"The Lion" by Gav Thorpe

I suspect (though, of course, cannot confirm) that ‘The Lion’ was supposed to be immediately followed by ‘Prince of Crows’ to close out ‘The Primarchs’. Chronology-wise, the two stories are as firmly linked, in their way, as ‘Feat of Iron’ and ‘Promethean Sun’; arguably more so, as ‘Crows’ seems to follow ‘The Lion’ by a matter of days. But, of course, that’s not how the table of contents ended up. It’s not impossible to believe that Aaron was a little late with the story – but then, if this was the case, one looks at the sheer quality of ‘Prince of Crows’ and thinks “Well, I don’t mind waiting.”

Still one of the cooler Legion sigils.

‘The Lion’ is a sequel to ‘Savage Weapons’, and we join the First Legion as they continue to prosecute the Night Lords in the Thramas crusade. It’s also a sequel to ‘Fallen Angels’, as it picks up Nemiel’s storyline again. However, ‘The Lion’ goes to some places you might not expect from those two starting points. Mere pages in, we’re off to a planet called Perditus (Oh, Games Workshop, I do so enjoy your creatively named planets) as the Lion chooses to go and interfere in a conflict between the Iron Hands and Death Guard, leaving the bulk of his Legion to keep fighting in Thramas. Aside from a brief cameo, Kurze’s mob aren’t here, though by the novella’s close, the Lion has procured the device necessary to break the Thramas deadlock – hence tying this story in to the terrific drubbing the Angels give the Night Lords not once but twice in ‘Prince of Crows’, the impact of which would only have increased if ‘Crows’ had been the last novella here – but I’ve said enough about that already.

I don’t think I’m alone in considering AD-B’s ‘Savage Weapons’ the best Dark Angels Heresy fiction so far. Gav tries hard to follow up that compelling portrait of the secretive First Legion and their mercurial Primarch, but by making the Lion a viewpoint character, the mystery is dispelled a little. Historically I’ve been more in favour of Primarch viewpoints than Primarchs being shown as remote and unknowable (‘The First Heretic’, ‘Angel Exterminatus’ and ‘The Unremembered Empire’ being some prime examples), but I really feel that with his near-pathological aversion to showing his motivations, the Lion is incredibly poorly suited to being a narrator, perhaps only second to Alpharius. So what does Gav do? Shows the Lion’s motivations all over the place. Rather than building on Aaron’s compelling but (by necessity) rather sketched portrait of an arrogant, imperious templar-king in space, Gav takes it back to the end of ‘Fallen Angels’: the Lion’s motivation here seems to be little developed beyond “I’M P-NOID, MY HOMIES SAY I’M P-NOID!” (A bit of Clipse humour there.) He also has apparently unexplained swerves in temper – sure, he was always stern with his Legion, but going from slightly paranoid doubts about his subordinates to straight up executing one of them over a dispute of ethics? It seems a rather dramatic swerve, but more on that later. It feels like Gav wrote with the words ‘Mystery’ and ‘Reveal nothing’ above his desk but only looked up at them from time to time – during one period of soul-searching, the Lion notices a blade from Luther on the ship, but his inner monologue gives no indication of how he feels about that character; shortly after he kills Nemiel we’re privy to a moment of the Lion’s quiet reflection, but he doesn’t even vaguely consider the ramifications of what he just did.

The Lion is a patronising egotistical bastard with poorly hidden doubts as to the superiority he trumpets; he’s also a genius strategist and a superlative warrior even for a Primarch. It’s safe to say he’s a fascinating character and while I don’t think this is a bad portrayal of him, it’s a shame it took until ‘The Unremembered Empire’ for his character to reach three dimensions. (And even there, he was mostly shown from the outside – we weren’t given much insight into his thoughts.) Perhaps it would be best for us to NEVER be inside the Lion’s head. It’s still hard to read where his character is going in the Heresy-era – though his conversation with the Lord of Change during this story seems to offer some hints.

