Shrike Novel

[SkimaskMohawk]

So on an impulse I decided to buy the Shrike novel to give me something to read for a few days. I've read all the Gav Thorpe stuff from the Horus Heresy so I was prepared for a main character that had some odd moments (looking at you Corax), on the chance I had to endure that again. That being said, I know George Mann has written a lot of RG stuff in that past, and I even remember reading one story that had Orks and Eldar and a Captain out-stealthing the Eldar.

 

Imagine my surprise when I finished the book wishing for Gav Thorpe's Corax, mental breakdowns and all from Weregeld.

 

Where to start. I think the biggest thing that broke my immersion was also one of the first; the description and references of Kiavahr and then later on Deliverance. Forests. Forests everywhere! Where did all this come from? "Great landmasses, near subsumed with the ever-living forest"; I though Kiavahr was a pseudo-Forgeworld, with tech-guilds and giant amounts of factories and irradiated wastelands from where Corax dropped nukes during his uprising. This is how advancements like reflex shield technology comes from, as well as explanations for the vast amounts of materiel produced during the Heresy for the XIXth. The Tanith-esque description made me feel like it was a vehicle for the bird hunting. This goes double for Deliverance; it's supposed to be a literal rock with force domes, why is there descriptions of clouds and atmosphere?

 

The bird hunting. Of course the Raven Guard are going to have actual ravens and their skulls, they have an animal in their name. It's so contrived, and a ton of emphasis is put on retrieving the bird skulls of dead marines. This was a bit easier to swallow than the surprise makeover of the planet and moon, since 40k is highly ritualized compared to the 30k era and I could see a lot of emphasis being put on tradition over time, compared to the planet being completely different with no explanation.

 

The literal inclusion of 7th edition Detachments and Formations. It felt so unnatural to hear, especially since their function was never expanded upon; they just mention them in passing instead of having a point in the story. The references to Astra Militarum, Militarum Tempestus and Tempestor Prime were fine, because when the general referred to them as "the Guard" and "storm troopers" it kind of showed the difference between Shrike and normal humans. Formations just seemed like forced product placement, which was especially bad when the author referred to both an Imperial Knight and Storm Talons guns as auto cannons. The relentless mention of the Raven's Talons wasn't pleasant either, mix it up and just say "his claws", "lightning claws", etc... and only use their name for important moments.

 

The bolter porn. The entire book is almost all action, and the fighting scenes are imo over described and last way too long. The only respite was the flashbacks, of which I was bombarded by tales of the vast forests again.

 

Shrike. He kind of sucks as a character. He's angry at Orks for the entire story and wants to kill that warboss in particular because his friend died. He doesn't display any real change in character from being a Veteran to Chapter Master; no displays of strategic or tactical planning, or any of his famed guerrilla warfare. He just beelines for the warboss at every opportunity. If his arc was supposed to be "destroys tremor cannon"-"evacuates some humans and material"-"doesn't rush in alone" then its rather poorly done and non-impactful. It's also very odd that the focus is on his vengeance against a random Ork Warboss. It's not Skullkrak, whom he's been warring with since 4th ed;  it's not Shadowsun who killed the Chapter Master and a significant part of the Chapter, it's an Ork who got one of his friends killed and then got away. Doubly odd that they put vengeance above rescuing citizens and overwhelmed worlds, since that has a huge part of the character in the past.

 

Anyone else have issues with the book, or am I missing some key parts? 

 

 

[Claws and Effect]

The constant reference to the Raven's Talons bugged me too. Especially since he got their name wrong.

 

Now that you've read it, read it again with the reveal from the third part in mind.

 

It's not just "This goon killed my buddy", it's more of a case of "my friend's death is a personal failure of mine I need to atone for."

 

It's also not like he relentlessly hunted the warboss down to the exclusion of all else. The planets in question were already done for before he got there.

 

There was one key moment of overconfident stupidity, but later on it does at least show that he learned from it.

[Race Bannon]

Thank you for the spoilers:(

[Claws and Effect]

Sorry, was trying to keep it vague.

 

I don't know how to do the spoiler thingie.

[SkimaskMohawk]

The constant reference to the Raven's Talons bugged me too. Especially since he got their name wrong.

 

Now that you've read it, read it again with the reveal from the third part in mind.

 

It's not just "This goon killed my buddy", it's more of a case of "my friend's death is a personal failure of mine I need to atone for."

 

It's also not like he relentlessly hunted the warboss down to the exclusion of all else. The planets in question were already done for before he got there.

 

There was one key moment of overconfident stupidity, but later on it does at least show that he learned from it.

 

Oh I get the reveal or revelation he has at the end, but the reveal was kind of spoiled by his spiel about brotherhood and orks only respecting individual prowess. Maybe I just felt that his guilt about getting his friend killed because he wasn't ready was a bit contrived, seeing as his friend was his seargent; chapter command obviously disagreed.

[SyNidus]

Frankly i feel it too. I read Corax and as angry as i was that Corax had his mini-mental breakdown, i was still thoroughly engaged and hooked on the book and character. Even the action scenes were better written.

