By novel, I’m presuming you’re refering to On a Way to a Smile: Case of Denzel right? That was actually animated into a single episode OVA included with the Blu-ray version of FFVII AC, which goes into Denzel’s past story.
But yeah, he didn’t actually appear in the original FFVII game.
Thanks for the reply. In the novel the chapter about Denzel is simply Denzel. What did you mean by ‘On a Way to a Smile: Case of Denzel’? Please explain when you have a chance.
Most are only available in Japanese (with numerous unofficial English fan-translations), but apparently Case of Barret was officially released in English with the limited edition version of Advent Children.
There was one other FFVII spin-of novella released – a short story called The Maiden Who Travels the Planet, included with the Japanese FFVII Ultimania Omega guidebook, which is about Aeris’s travels in the Lifestream following her death in the game, but this isn’t usually believed to actually be canon to the actual storyline (Square Enix themselves have never mentioned or even acknowledged it’s existence when referring to FFVII’s tie-ins and storyline) and most fans aren’t even aware it exists.
If the ‘novel’ you have is called anything other than these titles, then it’s almost definitely an unofficial fanfiction which has not been licensed by Square Enix I’m sorry to say, as the above stories are the only official FFVII tie-in novels available.
More information about On the Way to a Smile and Maiden Who Travels the Planet can be found here: On the Way to a Smile – The Final Fantasy Wiki has more Final Fantasy information than Cid could research (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/On_the_Way_to_a_Smile)
Hoshi wo Meguru Otome – The Final Fantasy Wiki has more Final Fantasy information than Cid could research (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Hoshi_wo_Meguru_Otome)
I hope you see the following reply.
I got the FF7:AC Boxset. It came with the 2-disc Special Edition movie, the script, the novel entitled ‘Final Fantasy 7: Advent Children The Novel’ and some postcards.