Buffy the Vampire Slayer. With midterms looming, the students at Sunnydale High are predictably stressed-out. Even super-student Willow is feeling the pressure to succeed. And when her usual study buddies -- Buffy, Xander, and Oz -- decide they don't need her tutorial sessions, Willow wonders if she's really what they don't need. But her hurt feelings don't explain her sudden antagonism toward Buffy -- or the strange dreams they've both been having. As tensions in the school escalate into brutal acts of violence -- and the perpetrators turn up horribly mutilated -- Buffy and the gang search for a supernatural source. The evidence indicates that someone is attempting to resurrect a powerful Hindu demon. Willow's new confidante, guidance counselor Promila Daruwalla, becomes the prime suspect...until Giles runs into an old "friend" who is always causing trouble. It will take all of the Slayer's resources...and the help of all her friends...to find the culprit and destroy the key to the demon's resurrection.

In its seven years on television, Buffy the Vampire Slayer has earned critical acclaim and a massive cult following among teen viewers. One of the most distinguishing features of the program is the innovative way the show's writers play with language: fabricating new words, morphing existing ones, and throwing usage on its head. The result has been a strikingly resonant lexicon that reflects the power of both youth culture and television in the evolution of American slang. Using the show to illustrate how new slang is formed, transformed, and transmitted, Slayer Slang is one of those rare books that combines a serious explanation of a pop culture phenomena with an engrossing read for fans of the show, word geeks, and language professionals. Michael Adams begins his book with a synopsis of the program's history and a defense of ephemeral language. He then moves to the main body of the work: a detailed glossary of slayer slang, annotated with actual dialogue and recorded the style accepted by the American Dialect Society. The book concludes with a bibliography and a lengthy index, a guide to sources (novels based on the show, magazine articles about the show, and language culled from the official posting board) and an appendix of slang-making suffixes. Introduced by Jane Espenson, one of the show's most inventive writers (and herself a linguist), Slayer Slang offers a quintessential example of contemporary youth culture serving as a vehicle for slang. In the tradition of The Physics of Star Trek, Slayer Slang is one of those rare books that offers a serious examination a TV cult phenomenon appealing to fans and thinkers alike. A few examples from the Slayer Slang glossary: bitca n [AHD4 bitch n in sense 2.a + a] Bitch 1997 Sep 15 Whedon When She Was Bad "[Willow:] 'I mean, why else would she be acting like such a b-i-t-c-h?' [Giles:] 'Willow, I think we're all a little old to be spelling things out.' [Xander:] 'A bitca?'" break and enterish adj [AHD4 sv breaking and entering n + -ish suff in sense 2.a] Suitable for crime 1999 Mar 16 Petrie Enemies "I'll go home and stock up on weapons, slip into something a little more break and enterish." [B] carbon-dated adj [fr. AHD4 carbondating + -ed] Very out of date 1997 Mar 10 Whedon Welcome to the Hellmouth "[Buffy:] 'Deal with that outfit for a moment.' [Giles:] 'It's dated?' [Buffy:] 'It's carbon-dated.'" cuddle-monkey n [AHD4 cuddle v + monkey n in sense 2, by analogy fr. RHHDAS (also DAS3 and NTC) sv cuddle bunny 'an affectionate, passionate, or sexually attractive young woman'] Male lover 1998 Feb 10 Noxon Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered "Every woman in Sunnydale wants to make me her cuddle-monkey." [X]

Buffy is concerned about her sister's new friend because she saw the new friend one night while on patrol.

ReunionLife on the Hellmouth -- a.k.a. Sunnydale, California -- has always involved a steady parade of demons intent on ruining Buffy Summers's nightlife. Staying at the top of her game means Buffy's racked up some powerful enemies.Now an old nemesis has returned: Ethan Rayne, a college "friend" of Giles's, has arrived in Sunnydale, and this time he actually wants Buffy's help. Not surprisingly, he's run afoul of The First -- an ancient evil that predates humankind. And now The First has made Ethan a deal he can't refuse: ultimate power. All he has to do is lure Buffy into battle.With their sanity on the line, the gang is going to need all the help they can get. Enter Spike and Faith...

Real life battles "reel life" when the grand reopening of the Sunnydale Drive-In unleashes a cast of movie monsters on the town. Original.

Buffy gains a mysterious benefactor, and investigates when a virus hits her town of Sunnydale, California, and ruins the local vampires' food supply.

There is no time for Buffy to take a vacation and she could be facing death because there is a lot of evil in the world.