Rate what you Read, or the fight against Necromancy

[byrd9999]

One of the difficult things about writing about very clever characters (and this is also true of writing about military geniuses in Warhammer), is that either the author themselves have to be very clever (or a military genius), or it can come across as a bit handwavey.

 

I've never found Ahriman or Magnus to be particularly smart in BL fiction, but that seems to be their shtick. And in the case of Graham McNeill's work, quite the opposite.

 

The T Sons are often made to look stupid or foolish, so they can be "corrected" by a smarter character, in order to show how clever they are. But the cleverness is usually commonsense, or even just following their original orders, so the legion comes across as dense.

[lansalt]

I think it's done on purpose to show the TSons as delusional about their own cleverness and knowledge while being always the playthings of others in the end. Being book smart instead of actually smart It's their theme in both the HH and 40k, IMO

[grailkeeper]

 

I think it's done on purpose to show the TSons as delusional about their own cleverness and knowledge while being always the playthings of others in the end. Being book smart instead of actually smart It's their theme in both the HH and 40k, IMO

Yeah. There's a big difference between an academic knowledge of the nature of reality and being able to outsmart somebody.

[byrd9999]

That would be fine, but these guys aren't even booksmart. I have no problem with them being outmaneouvred, or their clever plans backfiring, but that would require the author thinking of a fiendishly clever plot point, only to have it backfire in a suitably Tzeenthcian manner. Which doesn't happen, because the authors are just authors and not fiendishly clever Tzeentchian manipulators. Instead, the TSons are just dumb.

Often a TSon will say something stupid, just so another one can correct them and be portrayed as the smart one.

Edited August 18 by byrd9999

[aa.logan]

Khârn: Eater of Worlds

 

How on earth is this 10 years old? In my head it was still a ‘new’ book, I cannot believe it’s taken me so long to get around to reading it. I’m a sucker for CSM books, but this is another cracker and an absolute hidden gem. 
 

Set in the aftermath of the Heresy, the World Eaters are licking their wounds and still semi-coherent, and refreshingly no loyalists feature. Am I right in thinking a sequel was scrapped? Lots of threads are set up and there are some interesting characters but the book does peter out a bit towards the end, leaving me feeling that more could be done with it. Throughly enjoyable despite this.

[DarkChaplain]

Another case of a canceled sequel that was originally intended but never happened, sadly.

[Rob P]

Shadowsun - Phil Kelly

 

It's a modern setting book (post rift), that covers some events relevant to the Psychic Awakening sourcebook 'The Greater Good'.

 

It looks at some of the tensions between the Tau of the 4th sphere and 5th sphere and their allies against the back drop of the Psychic awakening and a Death Guard threat.

 

The most interesting things with the Tau are how they treat allies and seeing them figuring out how the universe works. We got a bit of both here.

 

The Death Guard, whilst not my thing, got a good showing too.

 

Yes, there are a couple of battles but it felt the right balance rather than something that sucked space away from the actual plot. It helped that in one fight the focus was the characters and their interactions and not the mechanics or the physicality of the fight.

 

Finally, the author, something or a mainstay and loremaster at GW (like Gav Thorpe) does seem to have his haters. This seems often be presented as the writing not being the desired manifestation of their knowledge and ideas. Personally, I have no complaint here.

 

For a BL novel I'm giving it 4.5/5

Edited August 24 by Rob P

[Roomsky]

The Soul Hunter we Have at Home Shroud of Night - Andy Clark (Audiobook)

 

This book is perfectly okay. Sort of an above-average Space Marine Battles affair, IMO. There's way too much fightan for my tastes, but it's held together by a very solid cast of Alpha Legionaries. The question of "how much do we really gain by denying the dark gods?" is a good one, and there are some character concepts here I really enjoy, such as one legionary's compulsive secret-keeping. Very much reads like something imitating Talos' merry band, but that saves the book more often than not. I'd say the "core" group here more memorable than Akurra's from Harrowmaster, but in all other ways I prefer that book over this one.

