Rate what you Read, or the fight against Necromancy

[DukeLeto69]

Relentless by Richard Williams was also excellent. Truly good Battlefleet novel.

 

Wonder what happened to him?

[aa.logan]

Having just read, and adored, Ghazghkull it made sense to move onto Sebastian Yarrick, his famous grimgrod, or favourite enemy.

 

This Omnibus collects two novels, one novella and a handful of short stories that provide Yarrick’s bale-eye view of various events from his life.

 

The majority of the collection, perhaps inevitably, focuses on the Second War for Armageddon, and while this is an iconic and really interesting conflict that I’ll happily read about for days on end, it’s when it focuses on ‘lesser’ engagements that it really shines.

 

The opening novel, The Imperial Creed, sees one of Yarrick’s formative experiences as a novice Commissar, and Annandale delivers a story that is more than just a series of battle sequences- as is his later works suggest, Annandale is disconcertingly comfortable in writing about the disturbing and insidious nature of Chaos. In placing a green Commissar in unfamiliar environments where he cannot just execute his way out of problems we get a nicely nuanced look at the role they must play in the Imperial Guard. This more subtle approach is also evident in the short story, The Gallows Saint.

 

The novella, Chains of Golgotha also takes Yarrick out of his usual milieux and is the other standout in this volume. It ramps up the horror and brutality of the Orks as well as illustrating the bizarre and unique relationship between Yarrick and his nemesis.

 

The Armageddon-heavy stories are good too, adding depth and nuance to a well-told story, showing how and why Yarrick became such a potent figurehead for the Imperial resistance, while acknowledging the cost this inevitably had to his psyche.

 

The omission of the (fantastic) short detailing Yarrick’s orphaning is a strange one though.

 

Overall, a 6/10, but 7/10 for the three highlighted stories.

[Fire Golem]

I didn’t even know Imperial Glory existed. Will try and find a copy somewhere, thanks Roomsky!

[aa.logan]

It’s in the Glory Imperialis omnibus; I’ve bought it on the strength of that review too

[DukeLeto69]

It’s in the Glory Imperialis omnibus; I’ve bought it on the strength of that review too

Gonna do the same!

[byrd9999]

Saturnine, Dan Abnett

 

One of the best BL books I have read, imo. Masterful storytelling, and a great continuation of what has gone before in the Siege.

 

My favourite BL author at the top of his game.

 

just a shame that Jenetia Krole died. But what a way to go! I hope the Sisters of Silence continue to feature in the forthcoming novels

 

10/10

[DukeLeto69]

Saturnine, Dan Abnett

 

One of the best BL books I have read, imo. Masterful storytelling, and a great continuation of what has gone before in the Siege.

 

My favourite BL author at the top of his game.

 

just a shame that Jenetia Krole died. But what a way to go! I hope the Sisters of Silence continue to feature in the forthcoming novels

 

10/10

I finished Saturnine yesterday. By some margin the best SoT novel so far.

 

Now I am not the prime target audience for these Siege books because, weirdly I am generally not a fan of the “war” in “warhammer”. It is the setting I love and my fav books are those focused on Inquisitors (Abnett, Wraight, French), Arbites (Farrer), Crime and Horror and Fehervari (although do love the Gaunt’s Ghosts etc a LOT)...

 

BUT if you are going to write a (long) novel focused on a BIG battle with lots of fighting then Saturnine is how to do it. Never samey, never boring. A page turner:

 

I confess to actually welling up when we hear about Willem Kordy and his mate dying off screen. Expected to see it but this subverting of expectations emphasised the remorseless waste of life whose sacrifice is unseen

 

For me a 9/10

 

Mortis next.

Edited June 21, 2021 by DukeLeto69

[Fedor]

Imperial Glory also has the best (attempted) sex scene in BL history.

 

Williams was just a really good military fiction writer. It would be nice to see some new books from him.

[byrd9999]

 

Saturnine, Dan Abnett

 

One of the best BL books I have read, imo. Masterful storytelling, and a great continuation of what has gone before in the Siege.

 

My favourite BL author at the top of his game.

 

just a shame that Jenetia Krole died. But what a way to go! I hope the Sisters of Silence continue to feature in the forthcoming novels

 

10/10

I finished Saturnine yesterday. By some margin the best SoT novel so far.

 

Now I am not the prime target audience for these Siege books because, weirdly I am generally not a fan of the “war” in “warhammer”. It is the setting I love and my fav books are those focused on Inquisitors (Abnett, Wraight, French), Arbites (Farrer), Crime and Horror and Fehervari (although do love the Gaunt’s Ghosts etc a LOT)...

 

BUT if you are going to write a (long) novel focused on a BIG battle with lots of fighting then Saturnine is how to do it. Never samey, never boring. A page turner:

 

I confess to actually welling up when we hear about Willem Kordy and his mate dying off screen. Expected to see it but this subverting of expectations emphasised the remorseless waste of life whose sacrifice is unseen

 

For me a 9/10

 

Mortis next.

