"Death And Defiance" (short story collection)

This is a bit of a first for Black Library. A Horus Heresy novella-length hardback which is available at a normal price from the beginning of its publishing cycle. No limited edition at double the cost and then it’s unavailable for two years. No ‘event only’ availability. As pissed off as I am about what I now know regarding 'Legacies Of Betrayal', I’m glad Black Library can pleasantly surprise me with stuff like ‘Death And Defiance’. 

Fulgrim looks like fucking shit! What is this, a Conan book?

Despite what I personally think is one of the worst pieces of HH cover art in years and years, I was fucking PUMPED to buy this collection right after Warhammer Fest finished and it went on sale on the BL site (with surprisingly little fanfare). There are five stories here, written by some old faces and some new. Let’s get right into them.

Imperfect by Nick Kyme: Nick is very uneven as a writer, in my opinion – but his audio drama ‘Censure’ is a firm favourite of mine, and the micro-story ‘Phoenician’, concerned with Fulgrim and Ferrus’ Isstvan showdown, impressed me a lot. So I was excited to find he would be tackling those characters again in this collection. Here, Fulgrim and Ferrus face off across a regicide board, but is their good-natured banter all that good-natured? Is this regicide game everything that it seems? Any time that question is posed, the answer’s going to be “no”, isn’t it? Man, at this stage of the storyline, I would kind of get a kick out of it if the regicide game was just some flashback to happier times (ending with a soft-focus montage of Ferrus and Fulgrim riding their bikes, laughing, while Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Glory Days’ plays). But that’s not what’s cooking here. Since this is Purple Heresy and not a site by actual professionals who put effort and journalistic ethics into making good reviews, I’m just gonna spoil the shit out of this. The ascended Daemon Prince Fulgrim has cloned Ferrus Manus many, many times and is playing a regicide game against each one – I believe the story implies that he is trying to see if there is some chain of events or line of reasoning he can put into play that would result in Ferrus’ loyalty switching to Fulgrim (and Horus) rather than the Emperor. Sadly, each attempt ends in failure, with each clone trying to kill Fulgrim and failing. You’d have to eventually say, could we not just play 2-player Halo or something?

I do really like some elements of this story. Nick’s Fulgrim is different to the preening, histrionic drama queen Graham sketched so entertainingly in ‘Angel Exterminatus’. Here, Fulgrim is more subdued, more guilty, and his actions – if not his internal monologue – seem to present him as deeply ashamed of his failure to turn Ferrus, and the fratricidal incident this led to. He seems desperate to right this wrong in some way. An interesting twist on the characterisation of Fulgrim so far; we’ll see if it’s taken further.

I feel there is meant to be some big, shocking implication to the fact Fabius has some cloned infant with a “Cthonian birthmark” in his laboratory, but I assume this is foreshadowing for the cloning of Horus – something Aaron already wrote about in ‘The Talon Of Horus’. Then again, it seems a little early in the HH timeline for that event hundreds of years in the future to start getting set up, which means maybe this is going to tie into a different Sons Of Horus cloning plot. I think it’s too early to really give a fuck. Maybe he’s cloned Loken so there can be an evil Loken in the Mournival? At this stage I would not be surprised if Fabius was growing cloned Cthonian babies so that he could eat them alive just for kicks. I like the III Legion a lot so whoever writes them, I’ll read it, but after my initial optimism, it doesn't look like Nick Kyme plus Emperor’s Children is guaranteed to always be good. That new 40k Salamanders book he wrote sounds kind of interesting, but I’m still not hugely into the idea of another Horus Heresy novel by him. I bet it’s coming whether I like it or not, though. This one I give 7/10.

