA Times, amazon.com, LOCUS, and other bestseller lists. A four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award from the Horror Writers Association, she has also received accolades from the American Library Association, the American Reading Association, the New York Public Library, and Romantic Times.
She and Debbie Viguié co-authored the New York Times bestselling series Wicked for Simon and Schuster. They have continued their collaboration with the Crusade series, also for Simon and Schuster, and the Wolf Springs Chronicles for Delacorte (2011.) She is also the author of the young adult horror series Possessions for Razorbill. She has sold many novels and book projects set in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Saving Grace, Hellboy, and Smallville universes.
She has sold approximately two hundred short stories and essays on writing and popular culture. Her anthology, Outsiders, co-edited with Nancy Kilpatrick, was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award in 2005.
She teaches in the Stonecoast MFA in Creative Writing Program, offered through the University of Southern Maine. She has previously taught at UCSD and has served on the Clarion Board of Directors.
She lives in San Diego, California, with her daughter Belle, their two Corgis, Panda and Tater; and their cats, David and Kittnen Snow. She and Belle are active in Girl Scouts and dog obedience training.
Nancy was born in Los Altos, California, and her family settled for a time in Walnut Creek. Her father, who taught at Stanford, joined the navy and the family traveled throughout California and lived in Japan for three years. When she was sixteen, she dropped out of high school to become a ballet dancer in Cologne, Germany, and later relocated to Frankfurt Am Main.
Eventually she returned to California and graduated summa cum laude from the University of California at San Diego with a degree in Communications. Soon after, she began to write; her first sale was a young adult romance novel titled Teach Me to Love.
Nancy’s work has appeared on the New York Times, USA Today, LA Times, amazon.com, LOCUS, and other bestseller lists. A four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award from the Horror Writers Association, she has also received accolades from the American Library Association, the American Reading Association, the New York Public Library, and Romantic Times.
She and Debbie Viguié co-authored the New York Times bestselling series Wicked for Simon and Schuster. They have continued their collaboration with the Crusade series, also for Simon and Schuster, and the Wolf Springs Chronicles for Delacorte (2011.) She is also the author of the young adult horror series Possessions for Razorbill. She has sold many novels and book projects set in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Saving Grace, Hellboy, and Smallville universes.
She has sold approximately two hundred short stories and essays on writing and popular culture. Her anthology, Outsiders, co-edited with Nancy Kilpatrick, was nominated for the Bram Stoker Award in 2005.
She teaches in the Stonecoast MFA in Creative Writing Program, offered through the University of Southern Maine. She has previously taught at UCSD and has served on the Clarion Board of Directors.
She lives in San Diego, California, with her daughter Belle, their two Corgis, Panda and Tater; and their cats, David and Kittnen Snow. She and Belle are active in Girl Scouts and dog obedience training.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
June 23, 2022
This is the third book of three prose adaptations of Angel-centric scripts from the first seasons of the Buffy television show. Nancy Holder wrote this and the first one, but Richie Tankersley Cusick did the second. This one contains the three main Angelus stories from the second season, Surprise from Marti Noxon's script, Innocence by Joss Whedon himself, and Passion by Ty King. Holder doesn't add much in the way of motivation or back story (she didn't need to!) and does a good job of transcribing the events. Her writing is clear and concise and gives you a slightly different perspective without the music and actors and other such distractions. (...poor Jenny...)
January 1, 2026
i’m only giving it 4⭐️ because i hate Angel as Angelus.
i can’t wait for him to get his soul back.
i can’t wait for him to get his soul back.
April 12, 2018
5 🌟
Nice to see stories if Angel as Angelus. RIP Jenny Calendar. Sad that Buffy has to go through her boyfriend being a jerk. Glad that they were able to Ward against him and stop the Judge. Hope Angel gets his soul back.
Nice to see stories if Angel as Angelus. RIP Jenny Calendar. Sad that Buffy has to go through her boyfriend being a jerk. Glad that they were able to Ward against him and stop the Judge. Hope Angel gets his soul back.
May 23, 2020
It's the novelization of the episode where Angel reverts back to Angelus, except it has more words.