 

The overall presentation of the Unsung's military action undermines how much I like them, a little. They're constantly spouting tacticool dialogue that puts me in mind of military LARPers, and some of their psyop techniques are basically just magic. A few scenarios meant to emphasize their intelligence really only have the effect of making their opponents seem like morons, such as the leader of a Chaos warband teleporting to confront them by himself.

 

I also have issue with Khârn - in that there's not really any reason for him to be Khârn. That he's just able to tank massed enemy fire seems cheap instead of badass, and isn't terribly in keeping with him being Khorne's mortal champion. He's just an unstoppable plot device with no personality to speak of, it's like he's Khârn for brand recognition.

 

But my main issue comes back to the amount of fighting just being tiresome. Clark's prose is nothing special and the variance of contrasting forces is the only thing that makes it mildly interesting. While I'm not hot on Khârn (or Celestine, for that matter,) I like the Fists characters, I like the stubborn tech priest, I like the protagonists, I like 6 and Caleb. The points of view are fun, but like with a child eating trail mix, I'm only putting up with the whole for the handful of treats mixed in.

 

5/10. I know the book has a fanbase but I have to rate it Diehards Only. If you don't hate Brooks, Harrowmaster is a better Alpha Legion book. If you want a big system-battle book with several factions and an Imperial Fists component, read Apocalypse.

 

PS: Did the Iron Warriors mentioned ever come into play? Did I miss that?

[byrd9999]

The Death of Integrity, by Guy Haley.

 

This book has been recommended in a couple of places over the years, so I bought a copy a while back, but only just got round to reading it. It always seemed to get knocked back down the tbr pile by newer or flashier books or books that tie into big events, but I am very glad I took it on holiday with me and finally gave it a go.

 

This is a Top 10 Black Library book, a solid 10/10 for me.

We all judge books by how much we enjoy them (and why not?) but there is more to it than that. We can judge a book based on what it sets out to do, and by how well it achieves those goals. This book succeeded, in my opinion, on just about every metric I'd want to use. So why use a caveat? If someone pushes a book so hard, it can only disappoint the next reader, because what book ever surpasses the biggest hype? So, I'll qualify my fulsome praise.

This book is set on a Space Hulk, so I knew it would be Terminators versus Genestealers. The novelisation of the Space Hulk board game. And this is a Space Marines Battles series book, so I went into it expecting bolter porn. Highly recommended bolter porn, but bp nonetheless.

And it is, to an extent, but it's so much more.

It's set in M38, so it is removed from the current setting. Everyone's plot armour is gone, everyone is playing for real.

It features 2 lesser known chapters: Novamarines and Blood Drinkers, bone and blood, the rational soldiers and the frenzied melee warriors, the guys who memorise the Codex, and the guys with a secret to hide. But they aren't just there to contrast each other, like sunlight and shadow. Guy Haley gives each chapter a chance to shine by taking the reader into their private rituals, their homeworlds, their inner doubts and turmoil, what makes them tick. He gives each one their own flavour, distinct from each other but also Novamarines distinct from Ultramarines, and Blood Drinkers distinct from Blood Angels. And then Haley shows just how well these 2 chapters work well together. This isn't a study in binary styles, but how they adapt and learn from each other.

These aren't cookie cutter Marines. They have distinct personalities and roles. They are characters. They have inner lives, they have doubts, about their roles in the chapter, about their ability to lead, about their relationship to their chapters' histories.

Add in a contingent of AdMech, with their own agendas, and the Genestealers, both of whom play their roles to a tee, and it's a pretty varied selection of factions involved, each with competing goals and methods that worked well on their own, and also as part of a large ensemble.

 

The setting is brilliantly realised. It reminded me of Alien/Aliens, the claustrophobia, the tension. Guy Haley does a great job of engaging the senses in traversing the Space Hulk. Listen to the soundtrack of films like Alien/Aliens/2001, and how well they use sound and visuals to enhance the tension. The breathing, the pinging of sensor detectors, the panic of the best laid plans coming undone.

