Glue? Well, I could sit and contemplate on who would be a glue character to hold DS but I tend to think of it this way...
     More like gears, the gears inside a clock perhaps? Sounds good? Because gears must work together to work and keep the motion going (in this case, work to keep time going.) If one gear is misplaced the whole working chain just...stops. To me, each character was in turn holding another character in his/her place and kept DS going, just like a clock. 

As for the Ross novels, I think I stopped reading them around Barnabas, Quentin and the Nightmare Assassin, which is something like book #18 (though I continued to buy them - but as I've said before, the main reason I bought any of them was just for the cover photo  ). They're just too different from the actual show, what with Barnabas roaming all around in all different time periods when he should have been chained in his coffin.    So, I've never read Body Snatchers. How unfortunate (or, perhaps, very lucky) for me. 

Yeap, I feel the same. I just couldn't ease into the massive difference the books have from the show. Well, I bet at the time the books were a way to satisfy the audience who very much anticipated the episode when the weekend was over.  Despite the odd settings Ross puts Barnabas I have to say the covers are very "eye-candy-ish."  I liked a lot of the covers especially the book I have.

...and thanks for the welcome