 

 

Same here. I end up skimming most battle scenes because I'm not a big fan of that kind of stuff, but Saturnine was the first one where I was gripped by the action. I found myself picking it up at odd times of the day and reading a couple more pages because I had 5 mins spare. And I too loved the way some deaths were reported, off screen in others' reports. The casual, mathematical nature of tallying death during war made it pack a real punch.

 

With almost every single BL book I have read, no matter how much I enjoyed reading it, by the end of the book I am ready for it to be over. But Saturnine was a rare one (maybe along with Brothers of the Snake and Spears of the Emperor) where I wished it was longer.

[DarkChaplain]

I really envy you folks that experience. The "ready to be over" feeling for Saturnine cropped up pretty early for me, and I couldn't wait to go back to whatever else was on the platter at the time. I think a Genevieve story, or something non-BL?

 

Especially when it started chugging characters with unfinished arcs into the meat grinder just to fill up the roster of losses on both sides, I was ready to get it over with. My biggest reaction to one character death throughout was actually a bit of gladness that the third->first person narrative switcheroo was finally over...

 

The strongest parts were still those with Olly, though. Great character with a finished arc.

[sitnam]

(Spoilers for Mephiston trilogy ahead)

 

I recently wrapped up the Mephiston trilogy on audible, and I have to say it was pretty good and got progressively better as the series went on.

 

One thing that bothered me was that the female acolyte of Zadkiel (the big bad), never really showed up in the latter two books. I think City of Light had a nod to her at the end, but I expected her to show up in the second and third books as a part of the direct story. The story ended up spanning several decades (if not a century or two) and they all didn’t directly lead to one another.

 

I also felt the paranoia Andross had toward Mephiston towards the end of Revenant Crusade didn’t show up in CoL.

 

I think the series could of been a bit more cohesive and covered a smaller time period, but it still came out pretty good. I’m a bolter porn afficanado, and the action was overall pretty well written. The scene where the whole crowd turned into Tzeentchian horrors was awesome.

 

I also really liked this book as a Tzeentch fan. Zadkiels scheming and manipulation fit perfectly into what I think a Tzeentch Daemon Prince would pull off. The fact that his entire plot backfires in his face is also kind of telling of his Patron god.

 

I also wish every story wasn’t Mephiston, his two librarian buddies, a squad or two of red shirt Blood Angels, and beleaguered human allies. Not everything needs to have crusade levels of force disposition, but going outside of kill teams would of been nice.

Edited June 25, 2021 by sitnam

[byrd9999]

Baneblade, by Guy Haley.

 

This was okay. It seems like an early Guy Haley book, his more recent ones are much better.

 

There wasn't as much action in the Baneblade itself as I was expecting, and the non-action scenes weren't that gripping. The main character's backstory was told in flashbacks alongside the main story, about how he was from a rich family and killed his cousin in a duel over an arranged marriage, and this format led me to think that the two strands of the story would be intertwined in some way, but they weren't really, so the "reveal" kind of fell flat for me.

 

6/10

[DarkChaplain]

Baneblade, alongside Skarsnik, sold me on Haley originally. I loved the way that novel tackled themes of class divide and politics both of the familial sort and military. Colaron's background and trying to fit in, eventually really growing close with the rest of the crew of veterans, made the book for me.

[byrd9999]

Interesting. I guess reading Baneblade now in 2021, those kind of subjects are more common in BL fiction, so the book wouldn't have the same kind of impact as it once did. Fair enough if Guy Haley was doing that kind of stuff a decade ago :) 

[Roomsky]

Mephiston: Revenant Crusade (Audiobook) – Darius Hinks

 

Another mixed but intriguing bag from Hinks. I decided to give this one another try after really enjoying Gitslayer, though another failed attempt at Ghoulslayer makes me think Hinks is just getting better as an author.

 

Anywho, I enjoyed this but it has a lot of issues.

 

Point against the first: Hinks is absolute ass at En Media Res. Both this and Blood of Sanguinius had almost unbearable first thirds; they’re overly action heavy and have very little to do with the actual plot. The first chapter or two were fine enough, but it just goes on and on before the book has any apparent point.

 

The second issue is that, structurally, the book borders on the incoherent. I certainly get all the events that occurred, but their distribution is mildly insane. New POVs appear and disappear at random, some for only a couple chapters. Some chapters are frustratingly long and others barely present. Tangents come and go, and while I came out the other end fairly satisfied, I couldn’t help but scratch my head a little for how we got here.

 

Thirdly we once again have “Those Wacky Necrons” ™ - I won’t claim they weren’t entertaining and interesting, and I suppose that’s the more important factor, but once again we get space Tomb Kings instead of any attempt to grapple with the psyche of an immortal, soulless being (with one exception.)