Howl Of The Hearthworld by Aaron Dembski-Bowden: A pack of Space Wolves bitterly protests their assignment as ‘watchpack’ to Rogal Dorn, then eventually accepts it. They get on a ship and start on some poor clerk guy. That’s pretty much the events right there, though of course there’s more depth to it that I’m not doing justice to. I probably won’t write much on this (I think it’s the shortest story here). My gut reaction is that these seven warriors will end up being the only Space Wolves present on Terra for the Siege, and will probably play some significant/tragic role there. Maybe we’ll see more character development before then, maybe they’ll start a brawl with Bror Tyfingr and get murdered, maybe they’ll never even reach Terra. The Space Wolves here did seem interesting and I certainly want to find out more about them, but as in some moments of ‘The Talon Of Horus’, it feels like Aaron is over-writing some of this stuff. I’m not saying every 40K novel has to be bleak, hard-bitten Mike Hammer type shit, but – though I hate to say it – it means that Aaron’s Space Wolves are just not as enjoyable to me as Abnett’s or Wraight’s. This would be fine (as different portrayals of the same Chapter are equally valid in 40K) if I didn’t feel like he was aiming for the same exact area as those two but JUST missing it. It may grow on me over time, but at this point I’d say ‘Howl Of The Hearthworld’ is the least enjoyable Horus Heresy material Aaron’s ever produced. Still, I didn’t like ‘Betrayer’ at first either. For now, I give this 7/10.

A Safe And Shadowed Place by Guy Haley: With Aaron’s portrayal of the Night Lords perhaps one of the most widely loved explorations of a Legion, it’s not easy to step into the Horus Heresy with a Night Lords story. Guy Haley has written relatively little Heresy fiction, but with ‘Shards Of Erebus’ and ‘Strike And Fade’ he showed he could stand with the big boys. I also really enjoyed his ‘Hunter’s Moon’ audio drama. Fucking good thing I did, because less than a year later it will be taking up like 20 pages in the "new" story collection ‘Legacies Of Betrayal’. That’s a rant for a different time, though. It’s ballsy that Guy’s jumping in with a direct sequel to ‘Prince Of Crows’, one of the fan favourites of the HH canon. He doesn’t follow Sevatar’s arc, of course (apparently set to continue in audio drama format this year); if anyone but ADB handled that, there would be riots in the streets. Instead, ‘A Safe And Shadowed Place’ deals with Skraivok, a Night Lords officer whose badly damaged ship has limped to the borders of Ultramar following the Dark Angels’ battering of the Night Lords fleet. Abandoned by the few captains that were accompanying him, he struggles to deal with his fractious command and the frustratingly slow repair of his vessel. The waters are muddied by Krukesh the Pale (a minor but memorable presence in ‘Prince Of Crows’) showing up with a much larger Night Lords fleet and starting to throw his weight around.

Guy seems to have studied Aaron’s Night Lord characterisation very closely, but he puts a lot of ideas in there that are clearly his own as well. While I wouldn’t call any of the characters here staggeringly original, Guy is a good writer of both action and dialogue, and while Sev’s barbed witticisms are sorely missed, there is some bleak humour here. I can’t believe Black Library let him put in the moment where our VIII Legion hero idly thinks to himself that a female bridge officer “looked like a screamer”. Yeah, I know he was supposedly thinking it in the context of considering skinning her alive, but… I’m pretty sure the innuendo was intentional. Hilarious.This was the first story in the book where I didn’t feel a vague sense of disappointment after reading it. With a growing Night Lords fleet presence lurking near Sotha, and Kurze still apparently on Macragge intending to wreak yet more havoc on Imperium Secundus, I’d assume this story is a one-off intended as further VIII Legion antagonistic setup for Dan’s sequel to ‘The Unremembered Empire’ – but I’d certainly not object to more Guy Haley Night Lords stories. 8/10.

