Battle for the Abyss: Not the greatest book ever...

[Captain Malachi]

The very thought that an Ultramarine pup could beat a seasoned veteran like Brynngar, or that they'd even duel in such a fashion, still bugs me.

 

 

To be fair the Ultra amrine Was a captain and the SW was only a Wolf gaurd so it was right that the Smurf captain beat him. I know SW are badass but we are not that badass.

That, 'cos he said it so well.

 

Personally I quite liked the book, could have been better, but it could have been a lot worse.

[JEFF4i]

The very thought that an Ultramarine pup could beat a seasoned veteran like Brynngar, or that they'd even duel in such a fashion, still bugs me.

 

 

To be fair the Ultra amrine Was a captain and the SW was only a Wolf gaurd so it was right that the Smurf captain beat him. I know SW are badass but we are not that badass.

 

True. But it still doesn't seem right, melee is what we do! *shrug* Chalk it up to my pride, he was still an underdeveloped character.

 

And yes, I meant Ben Counter, I've grown too accustomed of saying "Smurf Graham" hehe.

[Cyrox]

Yeah I agree, I hope Ben Counter doesn't write any SW stuff too

[Mr.(Space)Marine]

I agree that Skraal is pretty cool, and Mhotep is too, but I only got through half of the book before i put it on my shelf and never tried reading it again. It was just too boring, bland, and stereotypical. Galaxy in Flames, for example, had me with my eyes wide open desperately wanting to know what happened next.

 

As a few others have said, it just seemed like some ordinary space marine book. There were no coll heresy-era things to me (besides world eaters and thousand sons teaming up with ultras), it just seemed like a boring, ordinary book about SMs.

[Pontus]

Apart from the ultramarine winning the duel, im pretty sure Bryngar would have killed him if it were to the death. He had him unconcious for a few, and only a slight scratch that drew blood ended the duel.

 

The should have pitted Skraal vs Bryngar instead :)

[Imperialis_Dominatus]

Highlights:

 

Mhotep was cool.

 

Skraal was a badass. Like... want MOAR World Eaters. :lol:

 

The Ultramarine's

hell that he had to go through

was interesting.

 

Things part fail and part lose:

 

The Word Bearers. Fail characterization is fail.

 

The Ultramarines. Not that they were there, hyper-defensive Smurfboyz, the way they were represented.

 

Meh plot. Very meh.

[son of nocturne]

I liked it because, i looked at the book as a plot advancer, i felt i wasnt ment to get attatched to the characters as they were meant to cop it in the end, for the greater good. Now admittedly if the book was written a bit better we would have not wanted to see the characters die, but i think that would have defeated the purpose of the book, its about the bigger picture, only time will tell of course as either the ultramar battle will be bloody brilliant and i will have interpreted the book correctly, or itll be at worst mundane and im an idiot! :P

S.O.N.

[jay79]

Unfortunately none of the HH books have impressed me save for the first three. I hope it gets back on track with Mechanicum which I have sitting on the shelf while I finish Brothers of the Snake.

[Bigger-than-Jesus]

It's better than some people gave it credit for, but I enjoyed it far less than any other HH book so far, I trend I can see continuing considering what's lined up for the year. I wish Ant reynolds wrote it as his portrayal of Word bearers in DA has me very tempted to get an Anointed force for apoc(basically 50 or so termies with Kol Badar). That said I liked Mohtep a fair bit, and Loved Skraal, who has to be 40k's equivalent to Jack Bauer.

[Dammeron]

The Word Bearers. Dark disciples of Chaos, walkers of the True Path, scions of ruin, children of Lorgar...morons.

At least, that seems to be Ben Counter's take on them. Seriously, the Word Bearers in this book are pitiful, cackling super villain stereotypes that evoke nothing of the twisted piety and black faith that should ideally define the legion. Rather, they come off as opportunistic, petty, conniving, cruel imbeciles who can't even deal with a tiny boarding party of rag tag loyalists even when they outnumber them hundreds to one. Heck, they can't even deal with ONE lowly World Eater marine. It's pathetic.

 

As for plot, I don't know what happened to it in this book. It seems to have gone the same way as any semblance of the Word Bearer's character as a legion. Something about an uber weapon of death Star Wars nonsense, essential to the Heresy war effort, blah, blah, means of destroying the Ultra Marines legion, blah blah, lots of aimless meandering through space and drawn out, poorly described ship to ship fighting...in fact the only notable elements of this ENTIRE BOOK are two characters from legions THAT IT DOESN'T EVEN FOCUS ON!!!!! A Thousand Sons sorcerer who seems to be the only character Counter decided to invest with anything approaching sense, and the aforementioned World Eater who happens to survive for some considerable time alone, injured and fighting HORDES of Word Bearers aboard the aforementioned uber-engine of ultra-death.

 

The entire story is incidental, taking place in a vacuum away from the principal narrative arc of the Horus Heresy series. You could easily miss this one out and not even know it. And it's probably advisable to do so; this book is painful to read. The prose is awful; repetitive, arrhythmic, burdened with wads and wads of clumsy, unnecessary, superfluous, lumpy, broken description (see what I did there? That's irony that is)...this one is a REAL chore, advisable only to completists, and even then with a big, bad warning label attached.

 

Worst book in the series thus far.

[Vassakov]

Ok, perhaps I'll restate my principcal objection to this book. The Heresy is a tragic drama - a story as old as humanity. We know, reading the books that it doesn't really matter. There is a suspense of "what happens next" - everyone who knows something about the heresy knew from the first few chapters of Galaxy in Flames that Torgaddon, Loken and Saul Tarvitz were going to die, almost all the Astartes on Istvaan V including Ferrus Mannus were going to die by the end of Fulgrim. We know, even from page one of Horus Rising that Horus will fall, and betray everything that he stands for.

 

And yet the final few chapters of Horus Rising are amongst the best in the Black Library because they are tinged with such tragedy. Similarly, although much maligned Descent and Fallen Angels are also well written for the extent of the way it portrays the events - that this brotherhood will be set against each other over. Mechanicum covers the ending of Mars and the Dark Mechanicus. Again, it captures the drama and the darkness that the more objective fluff has hinted at.

 

And yet Counter had almost a blank slate to work with. Think about it - a tale of a brotherhood coming apart, a race against time and the fate of worlds - perhaps the Imperium itself resting on the shoulders of barely 100 Astartes. The moment when the Word Bearers finally cast off all falsehoods and declare their new, darker loyalties. The conflicts between even the loyalist Legions, and between Astartes and humans. This book could have been gold, could have been tied into the Heresy as a whole. And yet it was badly written, the characters (largely) poorly characterised and as Dammeron has stated, the book seems to exist in isolation from the overall series, and entirely fails to caputure the drama of the heresy. Or even add all that much to it.

 

To be honest, it's just not a particularly good book and you won't miss much.