If you like to read rather than see, this one's for you. If you rather like to see than read, don't bother with this and just watch the episode.
If you like to read rather than see, this one's for you. If you rather like to see than read, don't bother with this and just watch the episode.
August 19, 2013
Another great novelisation of three Buffy episodes, this time covering the heartbreaking time when Angel lost his soul and killed Jenny Calender. I really enjoy these little revisits to the Buffy universe and as each chronicle dosn't take much time to read, it seems like the first time I watched them.
January 7, 2025
The third and last volume of The Angel Chronicles ends while Buffy is still in its second season which is the one let down.
The episodes adapted are "Surprise" by Marni Noxon, "Innocence" written by Joss Whedon and "Passion" by Ty King. These are adapted for novelization by Nancy Holder.
For those who have never watched Buffy, you should probably at least try to watch up to the actual season 2 episode of "Innocence" before continuing to read some of this review even if I try to be as spoiler-free as possible.
The last two books were more of the start of a relationship with the few drawbacks of learning how to trust one another but still being in that very much serious first love relationship. This last one focuses mostly on the theme of when you thought nothing could be more perfect...it becomes the most painful time in your life.
Most people know basic Buffy lore about Angel, the vampire with a soul. He use to be one of the most evil vampires, sadistic yet charismatic, until the day he was cursed with a soul by Gypsies.
Filled with angst and regret, no longer Angelus, he fled to North America and stayed low until the day he crossed paths with Buffy Summers, the newest in a long line of vampire slayers. Now most curses can be broken with true love but this was one curse where love would be its undoing...
One moment of true happiness and Angel's soul would be ripped away from him and return him to Angelus once again. Most people don't ever know true happiness at all so one moment where you forget all the worst things you ever did in your life are rare so imagine how terrible it is to build up a relationship so built on love and watch it fall in such heartbreaking fashion...
As a teenage girl watching these play out on television and then reading them as an adult with a little more insight into the character's inner thoughts is devastating as much as it was then. It is a good thing there are a few quips to add some lightness to the tone or else you would be a sobbing puddle melting tears into your ice cream gallon...
Volume three of The Angel Chronicles has the prologue and epilogue after a major change in Angel's character to Angelus to make it seem exactly like two different people and that takes not just writing skill but acting talent as well. Even with Buffy and Angel being that main couple, there is still the big love...shape...going on with Willow, Xander, Cordelia, Oz and then the dynamic between Angelus, Spike and Drusilla.
As confusing as it may sound, everything is weaved together perfectly and I will say no more because I have said too much already without even spoiling the most tragic aspect of all so if you know then you know...
The episodes adapted are "Surprise" by Marni Noxon, "Innocence" written by Joss Whedon and "Passion" by Ty King. These are adapted for novelization by Nancy Holder.
For those who have never watched Buffy, you should probably at least try to watch up to the actual season 2 episode of "Innocence" before continuing to read some of this review even if I try to be as spoiler-free as possible.
The last two books were more of the start of a relationship with the few drawbacks of learning how to trust one another but still being in that very much serious first love relationship. This last one focuses mostly on the theme of when you thought nothing could be more perfect...it becomes the most painful time in your life.
Most people know basic Buffy lore about Angel, the vampire with a soul. He use to be one of the most evil vampires, sadistic yet charismatic, until the day he was cursed with a soul by Gypsies.
Filled with angst and regret, no longer Angelus, he fled to North America and stayed low until the day he crossed paths with Buffy Summers, the newest in a long line of vampire slayers. Now most curses can be broken with true love but this was one curse where love would be its undoing...
One moment of true happiness and Angel's soul would be ripped away from him and return him to Angelus once again. Most people don't ever know true happiness at all so one moment where you forget all the worst things you ever did in your life are rare so imagine how terrible it is to build up a relationship so built on love and watch it fall in such heartbreaking fashion...
As a teenage girl watching these play out on television and then reading them as an adult with a little more insight into the character's inner thoughts is devastating as much as it was then. It is a good thing there are a few quips to add some lightness to the tone or else you would be a sobbing puddle melting tears into your ice cream gallon...