Sadly, the ‘little brothers’ take some hits as well. Corswain goes from one of the best Loyalist characters I’ve ever read (honourable, bleak-humoured but dour, someone whose heroism seems genuinely warranted rather than lazy SUPERCOOLGUY plot armour) to a generic, habitually-bowing Space Captain Man. The others, primarily created for this story, aren’t any better. And Nemiel – well, Nemiel was always kind of shite, so I can’t say this book is worse for him, but fuck, I’d hoped they would somehow improve on him before shuffling him off. In terms of making the Dark Angels an interesting Legion dramatically distinct from their 40k-era incarnation… nope. The only slightly interesting element in the dialogue here is the Dark Angels’ overuse of “my liege” in deference to the Lion. In fact, in one three-page scene, “my liege” is used no less than eight times. A clever lampoon of the Dark Angel’s pomposity and lack of imagination, or lazy writing? You decide. Am I just an asshole for wanting Dark Angels to always talk like gloomy monastic knights, possibly ones from France or Germany? It’s fluff-appropriate, but it’s also difficult to pull off without them sounding stilted and awkward.

The Night Lords do appear here, briefly. For a while I thought this was the worst Night Lords portrayal in the whole series, but that’s unfair. It’s too short to be called bad. It is, however, a bit of a plot failure. They track the Dark Angels through the warp in a way which should be impossible (barring warp trickery) before destroying their own ship in an apparent suicide attack which allows daemons to manifest on the Invincible Reason. Since it’s been established that the Eighth had a general disdain for magic and daemons during the Heresy, this seems unusual (and also – maybe this is the Legion least likely to mount a suicide attack?) but the Night Lords also had mad enough ‘fringe elements’ to make it far from impossible. What I resent is the complete lack of an attempt to even halfway explain it. Just a few sentences on how this Captain was a radical, crazy former psyker who went mad following Isstvan, or something like that, would be enough to shut me up on that regard. But no, just more navel-gazing from the Lion.

This plot point leads into a significant action in First Legion history, the first time they face daemons (well, I guess some of those monsters on Caliban were pretty suspicious) and a wonderful opportunity to explore the Legion’s their grip on the secular Imperial Truth – but that’s an opportunity Gav seems to ignore. In fact, the daemon fights in ‘The Lion’ have the same problems the majority of daemon fights have for me in the Heresy fiction:

1) No dialogue or possibility of the two sides relating in any way other than a full-on brawl. It’s tough to get too invested in a conflict where one side will remain voiceless and receive no viewpoint narration and the other side has no emotional response beyond shocked revulsion (as opposed to the myriad other reactions traitor v loyalist battles can play with).

2) There are only so many times I can read the same old rundown of the various daemon types and then get descriptions of their basic attack methods. Yep, those are Nurgle daemons doing Nurgle shit; yep, there’s some Daemonettes being all seductive; and look, a Lord of Change for the boss battle. Now, obviously GW’s product line restricts what the writers can do – but think about the variations and fresh character the writers can give to that old Tactical or Assault squad of Space Marines. Couldn’t daemons be similarly varied in their approach? Even the language used feels like each writer is cribbing from the same hopelessly understocked pool of adjectives; from my recall, only ‘Damnation of Pythos’, ‘First Heretic’ and, weirdly, ‘Battle for the Abyss’ have been remotely creative in their physical descriptions of daemons.

3) I feel like I’ve read ten or eleven “This is the first time we’ve fought daemons!” scenes and absolutely no “We’ve fought daemons before, so let’s use that knowledge” scenes. It’s getting real fucking old. I try to suspend my disbelief a lot with Heresy books, but with daemon fights, each time I read a “NEVER SEEN THIS SHIT BEFORE” statement, I think Guess what? I’ve seen this shit too many times.

Of course, the most memorable thing to come out of this sequence is the summary execution of Nemiel. After a forceful but brief argument about the Lion’s proposed breakage of the Nikean Edicts, El’Johnson karate-chops the Redemptor’s head off. Remember what I said in my last review about Graham’s brutal murder of high-ranked characters making the point that the Heresy was perilous and plot armour was in short supply? Well, this ain’t that. I don’t know what it is. For a while I thought this ‘interrupt’ of the Nemiel/Zadkiel arc was really clever and subversive – but now, in a wider context, it just looks horribly confused. Perhaps it was a way for Gav to distance himself from ‘Descent of Angels’ and ‘Fallen Angels’, which were not necessarily the best received books in the early Heresy. But by truncating this character’s storyline so dramatically, and then apparently leaving the drama to go stale (none of the Dark Angels work since this has referenced Nemiel’s execution), it feels like a flagrant waste of a character with a little bit of potential. As it stands, it looks like Nemiel’s murder is just going to give Zadkiel some motivation to rebel against the Imperium – but he’d kinda already done that by the time 'The Lion' was published, sooooooo... hm.