 

Fourthly, Mephiston’s power level is obscene to the point where it’s distracting when he has difficulty with something. It’s not enough that he can read the plot or ZA WARUDO and stop time, but sometimes he just doesn’t in situations where it would be a significant help. Like, I don’t mind an invincible protagonist, but at least make him remember his own abilities. His entire goal is undoing a psychic block, but it only seems to hinder him when the plot demans.

 

So this book is kind of a mess. That said, I still think it was worth my time, and a few of its shortcomings do have caveats.

 

The Necron chapters were honestly a really fun read. Despite their incompetence, they play really well into one of the books’ themes – when you’re acting on 40k’s time scale, people tend to start forgetting the why of their actions (this is the exception noted above.) The Necrons here have been waging a pointless war for so long that the Cryptek newcomer to their court is baffled and confused by basically everything. The court is run by insane logic that has mutated from what started as an alright idea hundreds of years ago – it’s great. The same goes for the Guard Regiment who pops up a third into the book (and who are by far the most interesting part.) They’re waging a hopeless war on a dead world because orders are orders (generations old orders!). As with the first book, I think Hinks really gets the setting’s themes even when he sometimes doesn’t get how to write a book.

 

Besides the noted inconsistency, I also really like Hinks’ Mephiston. He’s a practically setting-breaking character, despised by many, and I think Hinks has the perfect approach to him: he’s an absolute freak. Mephiston here has no social ability, he variously shouts or whispers when in conversation, and rarely consults anyone before pulling his disturbing antics. Hinks writes a Mephiston that really makes you get why he’s feared. He also takes a great approach to such an absurdly powerful character: Mephiston is so concerned with galaxy-spanning plots and events that he’s essentially useless for any immediately practical purpose. So concerned is he with fighting the Great Rift, he can’t really be arsed to entertain individual lives, and that is great.

 

The plotting is a mess, but I like the puzzle-centric nature of the finale. There is action, but it’s surrounding characters just trying to figure :cuss out, and it makes for a much stronger ending. Hinks’ prose is generally pleasant, and there’s a lot of little details throughout that are fun as well. I also really appreciate Antros not being immediately duped by Zadkiel – I was worried he’d turn against Mephiston on a dime, but was pleasantly surprised when it didn’t happen.

 

Overall, Revenant Crusade is an odd duck. It’s a mess, but at times I think it’s worth it. I wish Hinks and Haley could do a fusion dance – their strengths combined would make a really excellent Blood Angels book.

 

5.5/10 – Diehards Only/To Taste, hard to say.

[Sothalor]

"Semi-coherent mess" is kind of an apt descriptor for the Mephiston series.

 

For me, the highlight of the series was probably some of the vivid imagery and scenes depicted by Hinks.

 

The most memorable scene in Revenant Crusade was that one where Mephiston has flayed himself like as part of a spell and splayed out his dripping bloody skin like immense angel wings, while the manifesting souls of those he's personally killed cling onto it like spiders on webbing.

 

It's horrible, grotesque, and oh-so-evocative of the setting.

[Roomsky]

Mephiston: City of Light (Audiobook) – Darius Hinks

 

This was oddly disappointing.

 

On any technical level, this is a better work than the previous two. The plot is less disjointed, and the writing quality is better. I wasn’t left bored out of my mind at any point like in the previous books, and it seems the first in the series to have genuine focus.

 

But as the finale to a pretty fascinating trilogy, it was neither grand nor interesting. Zadkiel loses all of his mystique and becomes just another Tzeentch bad guy. The human element here is fine, but is the least intriguing and most straightforward of the three. Mephiston himself is much more stable, and by extension less unique than the previous times Hinks drew him as a character – it’s certainly more in line with Haley’s work but I don’t consider that an improvement. And after all this time, the book basically ends with a tedious series of chapters involving an amnesiac Mephiston wandering around the City of Light before going “No u” to the baddies, and the day is saved. I wouldn’t have minded had this been a Mephiston standalone, but as the capstone to a trilogy it was weak as hell.

 

It’s all just kind of lame. More competent yes, but it lacks the spark I appreciated so much in the previous entries. Frustratingly generic.

 

5/10, congratulations, you passed.

Diehards Only.

[Paceyjg]

Heralds of the Siege - 7/10 Ok but nothing that really gripped me.

 

Listened to Eisenhorn Trilogy recently (read them years ago) 7/10

 

Listening to Ravenor which I am enjoying more 8/10.

[sitnam]

Just finished the first two Dawn of Fire novels, and I have to say I am impressed. I've always liked Haleys work, and Avenging Son was a good start to the series. It had a few to many subplots going on (the scribe storyline on Terra was pretty irrelevant to the rest of the story), and a bit to much set-up to get to the last act of the story. The story also suffers from having no named antagonist. The action was good however, and it has a nice range of likeable imperials, from naval officers to inquisitors to Firstborn and Primaris.