 

I'm still having trouble trying to get through the book. And yes, i was quite perplexed by the forests of kiavahr. All the early parts which show him trying to supposedly overcome adversity seem contrived to me. Like the squad bungling up the operation is just there so that it can establish shrike as being a badass but it felt fake to me.

 

Here's hoping we get someone like ADB to write our stories in the future.

[Claws and Effect]

I really can't respond to that without completely spoiling the book for people who haven't read it yet.

 

I will say though, that of course it was contrived. All works of fiction are 100% contrived. How noticeable it is happens to be a pretty good measure of an author's skill.

[SkimaskMohawk]

the spoiler tag is

and then the same with a / in front of spoiler

Edited July 28, 2017 by SkimaskMohawk

[Extropian]

I was very sad that i paid money for this book. What a wasted opportunity.

 

Tbh, i agree with everything the original poster says. It feel so...."product placement"-ish. I shouldn't be shocked as many of the Space Marine Battles series are the same, but was still a shame.

 

Add to that a generally mediocre (to be generous) story, fairly major incompetence on the part of that

useless Raven Guard sergeant (and by extension the entire Chapters training and selection process)

and a general lack of engagement, and it was a real let down.

 

I won't be buying any George Mann books it would appear!

[Biscuittzz]

I'll disagree with the forests and animals part. You're 100% correct about the product placement but that's part and parcel of all 40k books now unfortuantely.

 

On the forests: all of Mann's RG 40k work has forests on Kiavahr so it's not new. And to be fair, it's only stated that the lands around the hive cities and the forge-cities are wasteland ( only reference is Deliverance Lost, that I know of), so it's not unlikely that the rest of the planet has an ecosystem. Corax only targeted certain hive cities, not all of them. 10,000 years is easily enough for the environment to take control again - look at Chernobyl after 30-40 years.

 

Deliverance should be a barren rock so I agree on that point.

 

With regards the Ravens and collecting skulls, I don't see the problem. I actually think it shows the humane side of the RG and the bit of faith/culture that they possess. It's not as if it's rolled out constantly like wolfy mc wolf wolves or the bloody sanguine encarmine blood angels of bloodness etc etc. 

 

The book is poor yes, but nothing unexpected for a bolter porn book. I suggest reading the rest of the RG 40k stuff, if only for the background/cultural stuff - story wise they're just as bad.

[SkimaskMohawk]

Here's the thing with the forests, the planet was essentially a forgeworld and heavily industrialized, which tend to eat resources. We can see the effect of the imperium on forest words with what happened to Caliban; kiavahr was a tech world far before the imperium.

 

I'd be fine with a retcon if it was explained in any way, but as far as I know it hasn't been and the crazy huge forests aren't mentioned in the heresy series or in extermination where it straight up calls it a forgeworld. At least he's consistent in his own works, but one author saying something contradictory to the rest of the canon with no explanation doesnt make a precedent.

[Claws and Effect]

A forest can take up a huge amount of space, yet be a tiny percentage of the overall landmass of the planet.

 

And if I recall correctly, Kiavahr is classed as an Industrial world, not a full on Forge World. It maintains some independence from the AdMech, largely due to being under the protection of a First Founding Astartes chapter.

 

Furthermore, some of the things mentioned about the forest combined with the millennia ago nuclear bombardment and the canon compliant high rate of mutation among Kiavahran citizens...it isn't much of a stretch to assume that the forests in Kiavahr have at least a mild degree of radioactivity to them. Which would be perfectly in keeping with an Industrial/Forge World.

 

The forests exist because their nature makes them useless as a resource.

Edited July 29, 2017 by Claws and Effect

[deathspectersgt7]

Biscuitzz is correct on the forests as is Claws and Effect it is a Industrial class not a Mech Forgeworld.

[SkimaskMohawk]

A forest can take up a huge amount of space, yet be a tiny percentage of the overall landmass of the planet.

 

And if I recall correctly, Kiavahr is classed as an Industrial world, not a full on Forge World. It maintains some independence from the AdMech, largely due to being under the protection of a First Founding Astartes chapter.

 

Furthermore, some of the things mentioned about the forest combined with the millennia ago nuclear bombardment and the canon compliant high rate of mutation among Kiavahran citizens...it isn't much of a stretch to assume that the forests in Kiavahr have at least a mild degree of radioactivity to them. Which would be perfectly in keeping with an Industrial/Forge World.

 

The forests exist because their nature makes them useless as a resource.

 

 

Biscuitzz is correct on the forests as is Claws and Effect it is a Industrial class not a Mech Forgeworld.

 

It's exact designation seems to be hazy at best. Extermination says that its output wasn't the same as a fully-fledged Forge World, while Omegon considers that Kiavahr only has an average output compared to other Mechanicum forge worlds, and terms it a forge-world in Deliverance Lost. 

 

As for the forests, its pretty explicit in Extermination that the surface was "scoured to blasted wastes"; Deliverance Lost notes lots of rad-wastes, chem pools and other extremely hazardous, chemistry-related features. On giant forests =/= landmasses Mann describes "great landmasses, near subsumed with the ever-living forest"; multiple landmasses, nearly all forest; continents worth of forests. Hopefully he did mention somhwere in his RG novels why there was a vast forest, but I kind of strongly doubt it considering he got Deliverance wrong, as well as Shrike's weapons....