One thing I do really like about ‘The Lion’ is Calas Typhon popping up, and I think it’s the first time he’s been shown since ‘Flight of the Eisenstein’. While the character is a long way off being the best-developed equerry in the series, Gav’s portrayal of Typhon at this point of the Heresy made sense – he’s not full-on corrupted yet, but he’s openly vowing to ‘the Father’. I suppose that as he’s a former Librarian, it makes sense that he’d be gifted with some knowledge of the dark powers behind this war. The physical corruption and the gifts of Nurgle are beginning, as well – all in all, ‘The Lion’ is a nice development for Typhon following the initial impressions we got in ‘Flight of the Eisenstein’. Around the same time that Typhon shows up, we get some Iron Hand characters, but they’re of minimal interest, being fairly bland Loyalists rather than the psychotic sadomasochists the 10^th seem to always be portrayed as these days. One kind of cool thing about these guys: Midoa, the Iron Hand warrior, has extensive facial augmetics which make him speak in a “sing-song cadence”. I don’t know if Gav intended for me to hear all Midoa’s dialogue in the autotuned voice of T-Pain, but that’s what I did.

Gav is a little like Nick Kyme, in that he’s written stuff for the Heresy which I really like, and stuff I very nearly despise – and it’s difficult for me to articulate what the difference is between the two types of work. In both, you’ll find overblown battle scenes, fairly shallow characters, a healthy respect and knowledge for 40K’s ‘lore’, a willingness to disregard or revise that lore when it best serves the story, and the distinctive White Dwarf writing style. ‘The Lion’ is not a great novella, and it doesn’t leave me massively optimistic for Gav’s HH Dark Angels novel supposedly coming this year, ‘Angels of Caliban’. But it’s not terrible either. It’s exactly the standard I expect from the Black Library, and that’s a little depressing, but it’s not enough to make me give up forever. Yep, you guessed it: 6/10.

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

"Burden Of Duty" by James Swallow / "Grey Angel" by John French

2 OF AMERIKKKA'S MO$T WANTED

Burden Of Duty by James Swallow: For a long time I considered ‘Burden Of Duty’ (or ‘Garro: Burden Of Duty’ to some) the weak link in the Garro audiobook chain, since “NOTHING EVEN HAPPENS!!!!” Listening to it again, though, it seems to be an excellent addition to the ‘Silent War’ arc. The actors here are John Banks, Toby Longworth and Ramon Tikaram, and as always, Toby Longworth is great to hear as Garro: that unhurried elegance just on the right side of stuffiness.

James Swallow always starts his Garro dramas with a bit of a recap/overview of the Heresy series. Welcome for newcomers (though once again I have to state that people with no knowledge of the HH chronology who begin the series with a Garro audio drama are smoking crack). I’m not sure how well that will play when the rumoured prose collection of Garro’s audio adventures is printed, though – imagine an anthology where the first couple pages of every story is identical. Not a fun time.

The plot for this audio drama is pretty straightforward. Using a single-person ship and a falsehood, Nathaniel Garro infiltrates the Imperial Fists fortress-ship Phalanx and makes his way to the meditation chamber where all the Fists Librarians have been sequestered. The Imperial Fists apparently withdrew their psykers from combat duty entirely once the Edict was passed. The Librarians, led by a Brother Massak, awaken from their meditation and attack this intruder, but the fray is stopped by Rogal Dorn, who takes Garro into custody. Despite being pressed to account for his actions, Garro will not reveal the purpose of his mission – but it seems obvious he was intending to recruit the unused former Librarians into Malcador’s service. The drama ends with Garro released by Dorn, but the Imperial Fist Librarians remaining in seclusion. Like I said, fairly simple, but the worth of ‘Burden Of Duty’ is in the well-drawn characters, and the exploration of the motivations of two key figures in the Heresy and the ambiguity of their relationship.

Joe Budden Of Duty

Chronologically, I always assumed that this took place at the same time as ‘Grey Angel’ since they were packaged together on the same CD. However, a lot of people think this is set much earlier, long before Loken joined the Knights Errant. Since ‘Legion Of One’ was supposed to be the last recruitment mission by Garro, this probably takes place before that, but it really could be at any time after ‘Flight Of The Eisenstein’, since none of the other Knights Errant are mentioned.