Volume three of The Angel Chronicles has the prologue and epilogue after a major change in Angel's character to Angelus to make it seem exactly like two different people and that takes not just writing skill but acting talent as well. Even with Buffy and Angel being that main couple, there is still the big love...shape...going on with Willow, Xander, Cordelia, Oz and then the dynamic between Angelus, Spike and Drusilla.
As confusing as it may sound, everything is weaved together perfectly and I will say no more because I have said too much already without even spoiling the most tragic aspect of all so if you know then you know...
April 18, 2018
I’m giving this one four stars, though as far as straightforward novelizations go this one will probably be tough to beat. It’s not really a surprise, as reliable author Nancy Holder was tasked with combining three of the ten best episodes of the series (that also fit very well together) into one installment.
I recently saw a website picking the best season of every famous tv show and even before opening it I knew season 2 of Buffy would be their choice (and it was their choice). I think most fans would have it as their consensus choice as it featured the great villains of Spike and Drusilla and later Angelus. While season 3 (Faith, the Mayor and graduation) was every bit as excellent it lacked the gut punch the end of season 2 had.
Three of the four best episodes of the season are revisited in Angel Chronicles: Volume 3 with the only one missing being the season finale. The first two are episodes 13 and 14 which were the rare “to be continued” two parter and the last was episode 17 which had the pay off to the prior two. Here you’ve got Angel and Buffy’s last perfect night together, the switch to Angelus and the biggest death of a central character yet on the show (and for my money the best done death outside of “The Body”).
The two episodes skipped through on the way to Passion were an Oz then Xander centered stories which while fun episodes were easily enough skipped with one line of exposition by Holder (“since then Willow had gotten a boyfriend”).
The reason this only gets four stars is that while the source material is awesome and the execution is spot on, as with all of these there’s not much added to what we already saw on the screen. There’s 2 pages of prologue and two pages of epilogue that frame the boom but don’t add to it and any additional benefit is in characters’ inner monologues which are fairly sparse. In other words, for die yards only.
I recently saw a website picking the best season of every famous tv show and even before opening it I knew season 2 of Buffy would be their choice (and it was their choice). I think most fans would have it as their consensus choice as it featured the great villains of Spike and Drusilla and later Angelus. While season 3 (Faith, the Mayor and graduation) was every bit as excellent it lacked the gut punch the end of season 2 had.
Three of the four best episodes of the season are revisited in Angel Chronicles: Volume 3 with the only one missing being the season finale. The first two are episodes 13 and 14 which were the rare “to be continued” two parter and the last was episode 17 which had the pay off to the prior two. Here you’ve got Angel and Buffy’s last perfect night together, the switch to Angelus and the biggest death of a central character yet on the show (and for my money the best done death outside of “The Body”).
The two episodes skipped through on the way to Passion were an Oz then Xander centered stories which while fun episodes were easily enough skipped with one line of exposition by Holder (“since then Willow had gotten a boyfriend”).
The reason this only gets four stars is that while the source material is awesome and the execution is spot on, as with all of these there’s not much added to what we already saw on the screen. There’s 2 pages of prologue and two pages of epilogue that frame the boom but don’t add to it and any additional benefit is in characters’ inner monologues which are fairly sparse. In other words, for die yards only.
April 28, 2020
Buffy and Angel are so melodramatic in Surprise. I mean, I *knew* that, even when I first saw it at 10, but the older I get, the more dramatic they come across to me. I find my time rereading the episode just killing time until Innocence. Angel became so much more interesting when he turned evil.
My fave story in this, however, is Passion. This is the first episode in all of Buffy when we get to see how real the stakes are (pun intended.) Buffy's friends and allies can and *will* die sometimes. And those repercussions will be felt. I remember thinking from Surprise up until Passion, which aired around a month later, that maybe Angel was faking it or there'd be a quick fix. Passion proved that he was well and truly evil in ways that Innocence only hinted.
The only thing I don't get about the episode novelization is that no reference is made about episodes in between Innocence and Passion. Jenny thinks in one scene that she and Giles had not talked since he froze her out after her betrayal was brought to light, but they spoke numerous times in Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered. Just a random aside that threw me while I read the story.
