The Origin, released last year, almost managed to bring the early Buffy incarnation into line with the current "sitch" -- including a reworking of Buffy's slacker boyfriend, Pike. Pike later reappeared in Golden's novel, Sins of the Father, which was, apparently, quite a feat of Joss-engineering. "Joss originally said: 'No, you can't use Pike.' So I said: 'Well, why can't I use Pike?'" Considerable persuasion, and time, was needed before, "...finally he said: 'Well, okay.'"

Golden was also told that the subject of Giles' family, addressed in the book, was likewise on the Forbidden Secrets List. "My response," he says, "was: 'What if I just talk about Giles' past, without really talking about his family? Just talk about that impact that had on him?'" Permission was eventually given, which opened the door to further exploration of Giles' somewhat murky history. "Tom and I are writing a Giles one-shot for Dark Horse for next Fall," he announces proudly. "A comic book."

Details?

"Let's just say it's Giles' past catching up with him." Again? "He returns to England."

Golden and Sniegoski also have a Star Trek comic book due out this year. Entitled Embrace the Wolf, it promises to bring the gaseous entity Redjack (Jack the Ripper from the Original Series episode "Wolf in the Fold") to the Enterprise-D, and onto the Holodeck to do battle with android Commander Data's favourite alter-ego, Sherlock Holmes.

"I didn't find it jarring, and I think the reason is because I had no intention of doing it on any kind of long-term basis," replied Golden as to whether it was jarring to work within the well-established Trek universe. "It's not something I want to do a lot of. I have no real interest in writing a Star Trek novel," he continues, "because there's like sixty, seventy, eighty..."

...several hundred...

"... and I think at this point, 'what can I do that hasn't been done?'"

The suggestion of attempting a good Voyager novel is met with a mildly admonishing: "Now, now."

"Whereas with Buffy, we wrote the very first Buffy original novel (Halloween Rain), the very first Buffy adult novel (Child of the Hunt), the very first Buffy trilogy (The Gatekeeper Trilogy), the first Buffy hardcover, (Immortal), and next year I'm gonna be doing the very first Buffy serialised novel. "It's called Buffy: The Lost Slayer, and I don't want to give away too much, but let's just say that over the course of the story, Buffy does something she shouldn't have, and we are privy to, and thrust into, one possible, and particularly terrible, alternate future. Originally, the pitch was... remember Batman: The Dark Knight Returns?"

For the uninitiated, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns is the story of everyone's second favourite night-stalking vigilante lurking guy, in his twilight years. Bruce Wayne has hung up the cape, and the Bat has passed into myth. But then old enemies and new emerge, politics run rampant, and that Mama's Boy, Superman, ends up killing the Dark Avenger in a fight to the death. Or does he?

"That'll be out, I suspect -- I hate to say, 'cause they yell at me -- but I suspect that'll be out sometime in 2001," the author says. Dark Knight set in a Buffy context - it should be one hell of a ride.

And, very like "The Wish." Except, as Golden points out ruefully: "I came up with it before 'The Wish.'" Which is a question that needed to be asked...

"It's frustrating as hell, that's the answer to that question," he answers pre-emptively, with a chuckle. "It's frustrating as hell. I'll tell you something," he goes on, warming to the theme, "I pitched a Willow and Oz one-shot comic book a year ago, and the plot was that a female werewolf in heat comes to town, and Oz wants her desperately as a werewolf, and can't balance the difference the between the werewolf side and the human side -- and it causes Willow a great deal of pain.

"They came back and they said: 'Well, Joss wants to do something similar to that next season, so no you can't do it.' I'm like 'But wait a minute! Maybe you should let me write the episode then!'"

And is writing an episode anywhere on the Golden agenda?

"I'd love to write an episode," he acknowledges, "but it's not something I've ever pushed for. I wanna make sure that in any conversation that happens on that level, it's understood that I'm not doing the books and the comic books so that they give me an opportunity out there."