I’ve made my dislike of Rogal Dorn quite clear on this site, but this drama illustrates how far a good performance can go in changing your mind about a character. Here, Dorn is stern and patrician, yet he has an underlying charisma where the character could have been cold and forbidding. I’m not sure who’s playing him, but they sound exactly like Horus in ‘Warmaster’, so it’s either Ramon Tikaram or Toby Longworth. It’s a stark contrast to the way Magnus sounds like a burbling idiot in ‘Thief Of Revelation’ – this is how to do a Primarch the right way. Effective, nuanced performance, not gimmicks. His attitude to Garro seems to have softened a little, I think there’s clear admiration there – but he also seems to see him as little more than a catspaw of Malcador, who he obviously has little regard for. The last lines of the drama show perhaps one of my favourite Dorn moments in the whole series, as a decision I’d assumed was down to his servile obedience to daddy is revealed to be something much more ambiguous. Overall, Legion and Primarch bias may stop me from ever truly liking this guy but if he’s handled well, he can be an interesting character at least. Comparatively, Garro isn’t given too much to do in terms of dialogue, but his quiet dignity is always appreciated. Brother Massak could be a promising addition to the HH cast – I’m interested to see what else they do with this guy – but is a bit of a blander version of Rubio at this point (down to the slightly intense whispered delivery).

Joe Biden Of Duty

‘Burden Of Duty’ is very subdued, which is an approach that works surprisingly well with BL audiobooks, considering the narrators usually get overexcited and start yelling if any combat is taking place. Here, the PEW PEW PEW lasers and VRRRRRRM chainswords are at a minimum: sound effects are mostly ambient and serve only to immerse you further in the story. Black Library bringing out a minimalist Pinter-esque drama with nothing but talking is very unlikely, but I vastly prefer this atmospheric stuff to the shouting and explosions stuff. Listening to this again made me remember how much I enjoy James Swallow’s Garro audios, and considering that I feel they’ve been getting better and better in order of publication, I have high hopes for ‘Garro: Shield Of Lies’. I give this a solid 8/10.

Grey Angel by John French: But wait, haven’t I already reviewed ‘Grey Angel’? Yeah, but it was one of the first reviews I did, back when the tone of this blog was… a lot more irreverent, and I felt the need to put a few jokes into every paragraph even when they didn’t fit. I wince a bit when I read that review, and listening to the audio drama again recently, I thought it might be fun to try reviewing it again.

Following his recovery from the blasted surface of Isstvan III, Garviel Loken, the Space Marine everyone thought was dead, IS BACK WITH A VENGEANCE! Actually he’s back with a subdued personality and a likely case of PTSD. At the request of Rogal Dorn, Loken and fellow loyalist Sixteenth Legion warrior Iacton Qruze have journeyed to Caliban to feel out the allegiance of the Dark Angels posted there, and inform them of Horus’ treachery should they prove loyal. Captured by the First Legion and interrogated by Luther, Loken realises the loyalty of Caliban is no clearly-defined state. The ‘Grey Angel’ of the title could be Garro, clad in his new featureless armour – but more likely it’s Luther, standing not clearly with the light or darkness, but rather in the spaces between. Meanwhile, Qruze roams Aldurukh and encounters a mysterious Dark Angel whose motives are similarly unclear. Like ‘Burden Of Duty’, the voice actors here are John Banks, Toby Longworth and Ramon Tikaram.

I’ll just briefly reiterate what I spent most of my original review banging on about: HOLY SHIT, THAT LUTHER THOUGH! The performance here for the Lion’s former best buddy is really, really good. While there is arguably even more arrogance and malice in Luther’s voice than Hakim in ‘Sword Of Truth’, here there’s a contrasting edge of wounded pride and nobility we didn’t see in the White Scar’s portrayal. (I mention Hakim because I swear Ramon Tikaram is doing the voice for Luther – which is an oddly fitting redemption for a great voice actor). Luther is obviously a more complex character than the two First Legion novels have showed him – and actually, more complex than even the fairly subtle creature shown here. At least we’re starting to mine the character’s potential – I really hope there’s a lot of Luther in the upcoming Horus Heresy Dark Angels work (and, to be honest, that a writer a bit less ‘meat and potatoes’ than Gav was writing about him). The other voice actors are far from bad – in particular, Loken’s performance is very strong – and the narrator is also good despite the over-excited rushing through action scenes, but Luther is the star here.

luther had a dreaaaaaaam
horus had a dreeeeeeam
the emprah had a dreeeeeam

‘Grey Angel’ has been criticised for its possible deviation from the established chronology of the Dark Angels. While Luther and the banished Dark Angels who would become the Fallen were only part of the Great Crusade for a very small amount of time according to ‘Descent Of Angels’, ‘Grey Angel’ asserts that they took part in many significant actions and fought alongside many of the other Legions, notably the Luna Wolves – and that Loken is well-acquainted with at least one of their number. I do really like this idea and a Luther/Abaddon team-up is an awesome concept, but I’m sure that the time Luther was at the Lion’s side in the Crusade was around a year or less, most of which is covered near the end of ‘Descent’. Also, Luther cracks on to know nothing about the Heresy, but at the end of ‘Fallen Angels’ it’s established that the news of Isstvan had reached Caliban. You could assume that Luther is just lying because he’s a deceitful character, and that the war-damaged Loken is easily convinced because he wants to believe the full extent of Space Marine treachery has already been revealed. You could also assume that John French didn’t read ‘Fallen Angels’ recently (or ever, and who would really blame the guy) and forgot that Luther was aware of the Heresy. 

I’m not one of those people who throws their toys out of the pram when the order of events in HH is a little unclear (it’s pretty much expected in multi-author undertaking like this) but I really think in this incidence, the possible botch is problematic. I try to be optimistic, especially where John French is involved, so I’d hope that Luther’s playing a long game here rather than this just being an authorial mistake. Still, Gav seems to have taken over the Dark Angels writing now, and Gav is pretty good at ironing out chronology errors, so hopefully he'll write something about this. The fact that ‘Guardian Of Order’ and ‘Master Of The First’ didn’t mention the events of this drama makes me wonder if he'll just ignore it though. I’m also much less confident now that the mysterious Dark Angel who helps the Knights Errant escape is Zahariel; his comments about his plan to “watch and guard in silence – [the same as] those who came before me” make me think that it’s Cypher. Since Cypher is probably going to get a lot more character development once Gav focuses on Caliban, this is one strand of the story I’m very confident will be picked up.

There are more pressing issues with the plot than the ambiguity of Luther’s words. Loken’s insistence on not disturbing the Caliban ‘balance’, and the cryptic words of the Watcher who assists him, are not my favourite parts of this drama – they seem a little contrived, a way of extracting these characters from this precarious situation with nothing resolved and little of consequence happening. In fact, the dramatic conflict near the end of the drama is probably the weakest part, though the aftermath of this conflict sees the writing improve once again.  ‘Grey Angel’ has flaws, and as a story, I’d give it 7/10, but the performances of this audio version – particularly Luther’s theatrical menace – really bump it up, so it’s 8/10 for me.

There are a few thematic links between these stories: as well as honourable characters being forced to commit subterfuge and ‘shadow actions’, the significance of dreams is emphasised few times. Whether that’s the visions of Heresy which come to Brother Massak when he sleeps, the flashbacks of dead comrades who haunt Loken’s scarred mind, or Luther’s bitterness at his inability to dream since the Imperium “changed” him. Then again, one could argue that the true link between the stories is the feeling of “coitus interruptus”: you think it’s heading towards a resolution, so to speak, only to stop short at the last minute, rather frustratingly. I really wanted Massak to leave the Phalanx with Garro… but he didn’t. I really wanted Loken and Qruze to uncover some significant and obvious treachery in Aldurukh and let Malcador know Luther couldn’t be counted on… but they didn’t. Of course, we can’t always get what we want - but you could argue that by virtue of these downbeat endings, the protagonists achieve nothing in these stories. I think the common 40K messageboard meme that Malcador’s assignments are pointless wastes of time is generally nonsense… but unlike with ‘Garro: Legion Of One’ or ‘The Sigillite’ it seems unclear here what Malcador was really trying to achieve with his mission – realistically, how could Garro hope to escape the Phalanx even if all the Librarians joined his cause? And Dorn’s task was just as bad: if the Calibanites had declared for Horus, the Knights would have been fucked, and even if they were faithful to the Emperor, why would they believe or obey two anonymous, Legion-less warriors? Still, when the stories are this well-presented and the performances are great, I’m not going to complain too much. It actually worries me how well this will translate to the prose format because Dorn and Luther are performed so well that I can’t really tell how the writing will stand alone.