The plot is well crafted. What starts out as easy as getting from plot point A (there's a Space Hulk) to point B (let's destroy it), takes in twists and turns that are smooth and compelling as well as being tense and gripping. Everything is believable, every turn the narrative takes, feels entirely natural. Even the ending, the bare bones of which is kind of hinted at throughout the book, happens in a way I was not expecting.

The antagonists didn't need to twirl a moustache, they did exactly what they needed to do, being who they needed to be. Their motivations were believable, and I loved the brief insights we got into the Tyranid hivemind when the psykers connected with them.

And there was a fantastic balance of action and planning/character building/lore. The battle scenes were kept to a minimum, and didn't out stay their welcome. They were necessary and intertwined well with the plot and its development.

Spoiler Alert:

Even on literary terms, the book is a winner for me. You can't have a book titled Death of Integrity (the name of the Space Hulk) without it also doing double duty as a literary device metaphor/allusion/whatever to something in the book. But what is impressive is just how many elements the title relates to. The Novamarines Captain, Galt, who feels he has failed, both his friend Voldo, and the Codex ideals for which he stands. The Blood Drinkers Chapter Master, Caedis, who enters the Black Rage and doesn't feel what Sanguinius felt, but rather the history of Holos, the original Blood Drinker, and learns of the Tzeentchian treachery and deception Holos adopted in order to keep the thirst at bay, which is a secret shared by the Reclusiarchs.

And the twist at the end that the Imperium itself has betrayed humanity. The AI whose shipmate/friend tried to warn the Imperium of what lies in mankind's future, but was executed for heresy, and has now gone mad/vengeful. The (not novel but certainly very well executed) idea that humanity's attempts to save itself will be its downfall.

 

 

And finally, the way the Epilogue tied it back into the present day M41, meant it left me with some interesting things to ponder.

Perhaps it was the conditions I read it under, perhaps it was because my expectations were sufficiently lowered, but for whatever reason, this was the exact Black Library book I wanted to read. As a novelisation of the Space Hulk board game (not really, but kind of), it did everything it needed to do, but went out of its way to do so much more. Guy Haley didn't need to write a book this great, but I'm grateful he did.

 

10/10

 

[darkhorse0607]

Thank you for the writeup, I'm getting more and more into Novamarines lately and this sounds fantastic

[DarkChaplain]

Death of Integrity was such a ride, it's been the one Space Marine Battles book I'm hoping to see adapted to audiobook soon, and have been eager for since SMB got picked up at long last. It's one of those novels I wish I had the time to revisit either way.

 

It really is the preeminent Space Hulk book from BL. None of the others in a similar setting really boil down the danger of such boarding actions so well. It's dense and claustrophobic, with many uncertainties, and not just externally but especially in terms of internal character conflicts. Still fondly remember the early scene of the Mechanicus giving the Chapter leaders a briefing of the Space Hulk they're dealing with.

 

...and those scenes exploring both Chapters involved? Great. I love the way the Blood Drinkers engage in art to keep their troubling natures in check, in particular.

 

There's actually a short story leading up to this one ("The Rite of Holos", in the Sons of Sanguinius omnibus) and a sequel short ("Final Journey", from the old Space Marines celebration, so a 1000 word micro short...which they bumped ludicrously up in price since back then, putting it at the same level as a full-fledged short. Crazy! It's not been collected outside of the event-exclusive limited anthology back then, iirc). Even without either short, I think that the novel alone gives the full view of what these two Chapters are all about, how they function in relation to other, more well-known Chapters, and why you would care about them.

Edited August 26 by DarkChaplain

[lansalt]

Regarding space hulk books, I recommend Calgar's Fury as another good story and one of the few about Calgar himself.

[byrd9999]

 

Thank you for the writeup, I'm getting more and more into Novamarines lately and this sounds fantastic

Going in to the book, I knew nothing about Novamarines and didn't really care either way, but now I am a big fan!

 

This book spends time on their homeworld, Honourum, shows you rituals, chapter serfs, veteran brothers, lore.

 

There are paperback copies on eBay UK for very reasonable prices.

[Krelious]

I recently acquired my final needed copy of Limited Edition The End and the Death Vol3 and ive begun my mad quest of reading all 3 books in a row.