Virtues Of The Sons by Andy Smilie: I think this might be the first Andy Smilie Horus Heresy story. He’s more famous for writing a lot of 40K-era audio dramas and novels, most of which seem to be about the Flesh Tearers. Black Library’s frequent attitude of thinking someone is perfect for Horus Heresy books about a Legion because they write about that Chapter or its successors in 40K books has not always resulted in the highest quality books. Here, though, I reckon they’re on to something. Smilie obviously has a real ‘feel’ for this Chapter and is keen to get his teeth into their origin story. Of course, Amit, ‘the Flesh Tearer’, the possibly-Khornate Blood Angels warrior with anger management and impulse control issues, is a prominent character in this story, but it’s not all about him. Sanguinius and a Blood Angel called Azkaellon are also heavily featured. Primarch writing is always tough, I think, but Smilie writes Sanguinius possibly a little better than James Swallow did (yes, that is a compliment, I really liked ‘Fear To Tread’). As for Azkaellon, his juxtaposition with Amit makes me think he’s also going to be a Blood Angels Successor Chapter founder, but I can’t be sure about that. I could do some research, but I kind of prefer to be surprised in this case.

This kind of has the opposite problem to a lot of HH fiction: it’s very well written, but the events here, taken by themselves seem a little insignificant. The cynical side of me thinks this is a little bit of foundation-laying for ‘Sons Of Wrath’, the book about the first years of the Flesh Tearers Chapter following the end of the Heresy and Sanguinius’ death. I was planning to buy that book anyway, since immediately post-Heresy fiction interests me almost as much as the HH series itself, but knowing Smilie writes this well made me realise it’s going to be a mandatory purchase. Perhaps I’ll be grateful for ‘Virtues Of The Sons’ once ‘Sons Of Wrath’ is out, but for now, I’m giving this 7/10

Gunsight by James Swallow: My lengthy and quite whiny review of ‘Nemesis’ may have mentioned that this story was on the cards. I don’t know if anyone was after a ‘Nemesis’ sequel starring Kell the Vindicare Assassin; ‘Nemesis’ wasn’t super-well received and I get the impression most people thought Kell died at the end. But fuck me, this is really good. Kell is aboard the Vengeful Spirit, a lone gunman in the truest sense, consumed by an obsessive desire to finish his mission. The way that Horus’ shift in allegiances has changed the Spirit is really well captured; I liked what Graham did in his book, but I think Swallow just has a more evocative way with scene-setting. He also tackles one of my favourite themes in the 40K universe: the insidiousness of Chaos, and how easy it is to be corrupted especially when you believe yourself incorruptible. This is the other side of the coin shown in the Gaunt’s Ghosts series, where Gaunt and his men are able to overcome the darkness by clinging to their faith and their basic human decency. Kell is not so lucky. Still, there are some surprising twists along the way, and the door is very much open for a continuation of Kell’s ‘mission’ (in a way). I almost wanted a full-blown ‘Nemesis’ sequel after this… well, maybe just a novella, since this also reinforced my opinion that James Swallow is really good at short stories. Him becoming a near-exclusive audio drama/short story guy is a smart deployment of his talents. Against all odds, this is an excellent story; I give it 9/10.

So overall, this book didn’t have a collection of top-notch stories, but considering my least favourite was one of the shortest and my favourite was the longest, I can forgive a little inconsistency. I hope Black Library releases these a bit more frequently. It might take the sting off them apparently thinking a HH story anthology’s primary function is to be a fucking recycling dump. In the midst of all my bitter ranting I give this one 8/10. 

New to PurpleHeresy? Head on over to the index page to see a more chronological list of the Horus Heresy reviews on this blog.

"Hunter's Moon" by Guy Haley / "Thief Of Revelations" by Graham McNeill

Black Library released these two on the same CD, so I'll review them together, though they are completely separate stories.

YOU THOUGHT IT WAS AHRIMAN BUT IT WAS ME! DIO!!

'Hunter's Moon' is by Guy Haley and concerns the ongoing conflict between the Alpha Legion and Space Wolves touched on in ‘Scars’ and ‘Wolf’s Claw’. This time, events are witnessed by three fishermen on a planet called Pelago who find a crashed Astartes vessel and get more than they bargained for when they investigate: Torbjorn, a Space Wolf, the only remnant of the Watch-Pack sent to Alpharius’ side. The cast here are Gareth Armstrong, Angus King and Toby Longworth. I felt that the three fishermen were excellently acted; you have the callow, ignorant youth, the wise elder, and the sympathetic 'mid-point' who mediates and has a nice, reassuring Scottish accent. The Space Wolf is not as subtly performed – or subtly written – as the human characters (unsurprisingly, I guess), but still he was very good.

