Firefly: Big Damn Hero Novel Review

Titan Books has published a hardback book titled Firefly: Big Damn Hero available from numerous online retailers and high street book stores. Firefly: Big Damn Hero is a novel based upon the hugely successful Firefly TV series starring Nathan Fillion, Gina Torres, Alan Tudyk, Morena Baccarin, Adam Baldwin, Jewel Staite, Sean Maher, Summer Glau and the late great Ron Glass. Despite only spanning one season of 14 episodes from 2002 until 2003; Firefly lives long in the memory as one of the greatest TV series in history and deservedly continued with a blockbuster film named Serenity in 2005 that starred every core cast member from Firefly and Chiwetel Ejiofor portraying the role of the Operative, although Firefly has not been continued in TV or film form since. Does Firefly: Big Damn Hero deliver what it sets out to by producing a new story focused novel set within the ‘verse of the Firefly TV series?

Firefly: Big Damn Hero is the first officially licensed Firefly novel; rather amazingly featuring Joss Whedon as the consulting editor. Firefly: Big Damn Hero is in extremely experienced hands as Nancy Holder wrote the story concept having previously written numerous tie-in novels for Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel television series, alongside co-authoring two Buffy Watcher’s Guides, a prolific author of dozens of novels, short stories and essays on writing and pop culture as well as being a New York Times best-selling author and four-time winner of the Bram Stoker Award. Meanwhile, the novel is written by James Lovegrove; a New York Times best-selling author of The Age of Odin and having written multiple Sherlock Holmes novels including Gods of War, The Stuff of Nightmares, The Thinking Engine and more besides, alongside writing reviews of fiction for the Financial Times.

The story picks up only half a dozen years after the Unification War had ended as it is now the year 2517. Captain Malcolm Reynolds and his fellow crew members onboard the Serenity including Zoe Alleyne Washburne, Wash, Jayne Cobb, Kaylee, Inara, Shepherd Book, Simon Tam and River Tam are carrying out what they believed to be a normal everyday job of transporting five crates for Badger from the planet Persephone to someone looking to purchase the cargo. However, it is quickly established in the story that not everything is as it seems and the job that the crew had hoped would keep food on the table and Serenity flying is actually far more dangerous than they knew; leading to the unpredictability, intrigue and suspense throughout the story that is told over the course of a prologue and 38 chapters.

The quality of writing from the very first moment of the prologue onwards is award worthy as Firefly fans who already know and love the characters will be able to read each line of dialogue or a scene from a particular character’s perspective in that character’s voice due to the appropriate depiction of each character within the novel that are all proportionately adapted from the Firefly television series.

Firefly: Big Damn Hero is beautifully presented with incredible front cover artwork designed by Natasha MacKenzie featuring Nathan Fillion’s Captain Malcolm Reynolds and Gina Torres’ Zoe Alleyne Washburne, alongside a stylishly presented title, subtitle and author credits. Meanwhile, the back cover has artistically presented foreign writing before setting the tone of the story from the viewpoint of Captain Malcolm Reynolds. Every chapter number is situated within the centre of an image of the Serenity ship from a top-down perspective that provides another touch that Firefly fans will no doubt appreciate due to its attention to detail.

Firefly: Big Damn Hero’s value is the unique story encompassing every main character onboard the Serenity told within the Firefly ‘verse with a long yet continuously enjoyable story of 336 pages including a prologue and 38 chapters.

Firefly and Serenity fans can look forward to future Firefly novels from Titan Books including The Magnificent Nine by James Lovegrove in March 2019 and Generations by Tim Lebbon in October 2019. Firefly and Serenity fans should also look at other Firefly books from Titan Books including Firefly Encyclopedia’s coverage of the television series that released on November 6th 2018 in America and December 11th 2018 in the UK.

Analysis
• Title: Firefly: Big Damn Hero
• Writer: James Lovegrove (Story written by), Nancy Holder (Original story concept) and Joss Whedon (Consulting editor)
• Art: Natasha MacKenzie
• Publisher: Titan Books
• Length: 336 pages
• Cover: Hardback

Firefly: Big Damn Hero can be purchased in the UK from Amazon and Forbidden Planet, while Firefly: Big Damn Hero can be purchased in America and Canada from Amazon. You can also find Titan Books’ official website including a back catalogue of captivating books and product details regarding Firefly: Big Damn Hero.