My fave story in this, however, is Passion. This is the first episode in all of Buffy when we get to see how real the stakes are (pun intended.) Buffy's friends and allies can and *will* die sometimes. And those repercussions will be felt. I remember thinking from Surprise up until Passion, which aired around a month later, that maybe Angel was faking it or there'd be a quick fix. Passion proved that he was well and truly evil in ways that Innocence only hinted.
The only thing I don't get about the episode novelization is that no reference is made about episodes in between Innocence and Passion. Jenny thinks in one scene that she and Giles had not talked since he froze her out after her betrayal was brought to light, but they spoke numerous times in Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered. Just a random aside that threw me while I read the story.
October 13, 2020
Chronicle 3: the hardest one to get through. I had trouble with these three episodes on the tv series; even harder to read about. Buffy loses her virginity to Angel on her 17th birthday which, because of true happiness, Angel then loses his soul which turns him back to the evil Angelus. Angelus decides to start killing off Buffy’s friends and family before going after her. This book doesn’t end happy but because I was an avid watcher, I know what happens so I feel a little better ending the Angel Chronicles.
January 3, 2023
My god, I absolutely adored this. I mean, it's probably the easiest way to make an excellent Buffy book - and that's to literally just adapt three of the best and most tense episodes of the show (Surprise, Innocence, and Passion). I thought they translated perfectly to the page, the author obviously understands the character and the show well enough to give us good insight into their thought processes (something that doesn't always happen in the novelisations!!), and the stories function really well as a three-piece. EXCELLENT STUFF.
January 20, 2021
Angelus was always one of my favorite things about "BtVS", and probably started me on a long path of love for "bad boys". Angel was great but Angelus... *Drools* So, yeah... Still fan-girling over here, HARD. This book covers three of my favorite episodes pertaining to Buffy/Angel, thus I'm rating it strictly out of my 15year old self's obsession with all things Angel/Angelus.
March 3, 2024
Same opinion as the other two volumes but I think this was the best one. When Angel turns back into Angelus we actually get to read about what he is thinking. It’s some of the saddest moments in the TV show and I think it was written really well, it clutched at my heart strings and I felt the grief of those involved.
September 9, 2022
It was amazing
Honestly the book is amazing, not to thrilled on how it ended but I enjoyed it, I may only be eleven and there may be some stuff that I had to skip because it wasn't really appropriate for me but other than that it was really good!
Honestly the book is amazing, not to thrilled on how it ended but I enjoyed it, I may only be eleven and there may be some stuff that I had to skip because it wasn't really appropriate for me but other than that it was really good!
February 5, 2018
This one covers when Angel finds his happy place
September 19, 2023
I really loved this one. It showcased the sweetness of Angel and the pure evil of Angelus really well. It is a great collection of episodes and well written.
April 24, 2025
3.5 stars.
September 1, 2015
This is the third and final volume in 'The Angel Chronicles.' This volume is made up of stories based on three series two episodes. Surprise, which is later on in the series sees Angel lose his soul and turn into an evil vampire again. I always found this episode very sad and preferred the earlier ones. Passion I thought had an interesting story to it even though it is very sad. Like the other volumes I would recommend this one if you are a fan of the show. Now after finishing all of these I plan to watch the show all over again from the beginning.
March 27, 2008
if you've seen the shows, you've read this book. basically takes all of the dialogue verbatim and then puts narrative around it. i mean, it's buffy so it's not a total waste, but you're better off watching the tv show.
December 28, 2009
Novelization of three episodes of BtVS that tells how Angel reverted back to his old self, Angelus, because of one true happiness with Buffy.
August 10, 2010
Finished reading the novelizations of the episodes "Angel", "Reptile Boy" and "Lie to Me" -- will now save this for release on SlayerCruise 2005 (I leave in two days!!!)
Want to read
August 21, 2010Note: This book is the third volume. Darned if I know why the official listing doesn't have this info.
February 25, 2019
Definitely didn't need 3 volumes of Angel novelizations
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews