Not Black Library, or Dune but is it…?

[Rowland]

I love Sci-Fi.  I’ve read a lot of BL lately so fancied a break.  So, searching for recommendations I came across Empire of Silence (Sun eater series) by Christopher Ruocchio.  I love a lengthy space opera and I only downloaded a sample but I’m really struggling to not link it to BL stuff: all the talk of an Alien Race destroying the galaxy i.e. Tyrannids, Emperors, powerful families and Dune with shield belts and swords.

Has anyone read it and can recommend it, particularly if it’s a departure from 40k and Dune?

It seems so close to both books that I may as well read more BL.

I favour Iain M Banks and will probably give Peter Hamiltons Reality Dysfunction a go (which I may have read already).

Edited August 6 by Rowland

[wecanhaveallthree]

a) The Necromancy thread died for this.

 

b) Hamilton is a hack fraud which does not in any way inhibit me enjoying his stupid books, particularly the Commonwealth Saga, because it's like our stupid brainwaves aligned into one single stupid consciousness.

 

c) Disregard Empire of SIlence. Read Locked Tomb, spend half your reading time having to pick up the damn book after you throw it across the room yelling COME ON THIS IS JUST 40K WITH THE SERIALS FILED OFF. 

[Rowland]

Spoiler

 

Sorry wchat that went a little over my head…

a).  What’s that?

b). You like him?

c). Are you confirming the Sun eater series isn’t worth it?  Is Locked Tomb lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space?

[Sothalor]

The Sun Eater series is one of my favorites in recent memory, or maybe just generally in all honesty.

 

The prose is a particular standout - the author studied rhetoric and speechwriting in school, and it shows. The positioning of Hadrian as a byronic, potentially unreliable narrator with a fondness for melodrama and a classical education really lets Ruocchio go to town with wordsmithing.

 

It pays many homages to Dune and the author was very open about that as well; the series may be read as a thematic antithesis to Dune's ideas and Ruocchio himself encourages people to read Dune for that kind of metacontextual comparison. Sun Eater is quite self-aware when it comes to the science fantasy tropes and trappings it integrates.

 

That said, it's all just that: trappings. You might as well say that Star Wars and 40k are so similar because they have spaceships, wizards, scifi guns, and fancy tech swords. It's what stories, themes, and human ideas are underlying them that provides substantive differences.

[Roomsky]

6 minutes ago, Rowland said:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

Is Locked Tomb lesbian necromancers explore a haunted gothic palace in space?

Can't comment on Sun Eaters, but I feel there is a point where this particular brand of grimdarkness is inevitably going to fall back into being 40k, which in turn falls back into being Herbert/Moorcock/Wolfe etc. etc. etc. I try to just embrace the fun of spotting the similarities.

The Locked Tomb is, as a good friend once described it, "40k for lesbians." That said, despite Muir's prose stumbling a bit in the first book, The Locked Tomb is ultimately a lot deeper than any 40k fiction from the past 20 years, and goes places GW is too cowardly to let their novels explore. Highly recommended.

[Rowland]

Spoiler

 

Ah, that’s a great recommendation.  I shall give it more time.  It’s an easy read and not un enjoyable.  If it’s as good as you say it should be rewarding.

I get that stories can be based on the hero quest or whatever its called but I like Sci-fi for its departure from that, or at least some abstract thinking on the way.

 

@Roomsky yeah I get your last comment but I’d rather read good 40k as a newcomer because in some ways it feels like homework LOL.  But at the moment I’m a bit over40k’d.    For example the Culture stuff, Expnse, Hyperion, and even Red Rising depart from the grimdark gothic sci-fi vibe.

[wecanhaveallthree]

I don't just love Hamilton, I am completely convinced that I am an amnesiac Hamilton slowly rediscovering my true identity through clues hidden in my stupid stories.

 

Empire is good, but I think if you're looking for something more approaching the 40K aesthetic, Locked Tomb will get you there and with a bit more 'bite' (not that Empire is bad, I stress again, but rather that Tomb is really, really good). 

 

I know nothing about any Necromancy thread. I did not say this. I am not here.

[theSpirea]

Sun Eater series? One of the best SF series ever. The writing alone is on a whole other level and can’t even be matched by BL. Only Wraight can reach this peak, no other BL author comes close, especially later books in the series. I don’t see it as a rip-off of 40K and it's a completely different experience.

 

Hamilton? Can’t stand his writing. It all reads like dumb pulp.
 

[wecanhaveallthree]

Quote

Hamilton? Can’t stand his writing. It all reads like dumb pulp.

 

I already said I love his books, you don't need to keep selling me on them.

[Rowland]

I’m confused about Hamiltons Reality Dysfunction. I use a Kindle and it normally tells me I’ve read a book.  It’s not showing as read.  Problem is I’ve read lots of sci-fi and it all blurs a bit.  Is it the one where theres a sort of heart of darkness trip down a swampy river with some sort of jeopardy?  I don’t recall the overall theme.  I get confused between  Hyperion, Children of time the Expanse where they all have some off world exploration and discover an artefact or race and that has some significance.  One of them has a female politician who goes home to her farm, shapeshifting spys maybe???

With some of these space operas they don’t seem to be so significantly different I suppose.  The Red Rising Series was quite memorable.  It wasn’t as high brow but fast paced and the world building was good.  Enders games, The Forever war and All you need is kill are all memorable too.

 

Definitely will persist with the Sun Eater books then.  Thanks.

[Gamiel]

Have you tried the Iron Widow series by Xiran Jay Zhao? Not space opera but techno-feudalism, evil government and invading aliens so maybe what you are looking for.

[Rowland]

Spoiler

 

No, I will take a look. 

[DarkChaplain]

On 8/6/2026 at 8:17 PM, wecanhaveallthree said:

a) The Necromancy thread died for this.

 

Don't worry, we probably still have around a month before they check back in and close this one, too :^) We should enjoy our little book club on this ENTIRE BOARD while we can.

 

Personally, I have no idea about most authors mentioned here, but I'm taking notes!

[grailkeeper]

I really liked the Deathstalker book series as a kid. They're great space opera and there's a lot of them. 

I read the first one because it had the worst cover I'd ever seen.

 

Turns out it was actually really good. 

[Lathe Biosas]

Good News! 

 

I was at the used bookstore today and discovered something amazing. Remember Matthew Ward? The guy who wrote those amazing Grey Knight and Ultramarines Codicies back the day... you remember the ones where those chapters were almost too awesome for words...

 

Well... he writes fantasy novels too! 

 

Unfortunately,  I'm reading C.S. Goto novels right now, so I need a volunteer to read this series.

[Roomsky]

54 minutes ago, Lathe Biosas said:

Good News! 

 

I was at the used bookstore today and discovered something amazing. Remember Matthew Ward? The guy who wrote those amazing Grey Knight and Ultramarines Codicies back the day... you remember the ones where those chapters were almost too awesome for words...

 

Well... he writes fantasy novels too! 

Unfortunately,  I'm reading C.S. Goto novels right now, so I need a volunteer to read this series.

Ward's novels are apparently really good! I wouldn't write them off because of his codex sins; entirely different beast.

[wecanhaveallthree]

Let me put it to you this way. I picked up Ward's Legacy purely out of contrariness (as is my motivation for most things, granted). I went 'heh' in the first chapter. I went 'this is just Old World guff' in the second. 'This is derivative slop!'

 

And then the weekend was over, and I'd bought and read all of them, back-to-back. I devoured those books. I didn't go to the gym. I put off errands. I speed-ran my shopping. I ordered in. I'd close my e-reader and go to bed - I'd get up, make breakfast and start reading again. I was possessed by these books. 

 

They are not, to be clear, literary masterworks of original fiction. The prose is competent and occasionally great. The characters are engaging and occasionally compelling. The world and its building are interesting and occasionally gripping. It has no single stand-out element, no one thing you'd rave about, no character who is particularly notable (though there are a lot of good ones). But these books are what many, many works of fiction fail to be: they are the complete package. Ward's fundamentals are extremely strong. There is nothing in any of these books that is ever lacking, ever breaks your immersion, ever falls below a high standard. 

 

This might sound like 'damned by faint praise', but Ward's continuous competency means that everything he does lands. He earns every scene, every character beat, and everything moves the story forward. It is utterly compelling. There's this sense of energy and wonder, energy and intrigue that suffuses every page that captures the same feeling you might get reading, say, ASOIAF. Ward's world is not massively original, but it's not paint-by-numbers, and it is more than interesting enough to want to learn more, to see the gods and magics and stories and be sucked in. It... has, like, the darkness of ASOIAF, or First Law, the same gritty feel, but at the same time it is decidedly not those stories, those worlds, where the narrative is against the characters, where the world itself seems to close in and crush them.

 

This is heroic fantasy, where the good guys might have that dog in them, and sometimes that dog bites, but they are heroes. You get the politics of the best of the genre, the POVs, the grime that makes 'grimdark' appealing, but you also get the comfort of knowing this is a world - a story - in which the 'good guys' might not always triumph, but they're always in with a fighting chance. 

