Influences from outside 40K

[bluntblade]

I recently read David Kirk's Child of Vengeance and found it really handy as a source of inspiration for my writings, so I was wondering what people here draw on besides the BL canon.

 

I guess my other main influences have been ASoIaF, Iain M Banks (just in terms of settings and scale) and William Gibson. With some stray Terry Pratchett leanings.

Edited August 10, 2016 by bluntblade

[Olis]

I would advocate a general breadth of reading, to be honest, but I myself tend to stick to sci-fi and fantasy. 

[Erasus]

Child of Vengeance is a good book, have you read the second instalment?

 

Um, I would recommend reading the Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks, it's a great trilogy but related to this it's amazing at putting stunning visuals in your minds eye. Plus some of the scenes are fantastic for powerful struggles inspiration.

 

I read a lot as well, mostly fantasy with the occasional sprinkle of sci-fi and historical. I read certain genres for certain things I think, fantasy for example tends to focus a lot more on personal struggles while sci-fi is (at least for the stuff I've read) more about the consequences towards the grander scale.

 

I like reading Conn Iggulden's stuff because his work on Genghis Khan and Caesar were good tales of how great men came from smaller backgrounds, how they achieved greatness. Which translates well to how we aspiring writers and background fluffers want our own heroes and villains to rise to greatness and potentially fall.

 

Adrian Tchaikovsky's Shadows of the Apt has this theme of new/technological versus old/mystical and the two can't really coexist or intermingle well, which for me was a good foundation for how I view the relationships between the Imperium and the Eldar respectively.

 

I used to watch a lot of anime, they're great for epic struggles with often over the top rivalries and hatreds. They're brilliant for archetypes and creating moments of mind blowing awe. My mind is always trying to shove the super quick style of combat often seen in these shows into the 40k universe and I'm like "no! It's not like that brain, stop!"

 

I play a lot of video games (or at least used to) they're great for inspiration. Theres the 40k games themselves which is often a mixed bag, but games in general are great for inspiration on story, characters, themes, even culture for IAs. There's a particular moment in recent memory that made me think "that's perfect for 40k", it's in Fallout 4, it's a randomly generated thing that happens a lot, but

there's occasionally a vertibird carrying Brotherhood Knights on a patrol, when enemies pop up the Knights simply drop from the vertibird how ever high it is, slam into the ground in a braced position then wade in and kill stuff.

The first time I saw it I just couldnt help but think that was a perfect moment for space marines dropping from a Thunderhawk. Especially as in Space Marine, Captain Titus never takes fall damage, ever. Just like anyone in Fallout 4 power armour. I thought Dead Space was good as an inspiration for Daemonic infestation or just Nurgle in general. Also a nicer version of what life could look like on a ship, less posters and more Aquilias obviously. Video games are great for inspiration, they're so creative and if they have some solid lore behind them can feel like you're in an immersive universe, which is great to steal bits from.

 

Music is another great inspiration source for me, especially thematic instrumental music (like the stuff used for trailers and other epic moments, Requiem for a Dream being a good example) and rock music that gets the blood pumped or fits well with fight scenes. Breaking Benjamin, Linkin Park, Les Frictions, Two Steps from Hell, Zack Hempsey and Pendulum or Prodigy being some of my favourite examples.

 

Sorry for the long post!

Edited August 11, 2016 by Erasus

[bluntblade]

I'm gonna a grab the second soon. Possibly today. Shadows of the Apt sounds interesting too.

 

The Fury Road soundtrack has featured heavily in my writings, plus Meshuggah, Mastodon and similar acts.

 

Simon Scarrow's books have probably influenced me quite a bit, now I think about it.

Edited August 11, 2016 by bluntblade

[Erasus]

Simon Scarrow is good, really like his work.

The historical books set in Rome are brilliant for High Gothic terms and adding a bit more to the heavily Roman influenced Imperium :)

[Carrack]

Glen Cook's Black Company series was my first introduction to grim and dark settings, although it's fantasy. Thieves' World edited by Robert Asprin was my first introduction to a shared setting, also fantasy. Both have stood the test of time for me, and have been read more than a few times. Edited August 16, 2016 by Carrack

[bluntblade]

For Chaos stuff, The Atrocity Archive by Charles Stross has some interesting concepts about demonology and computing, as well as some interesting stuff on nasty rituals and some good eldritch horror.

 

It does use things from WW2 as part of its backstory in a way that may trouble some people, but I feel it did so in a way that was quite sensible done.

[Petitioner's City]

I think for any text that deals with machinations, politics, deviousness and strong characterisation, Hillary Mantel's 'Wolf Hall' and 'A Place of Greater Safety' will be excellent contributions to your research.

[bluntblade]

A slightly leftfield thought - Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams have a surprising amount to offer for writing "straight" sci-fi. Especially when it comes to scale and the way people act.

[Andrew Benn]

H.P. Lovecraft. The Granddaddy of Grimdark in my opinion. His stories, especially his longer ones, use a style that really lends itself to the setting of humanity battling endless hordes of alien monstrosities. He is also a master of not saying whats going on - the horrors are often indescribable or given only very general descriptions, and the events are usually given in a reportese style rather than as live-action, which can make the story less immediate, and which sometimes he overuses, but mostly very effortlessly adds a lot of reader-induced fear.

[bluntblade]

Also he's a fine example of purple prose done well.

[bluntblade]

AD-B recently mentioned Gates of Fire. I've now read it and it's very good indeed.

[Carrack]

AD-B recently mentioned Gates of Fire. I've now read it and it's very good indeed.

Gates of Fire is good, some of Pressfield’s other, lesser known historical fiction, is even better in my opinion. In particular, The Afghan Campaign and The Virtues of War are both worth reading.

[Warpmiss]

It'd have to be HPL for me as well, the Cthulhu Mythos are a perfect source of inspiration for anything Chaos related.

 

But my favorite books are actually historical and good ol' classic Gothic Horror novels ("The Monk" and "Melmoth the Wanderer" being two of my faves). I like that in both of those genres, religion and mysticism can play a big role and are usually the source of the a creepy elements in the narrative even in the purely historical ones. That translates pretty well to 40k considering we have Inquisitors, Ecclesiarchs and even deamons. Actually, I'm surprised I don't collect Word Bearers.

Edited January 13, 2018 by Warpmiss

[bluntblade]

As it's been a while, I'm adding Bernard Cornwell's Winter King novels, Ann Leckie's Ancillary series, Peter Higgins' Wolfhound Century (notably for some left-field fantasy elements and a horribly clear-eyed look at totalitarian governments) and Black Leopard, Red Wolf.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Robert E. Howard is a great inspiration. Limiting myself to only the works I personally read, James Allison, Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, Conan the Barbarian, Kull of Atlantis, and Solomon Kane all sparked ideas for fan fiction. The following, from The Valley of the Worm, are AWESOME as a hero's last words:

"Let my tribe remember," I said, speaking slowly. "Let the tale be told from village to village, from camp to camp, from tribe to tribe, so that men may know that not man nor beast nor devil may prey in safety on the golden-haired people of Asgard. Let them build me a cairn where I lie and lay me therein with my bow and sword at hand, to guard this valley for ever; so if the ghost of the god I slew comes up from below, my ghost will ever be ready to give it battle."