 

Gate of Bones, however, was just excellent. I'm an unabashed Andy Clark fan, and he does a great job making wars in the 41st Millenium seem truly to scale. I got into Clark via his two Knight novels (which need a trilogy wrap-up) and Shroud of Night. Those novels showed me that he handles Chaos Marines, Sisters of Battle, and Imperial Knights really well, and this novel is just another extension of that. I also am a bit of a Mordian Iron Guard fan now. Overall this novel had a great caste of characters, and the story didnt involve the Chaos Marines being swept aside in an overwhelming defeat. It's nice to see a novel where enemies of the Imperium get a few points on the score board. I really hope to see Andy Clark get another DoF novel.

 

Can't say I'm super excited for The Wolftime, as I really dont like Space Wolves, but I'm liking the series so far. I just hope book four isn't Dark Angels, that'll be two. Given the White Consuls got some love in the first book, I'd love to see more successors in the series, even the formation of early Primaris onlty chapters

[Kenzaburo]

Just finished the first two Dawn of Fire novels, and I have to say I am impressed. I've always liked Haleys work, and Avenging Son was a good start to the series. It had a few to many subplots going on (the scribe storyline on Terra was pretty irrelevant to the rest of the story), and a bit to much set-up to get to the last act of the story. The story also suffers from having no named antagonist. The action was good however, and it has a nice range of likeable imperials, from naval officers to inquisitors to Firstborn and Primaris.

 

Gate of Bones, however, was just excellent. I'm an unabashed Andy Clark fan, and he does a great job making wars in the 41st Millenium seem truly to scale. I got into Clark via his two Knight novels (which need a trilogy wrap-up) and Shroud of Night. Those novels showed me that he handles Chaos Marines, Sisters of Battle, and Imperial Knights really well, and this novel is just another extension of that. I also am a bit of a Mordian Iron Guard fan now. Overall this novel had a great caste of characters, and the story didnt involve the Chaos Marines being swept aside in an overwhelming defeat. It's nice to see a novel where enemies of the Imperium get a few points on the score board. I really hope to see Andy Clark get another DoF novel.

 

Can't say I'm super excited for The Wolftime, as I really dont like Space Wolves, but I'm liking the series so far. I just hope book four isn't Dark Angels, that'll be two. Given the White Consuls got some love in the first book, I'd love to see more successors in the series, even the formation of early Primaris onlty chapters

While i liked Avenging Son quite a bit for the intrigue and the different looks at different levels of the Imperium, I haven't touched the 2nd one yet. But your review has me looking forward to it.

 

I'm a bit worried though with the amount of different stories now happening over the first 3 books, because as I understand it, the plots from book 1 aren't continued in book 2. And with the Wolves being the focus of book 3, it doesn't seem like we'll get back to the characters of the first novel either. I think it's a bit of a shame, really.

[sitnam]

I'm thinking/hoping that we see the individual story threads and characters, picked up by the same authors in later novels.

[DukeLeto69]

Well TBF it is a story about a galaxy spanning crusade so we should expect some different stories and focus? Only read book 1 so far but is book 2 the same crusade fleet (if it us it makes my point moot)?

[Matcap86]

Finally got round to reading Anarch. After picking it up, but deciding all the other books were to long ago, I just power-read through the entire GG series and damnit if it isn't a lovely capping stone for now. Emotional, suspenseful, some of Abnett's best prose. There are some nit-picks here and there but overall excellent. 9/10 for me. 

Edited August 2, 2021 by matcap86

[DukeLeto69]

Mark of Faith - Rachel Harrison

 

This was a corker of a story. I really enjoyed it. I seem to recall previous reviews mentioning that the plot is straightforward. It is but nothing wrong with that. The characters are vivid and the insights into the Sororitas are really enjoyable. I particularly enjoyed the middle section (the book is split into sections) that saw the protagonists Sister Evangeline (and her Commandery) and Inquisitor Ravara (and her Acolytes) in a ship crossing the Great Rift. Scary stuff.

 

One thing this book did really highlight to me is that we really do “need” a series set during the Apostasy. There is so much history to explore and so much potential for some great stories using the religious turmoil as a backdrop. Based on this book, I would welcome Harrison being one of the lead writers.

Edited August 22, 2021 by DukeLeto69

[Noserenda]

Tried to listen to Brutal Kunnin on Audible. Unfortunately, despite loving Mike Brook's work the voice work on this one was extremely off-putting. I dont expect anyone to doom their throat doing a whole book in "Ork Voice" but it is really jarring to have someone doing it in "Blue peter presenter voice" and it just threw me right off. 

Guess ill have to find my kindle and get the ebook version :/