 

TL;DR Ward builds a world that you want to discover more of, populated with characters from many sides who you want to succeed, often in tension with one another. Buy it. The Codex Astartes supports such an action. 

[grailkeeper]

Matt Ward bashing? 

[Rowland]

10 hours ago, Lathe Biosas said:

Good News! 

 

I was at the used bookstore today and discovered something amazing. Remember Matthew Ward? The guy who wrote those amazing Grey Knight and Ultramarines Codicies back the day... you remember the ones where those chapters were almost too awesome for words...

 

Well... he writes fantasy novels too! 

 

Unfortunately,  I'm reading C.S. Goto novels right now, so I need a volunteer to read this series.

I cut my teenage teeth on fantasy novels (LOTR, Belgariad, Thomas Covenant etc) I’ve continued to dip my toe in when the big decent series are reviewed favourably.  On Goodreads he’s compared to Bernard Cornwall whose stuff I love.  Thanks for pointing this one out, it will be my between sci-fi read.

[Roomsky]

If you're taking fantasy suggestions for your backlog, Rowland, then I must suggest my absolute favourite dark "fantasy" series: R. Scott Bakker's Second Apocalypse. It's not just dark and gritty! It's black and sticky! It's like 40k but not written by cowards! It evolves Tolkien's tropes instead of just imitating them! Be transported to a fantasy Middle East and say "God, I hate it here!"

Edited August 8 by Roomsky

[Rowland]

15 hours ago, Roomsky said:

If you're taking fantasy suggestions for your backlog, Rowland, then I must suggest my absolute favourite dark "fantasy" series: R. Scott Bakker's Second Apocalypse. It's not just dark and gritty! It's black and sticky! It's like 40k but not written by cowards! It evolves Tolkien's tropes instead of just imitating them! Be transported to a fantasy Middle East and say "God, I hate it here!"

Thanks, I appreciate recommendations.  I’m trying to de:cuss:ify my life and return to actual books.  That plunge into buying an actual book without sampling it seems like a big step these days.  But back when there was no internet that’s what we did.

One reviewer compares it favourably to Malazan which I enjoyed. 

[wecanhaveallthree]

Quote

Malazan

 

Nobody enjoys Malazan. People enjoy Malazan in the same way people enjoy being tied up, blindfolded and beaten (which is, coincidentally, exactly how Malazan is written). Gardens of the Moon is five hundred pages of somebody hitting you repeatedly with a phone book and demanding to know which glorflemungle Scapelli is keeping the whickersnacker in while you sob 'I DON'T KNOW' (this only makes them hit you harder). 

 

One of my favourites, naturally. Roomsky hates it because they don't know what love is.

[Rowland]

15 minutes ago, wecanhaveallthree said:

 

Nobody enjoys Malazan. People enjoy Malazan in the same way people enjoy being tied up, blindfolded and beaten (which is, coincidentally, exactly how Malazan is written). Gardens of the Moon is five hundred pages of somebody hitting you repeatedly with a phone book and demanding to know which glorflemungle Scapelli is keeping the whickersnacker in while you sob 'I DON'T KNOW' (this only makes them hit you harder). 

 

One of my favourites, naturally. Roomsky hates it because they don't know what love is.

Yeah, but discussing it with the wife I can’t remember which is which…I recall starting on a battlement and a woman who becomes a wizard who is escorted by an ent like character, gets “born again” and long walks through a weird shifting desert and a rear guard action a prophecy with a big magical tower, a huge final? Battle in a garden courtyard…insert shrug here lol. One is Malazan one is First Law maybe..,

Edited August 9 by Rowland

[Taliesin]

21 hours ago, Roomsky said:

If you're taking fantasy suggestions for your backlog, Rowland, then I must suggest my absolute favourite dark "fantasy" series: R. Scott Bakker's Second Apocalypse. It's not just dark and gritty! It's black and sticky! It's like 40k but not written by cowards! It evolves Tolkien's tropes instead of just imitating them! Be transported to a fantasy Middle East and say "God, I hate it here!"

 

Seconded. An awesome series and one of my top 5 favorites ( alongside the Silmarillion, Song of Ice and Fire, Farseer Trilogy and sequels, Guy Kay's books and First Law trilogy).

[Rowland]

25 minutes ago, Taliesin said:

 

Seconded. An awesome series and one of my top 5 favorites ( alongside the Silmarillion, Song of Ice and Fire, Farseer Trilogy and sequels, Guy Kay's books and First Law trilogy).

Is your pseudonym a nod to a character from one of these?…sounds familiar.