[Claws and Effect]

Deliverance Lost happened 10,000 years before Shrike. It is extremely safe to assume there would be quite a lot of things regrowing and evolving during that timespan.

 

Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been resettled and have forests again, and they were destroyed by atomic blasts less than a century ago. I can't imagine Corax would have had anything much stronger on hand, as anything that could contaminate a planet for 10 millennia would also make any ore extracted with it unusable.

 

You can't say Mann is wrong about ehat Kiavahr looks like in 40k based on events that occurred 10,000 years prior. A planet can change a LOT in 10,000 years. For example, 10,000 years ago the very spot I'm sitting this very second was covered in a sheet of ice several hundred feet thick.

[MajorNese]

Well, the quality of the writing seems consistent with the post-codex 40k AdMech stories. If you have read the codex description, you can scratch half the Skitarius book, as it just describes how awesome these guys are, using the exact same wording as the codex. Which is why I'm rather sceptic when it comes to the less prominent writers and rather flashy.colourful covers that keep exactly to the models.

[Extropian]

Well, the quality of the writing seems consistent with the post-codex 40k AdMech stories. If you have read the codex description, you can scratch half the Skitarius book, as it just describes how awesome these guys are, using the exact same wording as the codex. Which is why I'm rather sceptic when it comes to the less prominent writers and rather flashy.colourful covers that keep exactly to the models.

This is a good point. You can actually spot the bad novels with a decent degree of success from their cover style. As MajorNese has spotted, the "models turned into colourful pictures" covers seem to be pretty universally just adverts more than stories.

[SkimaskMohawk]

Deliverance Lost happened 10,000 years before Shrike. It is extremely safe to assume there would be quite a lot of things regrowing and evolving during that timespan.

 

Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been resettled and have forests again, and they were destroyed by atomic blasts less than a century ago. I can't imagine Corax would have had anything much stronger on hand, as anything that could contaminate a planet for 10 millennia would also make any ore extracted with it unusable.

 

You can't say Mann is wrong about ehat Kiavahr looks like in 40k based on events that occurred 10,000 years prior. A planet can change a LOT in 10,000 years. For example, 10,000 years ago the very spot I'm sitting this very second was covered in a sheet of ice several hundred feet thick.

 

I'd agree with you, if it wasn't in 40k, where the whole shtick is "stagnation" and "grim dark". A planet that was "scoured to blasted wastes" by countless generations of forge-world esque industry and then nuked on top of that doesn't tend to turn into a forest world. A decent comparison is Baal, where nukes destroyed the paradise like moons during the Age of Strife and left them as irradiated wastelands. They're still like that in 40k. And iirc, the mining took place on Deliverance, while the manufacturing happened on the planet.

 

I can say Mann is wrong, because he changed Deliverance too, and managed to get Shrike's weapons wrong throughout the book. It's just ignorance with no fact checking.

[Claws and Effect]

As far as the advertisement-like nature of Shrike and similar books, I'd wager it was a decree from GW to put things in the book that players of the game will recognize.

 

There seems to only be a handful of authors that treat it like a living, breathing universe rather than a sandbox the game is played in.

[Biscuittzz]

I'm actually waiting for something along the lines of "Sergeant Korvyn sighed as he reloaded his bolt pistol, if only he had had the ten points to spare to acquire a plasma pistol from the armoury". 

[MajorNese]

I'm actually waiting for something along the lines of "Sergeant Korvyn sighed as he reloaded his bolt pistol, if only he had had the ten points to spare to acquire a plasma pistol from the armoury". 

"In his righteous fury, he overcharged his plasma pistol, to purge the <Legion> TERMINATORS. Were it not for his Captain within 6" intoning the Rites of Battle, this would have slain him instead of the enemy. This way, he just missed with a 2 on the reroll, and swore to never again touch a plasma pistol, considering his luck with the dice.

[Alcyon]

Glad to know I can avoid picking this one up, it's always such a crapshoot trying to figure out which 40k authors are worth their salt. Dan Abnett is the only one I know to be safe. Are there any RG books you guys think are excellent?

[Race Bannon]

Outside the Heresy novels, I think George Mann is the only guy to spend any detail on them. I mean, there is Hunt for Voldorus but that is more focused on White Scars, with RG a supporting role.

[Biscuittzz]

Outside the Heresy novels, I think George Mann is the only guy to spend any detail on them. I mean, there is Hunt for Voldorus but that is more focused on White Scars, with RG a supporting role.

 

And that tiny supporting role is probably the best writing they've received in the entire spectrum of 30k and 40k.

[SyNidus]

 

Outside the Heresy novels, I think George Mann is the only guy to spend any detail on them. I mean, there is Hunt for Voldorus but that is more focused on White Scars, with RG a supporting role.

 

And that tiny supporting role is probably the best writing they've received in the entire spectrum of 30k and 40k.

 

I must disagree with you. If we're not counting the Heresy books, i'd say a better story/depiction is in the Ultramarines omnibus.