Slayer Book Review

Slayer by Kiersten White

From Goodreads: Into every generation a Slayer is born…

Nina and her twin sister, Artemis, are far from normal. It’s hard to be when you grow up at the Watcher’s Academy, which is a bit different from your average boarding school. Here teens are trained as guides for Slayers—girls gifted with supernatural strength to fight the forces of darkness. But while Nina’s mother is a prominent member of the Watcher’s Council, Nina has never embraced the violent Watcher lifestyle. Instead she follows her instincts to heal, carving out a place for herself as the school medic.

Until the day Nina’s life changes forever.

Thanks to Buffy, the famous (and infamous) Slayer that Nina’s father died protecting, Nina is not only the newest Chosen One—she’s the last Slayer, ever. Period.

As Nina hones her skills with her Watcher-in-training, Leo, there’s plenty to keep her occupied: a monster fighting ring, a demon who eats happiness, a shadowy figure that keeps popping up in Nina’s dreams…

But it’s not until bodies start turning up that Nina’s new powers will truly be tested—because someone she loves might be next.

One thing is clear: Being Chosen is easy. Making choices is hard.

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Thanks to Netgalley for sending me this book in exchange for an honest review.

I have a confession to make: I have never watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I know, I know, this makes me a terrible person but honestly it’s just something I’ve never gotten around to. So I was pretty excited when I saw that Kiersten White, author of the brilliant And I Darken series, was going to be doing a YA story about the Buffy world. However,  I realise in retrospect that I probably wasn’t the best person to read this. For one, I really know next to nothing about the world and the lore and everything else that might have enriched my experience of reading the book. That’s not to say Slayer wasn’t enjoyable, just that I figure I missed a lot of gems and Easter eggs that might have been really impressive to other people.

Initially, I did have quite a big problem getting into the book. It does treat readers like they’re already familiar with the show, and as a person who hasn’t watched it, I can’t honestly say if it actually does that job well enough or not. I don’t know how close it is sticking to the story, or bending/breaking rules. Not that I really mind either way, I do know that it was set after the show, but that doesn’t explain much to me and my confusion did make me suffer a bit.

My other main issue with the book, more so maybe even than the plot, was the confusing whiplash behaviour of the characters. I liked Nina, and her sister too, but they were always being weird around each other. I get that this was a confusing situation, and that White was trying to make the characters more complex, but I just couldn’t wrap my head around it. One moment, Artemis was asking her sister to embrace healing and allow herself to be kept safe from harm, the next she was yelling at her that she was a terrible slayer and she needs to embrace being a Slayer over a healer. Nina also fluctuated a lot in how she viewed being a Slayer. I get it, it was confusing for her and of course she’s allowed to have mixed feelings about it, but it didn’t seem to work on the paper as well as it probably did in theory.

I did enjoy the action scenes though, and I thought the book was reasonably paced throughout. There were lots of amusing and witty one-liners and I did really like the way that Slayer kept asking what it meant to be a Slayer and how their authority should work and things.  It definitely made me want to check out the show in the future. After that, this book might be worth a re-read, but in all honesty, I’m pretty glad I didn’t end up buying it in a store. That’s not to say that it won’t be enjoyable for some, but for me as a total newbie to the world, it wasn’t for me.

Overall, I’m giving Slayer a 6/10 stars. It was a fun read, and very quick, but I didn’t understand much of what was going on and my enjoyment of the book suffered because the book kinda just drops you in and expects you to know a lot. The characters were mostly okay, although I didn’t understand why the protagonist and her sister whiplashed in opinions so often.

Has anyone else read this book or plans to? Is it better if you’re familiar with Buffy the Vampire Slayer? I’m very curious to know, so please feel to share any thoughts or opinions in the comment section below [but please, try and keep it spoiler free]

Until next time <3