Vol 1 down, id say im actually pleasantly surprised by the quality as I didnt do much skimming or skipping and I actaully just sat down and read the vast majority of the book. I'd give it a 8/10.

 

Vol 2 im about 230 pages in which I guess in Total is 880 pages of this Abnett guy, honestly its starting to drag now even though theres interesting bits and it flows nicely it just feels like too much and more of the same that structurally it just gets predictable. It also moves at a snails pace in terms micro managing character positions, like I would be okay if Abbadon just got to the Vengeful Spirit, I dont care about the Warp jumping shenanigans that much I mean good god I like these books but at the same time it feels like someone in corporate told Abnett he needed to write 3 books because thats what they wanted to sell so in order to pack 500+ pages into each novel its like taking a :cuss:ing microscope to the plot and it only moves forward once all the characters being written about and their dogs linearly move forward and it approaches each one with the sense of a jeweler examining the quality of a gem stone or in some cases the chapters are like two pages long and im like okay...

 

I think what these books needed to have at their core is Emperor and crew teleporting to the Vengeful spirit, the perpetual crew teleporting there, Malcador on the throne, last battle to protect the palace from the traitors. Sanguinious dies, Emperor fights Horus, Emperor is interred on the Golden Throne. Im sorry but i dont think we needed detailed specifcis on what Fafnir Rann and everyone else is doing or this Basilius Fo character who I dont really remember and hes kind of interesting but at the same time I dont give a :cuss: about. Like to me what these books remind me of is often times when im interested in something or im creative about something even in say a videogame or a cardgame or whatever I tend to jumble a lot of ideas and archetypes together into a mess that sometimes works, and I do this because I like exploring options and seeing connections between things and then later ill often refine it or ask someone for help in terms of refining/cutting  my ideas into something workable and more consistent, ie an editing process and I just feel like Abnett who is likely a couple decades older than I am should have learned this lesson and not published this jumbled mess.  And really in the most polite way possible I like his writing here and I can appreciate the difficulty in the story he is portraying here but its just way too much and im looking for someone to blame or even be honest about this because I dont think 1800+ pages is fair for this. And you might say well you have the option of spacing it out but at the same time im the type of person where very often what im reading doesnt really stick in my head past two weeks beyond really broad strokes or feelings and I wanted to get the entirety of The End and the Death done at once so it flows nicely together, its in my mind all at once and I can digest it all and get a sense of it as a whole.  I guess its also nice and timely that I'm likely going to finish around the two year mark since Echoes of Eternity. 

 

Instead of getting the End and the Death I feel like after 880 pages of this im getting Abnett brained and im getting good at predicting what's coming next. 

 

 

[theSpirea]

This is one of my main issues with modern SFF. The majority of these books are extremely long, and it's mainly filler. The books would have been much better if they were properly edited.

The End and the Death is approximately 425K words. That's more like 1200-1300 pages if this was published by Tor/Orbit, etc. That's why the page count is incredibly misleading.

There are fantasy books of similar length that are not even split into three volumes. For example, some of [redacted] stuff is decent but ridiculously bloated, adding absolutely nothing. The characters and world-building are too generic, and the dialogues are full of clichés. The same goes for [redacted], whose prose on top of that is fairly poor. It all reads like dull, repetitive AI output that I encounter at work far too often.

 

I'd rather not name these non-BL authors so as not to offend anyone and because they seem to be well-loved within the SFF community. I'm glad BL keeps most of their novels around the 100-120K word limit. It takes an exceptionally skilled author to write more without it feeling bloated.

[Firedrake Cordova]

 

Regarding space hulk books, I recommend Calgar's Fury as another good story and one of the few about Calgar himself.

If you're looking for Space Hulk books, there's also the Ciaphas Cain novel "The Emperor's Finest", which I quite enjoyed.

[grailkeeper]

 

This is one of my main issues with modern SFF. The majority of these books are extremely long, and it's mainly filler. The books would have been much better if they were properly edited.