Pelago is like many Imperial worlds: dedicated to the secular Truth, but also not completely ‘enlightened’ or up-to-date with the state of the Imperium. Talk about “star giants” and “men sailing the night in ships of steel and fire” and “monsters swimming in the sky’s night” sounds like superstitious nonsense at times, but they are obviously talking about the Great Crusade, just in more poetic terms than we might be used to. I was reminded of ‘Prospero Burns’, which for me is never a bad thing. I’m also always fond of stories which show how the galaxy-wide Heresy affects the lives of the countless billions of normal people whose worlds are being fought over.

As HH fans we can easily surmise why this Space Wolf warrior has been left stranded and alone on a crashed Alpha Legion gunship, but the way the story slowly fills in the blanks leaves it very suspenseful and worthwhile... at least until the last part of the story. The ending was disappointing and felt a little abrupt. I feel like BL authors’ increasingly frequent portrayal of the Alpha Legion as actively cruel and sadistic is odd. ‘Legion’ set them up as an unknown quantity for the Heresy time-period, motivations not entirely clear, but possessed of a lot of likeable qualities (and a lot of terrifying ones) – overall more callous and unfeeling than malevolent. While some HH stuff is running with that ambiguity, like ‘Scars’ or ‘The Serpent Beneath’, I feel like there’s been a gradual slide towards “They’re just some assholes” (ie, this story, or the slightly disappointing background for them in the Forge World book ‘Extinction’). Mind you, keep in mind that we are seeing the sons of Alpharius through the eyes of a terrified fisherman who’s befriended their adversary, so it’s not like we’re going to get a measured exploration of the character of their Legion. Also, I guess there are going to be a wide range of personalities across the XXth Legion, and some of them are going to be, well, just some assholes. I guess when it comes down to it, I’m just bitter that Dan Abnett isn’t writing every Alpha Legion book and that the ‘Legion’ approach of “What even ARE the Alpha Legion? It is a mystery, dogg!” has been ditched somewhat.

Still, this is an engagingly told story, and I have a weakness for Scottish accents, so that pushes it back to 8/10. I really hope Guy Haley has some more Horus Heresy stories coming.

'Thief Of Revelations', by Graham McNeill, is concerned with the Thousand Sons Legion. As we know, not much has been written about them since Graham’s book ‘A Thousand Sons’ which left them shattered and bitter in the Warp, licking their wounds. So it’s kind of nice to see what the survivors from the Burning Of Prospero are up to on the Planet Of The Sorcerers… but this section doesn't really add anything to their characters. Amon is still a self-important know-it-all (in fact, so is Ahriman), Sobek does fuck-all, and Hathor Maat is still vain and flippant. There is a nice scene where Ahriman is taunted by a 'flesh-changed Astartes' (he seems not to fully grasp what it is, but the way it's described just sounds like a straight-up Possessed Space Marine). Still, this whole introduction felt a little... pointless to me. They're disturbed by the Flesh-Change, and frustrated by Magnus' refusal to do anything about it. Really it didn't seem to tell us anything that the ending moments of 'A Thousand Sons' or that scene from 'Aurelian' haven't told us already. Next, Ahriman seeks an audience with Magnus. This does present one of the best moments of the story: the description of Magnus’ tower. A very important element of the Crimson King’s myth even post-Heresy and Graham gives it the respect it deserves. We also get some great little details that I love, like how the Thunderhawk Ahriman uses has been changed by warp energy so that it is actually becoming similar to a hawk. You might think that’s hecka dumb but I love that idea.