The End and the Death is approximately 425K words. That's more like 1200-1300 pages if this was published by Tor/Orbit, etc. That's why the page count is incredibly misleading.

There are fantasy books of similar length that are not even split into three volumes. For example, some of [redacted] stuff is decent but ridiculously bloated, adding absolutely nothing. The characters and world-building are too generic, and the dialogues are full of clichés. The same goes for [redacted], whose prose on top of that is fairly poor. It all reads like dull, repetitive AI output that I encounter at work far too often.

 

I'd rather not name these non-BL authors so as not to offend anyone and because they seem to be well-loved within the SFF community. I'm glad BL keeps most of their novels around the 100-120K word limit. It takes an exceptionally skilled author to write more without it feeling bloated.

 

I'm just finishing up my latest book before I send it to the publisher and I'm clocking in at just over 176K words. I hope they dont think it's bloated!

[The Scorpion]

 

Thank you for the writeup, I'm getting more and more into Novamarines lately and this sounds fantastic

It is such a shame that the Novamarines are consided a "lesser known" Chapter, despite being 2nd founding.

 

In fact, almost evey successor chapter is considered lesser-known. We all know what the First Founding chapters are like. I wish Black Library would devote some time to explore other chapters more often.

[DarkChaplain]

I wish Haley was still as prolific as a few years ago and we'd have gotten more Novamarines from him. Oh well, maybe we'll see Lucretius Corvo show up in that Scouring series folks are clamoring for, at least?

[grailkeeper]

 

I wish Haley was still as prolific as a few years ago and we'd have gotten more Novamarines from him. Oh well, maybe we'll see Lucretius Corvo show up in that Scouring series folks are clamoring for, at least?

 

I wonder whats taking up his time? He's one of BLs fastest authors so it must be something. I read one of his non-BL books once and enjoyed it. I cant seem to see any mention of him working on non-BL stuff now though.

[darkhorse0607]

 

It is such a shame that the Novamarines are consided a "lesser known" Chapter, despite being 2nd founding.

 

In fact, almost evey successor chapter is considered lesser-known. We all know what the First Founding chapters are like. I wish Black Library would devote some time to explore other chapters more often.

 

In the depths of my wishes that probably won't come true, that's what I'm hoping Robbie MaNiven is coming back to do. First, the Carcharadons, last weekend Oaths of Damnation came out about the Exorcists, hopefully, there will be more. I'd like to see books for a host of different chapters, Raptors, Novamarines, and Howling Griffons to name a few

[byrd9999]

 

 

I wonder whats taking up his time? He's one of BLs fastest authors so it must be something. I read one of his non-BL books once and enjoyed it. I cant seem to see any mention of him working on non-BL stuff now though.

4 things that I can see causing a reduced output from him:

 

1. He said himself he was in danger of burnout so he's deliberately reducing his speed/output/commissions he accepts. He said this several years ago, so based on time it takes from accepting a commission to when we have it in our hands, we're seeing that output drop now.

 

2. He's also writing for AOS.

 

3. He might also be writing for WH+

 

4. He has co-authored the massive new 40K DK book with Gav Thorpe. This probably took a huge chunk of his time 

 

But he is still writing 40k so I am grateful. 

[aa.logan]

Series-editing the Dawn of Fire books too

[Sothalor]

I want to be snarky and say something along the lines of "what Dawn of Fire books?"

 

But honestly, it wouldn't be fair because I haven't been keeping up with the series. The last one was Sea of Souls by Wraight, yes? What's been the general interval between releases? How long has this series been going on now?

[Roomsky]

 

I want to be snarky and say something along the lines of "what Dawn of Fire books?"

 

But honestly, it wouldn't be fair because I haven't been keeping up with the series. The last one was Sea of Souls by Wraight, yes? What's been the general interval between releases? How long has this series been going on now?

 

No set release schedule, but Hand of Abaddon, book 8 of 9, releases in September. In addition to running the series, Haley is almost certainly penning the last entry.

 

(I quite like Dawn of Fire and rarely love Haley books so I'm an outlier in wanting him to helm more projects like this instead of turning back into Mr. 3-Books-a-Year.)