While the description of Magus himself is also excellently done, I’m frustrated and unimpressed by a lot of the dialogue between Magnus and his wayward son. There’s a bunch more cryptic dick-waving about how Ahriman should definitely stop trying to find a way to stop the hideous mutations that are slowly destroying more and more Legionaries... but also a refusal to fully explain why Ahriman should stop, or what Magnus will do to remedy the shit situation they’re in. "No just do what I say though, powerful psyker who has shown clearly that he distrusts me and has a dangerous propensity for rebellion and free-thinking. DO IT THOUGH! SHUT UP!!!" Man, some of the Primarchs are complete assholes (or perhaps... slightly poorly written).

The ending of the drama is very entertaining, though, with Magnus showing Ahriman where some of the Primarchs are, and dropping dark hints about the roles they may play in the future. The conclusion of the Thramas Crusade between the Night Lords and Dark Angels is shown, as well as the dark fate of the Blood Angels at Signus Prime, and the sack of Guilliman's Five Hundred Worlds by Lorgar. Nice to get another dimension to these significant events… but while this seems intended to give a cryptic snapshot of Magnus' intentions and current mindset, it seems very clear which way the Thousand Sons’ Primarch is leaning. Despite an extremely confusing closing line which I still can’t really make sense of, it really feels like Magnus is 90% decided on throwing in with Horus. I’m a bit unsure on how, exactly, a novel’s worth of drama can be spun between this point and the point at which the Thousand Sons turn. But hell, Graham can often turn stuff that seems insignificant into a great story, IMO (see ‘Angel Exterminatus’ and ‘Vengeful Spirit’).

The actors for this drama are Gareth Armstrong, Martyn Ellis, Jonathan Keeble and Toby Longworth. It’s hard to portray a Primarch in an audio drama, since they are beings almost beyond human comprehension – Legionaries are hard enough. So I know that this was a real challenge to pull off – but in my opinion, the way they did Magnus’ voice sounds like SHIT. And Ahriman also sounds ancient and querulous where (I feel) he should sound strong and authoritative. The bitter musing of “Was it worth it, Russ?” is spoken in a tone more suited to “Get off my lawn you dang kids!” The narrator is very good, though - I'm pretty sure it's Toby Longworth. If it is Toby, he’s delivering a more restrained performance than he often does. The other Thousand Sons only appear relatively briefly, and their performances aren’t really worth discussing too much – not bad, not notably excellent.

I honestly question the wisdom of making this an audio drama. It feels like most of this would have served excellently as the first chapter of 'The Crimson King', the full-length Thousand Sons novel Graham is doubtless working on now. However, I bet 'Crimson King' isn't out for another year or two so I guess it's fair play that BL want to ensure the Thousand Sons are kept in our minds. Due to the issues I’ve outlined, this just misses being an 8, so I’ll give it 7/10. That Ahriman voice just puts me on edge.

This marks (probably) the last time I’ll buy a Black Library audio drama on CD. I was just doing it from some weird stubborn sense of obligation, but I never actually put any of them in a CD player – just ripped them to my PC and listened to them on that, since I find headphones the only way to go with this form of media. From ‘Templar’ onwards, I’m all about the MP3. Still not crazy about ebooks, though…

One thing I really feel is necessary to state is that the musical score is superb for both audio dramas. Generally an exercise in understated ambience... but there were moments where the musical accompaniment to the reading was so perfect, it gave me chills. The piano-heavy horror movie atmospherics in the last segment of ‘Thief Of Revelations’, in particular, seem like they might be the best soundtrack for a Horus Heresy audio drama so far. The sound effects are excellent as well. I really love the constant lapping of water in 'Hunter's Moon', and the howling winds on ‘Thief Of Revelations’. Christian Dunn produced both of these. I don’t know whether that means he helped with the soundtrack (probably not, this ain’t hip-hop) but simply from the excellent performances of most of the voice actors (especially in ‘Hunter’s Moon’) makes me hope he can produce more BL audio to this standard. If it takes him away from writing, it can only be a good thing...

New to PurpleHeresy? Head on over to the index page to see a more chronological list of the Horus Heresy reviews on this blog.