I honestly think John French and James Swallow might be the best at the audiobook format. Definitely looking forward to what happens next in the Knights Errant storyline; following the action-packed but sometimes jumbled handling of it in ‘Vengeful Spirit’, it might be nice to return to the subtlety of these two stories and give the characters some space to breathe.

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

"The Imperial Truth" (short story collection)

Today, exclusive to PurpleHeresy, a review of the just-announced HH limited edition novella "The Purge"! I hope you're ready for a lot of anorexia jokes!

Ahh, I'm just fucking with you. Today I'm reviewing 'The Imperial Truth'.

"And over there, you can see some horrible fucking compression."

‘The Imperial Truth’ was a stand-alone, limited-edition novella available only to attendees of the 2013 Horus Heresy Weekender, and for a long time ‘TIT’ (jeez I better not use THAT acronym) was one of my primary reasons to curse Black Library for a bunch of bastards. Why were they so keen to dry-fuck the fans who weren’t able to spend £70 for admission, plus train fare, to go to Nottingham and buy a bunch of limited editions in the £20-£30 range? Ah, I guess my question answers itself. We live in a capitalist democracy, so we always have a choice of “to buy or not to buy”. I think I was angrier because of the fact people said these stories were really good. BL release schedules being what they are (and ‘exclusive’ basically being meaningless with them) I knew that we’d get these stories eventually, but I wanted them now, now, now, right now! Luckily, when the ‘last few hundred copies’ went on sale in the Black Library vault, I managed to snap one up pretty quick. It’s now sold out, which I think means we’ll either get these in e-book form in the next few months, or they’ll bring it out as a non-limited novella next year – so take heart if you didn’t get a chance to buy it. Hopefully, the 2014 Weekender anthology ‘Perdition’s Gate’ will also be added to the vault this time next year, as I hear that one’s pretty fucking good as well. Without further preamble let’s get into the stories in this collection.

Hands Of The Emperor by Rob Sanders: In the context of the HH series, Rob is seen as one of the key Alpha Legion authors, but instead of XX Legion shenanigans, here he tackles one of my favourite areas of the Heresy: Age Of Darkness-era Terra. Our main character is a Custodian Guard called Stentonox, one of Constantin Valdor’s immediate subordinates, and we follow him as he tries to get through his 24-hour shift as Master of the Watch for the Imperial Palace. We learn this position is cycled between a different member of the Custodes every day, which is a pretty cool detail I think. Anyway, shit gets pretty outta control for Stentonox fairly quickly as he attempts to fulfil his role (apparently somewhere between police chief, air traffic controller and diplomatic envoy). Before long he’s in direct conflict with a complement of Imperial Fists who are manoeuvring an airborne ‘continental plate’ into the restricted airspace above the palace, and refuse to acknowledge his authority, saying only that Dorn’s word will be carried out. These continental plates are basically Bespin’s Cloud City, so you can understand the Custodes’ concern over not being in control of their movements. So how far will each side go to assert their authority, and will the long-simmering mutual resentment between Astartes and Custodes come to the fore? Sheeeeeit, do you even have to ask?

I really like these glimpses of the Imperial Palace. Rob Sanders brilliantly evokes the galactic capital’s atmosphere of desperation, mistrust, and frantic activity, with the defenders hoping they will be able to shore up Terra before the storm comes. It shows that even warriors who would normally be seen as upstanding and forthright can be drawn into intrigue and shadowplays simply by circumstance. And I like the way that the story isn’t neatly resolved in all aspects by the time it finishes; you get the feeling that its consequences will linger, particularly in the festering grudges of the Imperial Fist captain who opposes Stentonox. For my money this is a much better Custodes story than ‘Blood Games’ – but then I never loved that story too much. I give this 9/10.

Phoenician by Nick Kyme: A first-person monologue from the perspective of a mortally wounded Iron Hands Morlock Terminator on Isstvan V, this is the first of two ‘microstories’ in the collection, only lasting for a few pages. Who cares about some dying, flesh-spare bastard’s miserable last thoughts, right? Except… he’s watching the duel between Ferrus Manus and Fulgrim. Due to its length there’s not much to say about this one, except that I loved it. I feel the quality of the writing here is far above Nick Kyme’s usual standard (which I find capable, but bland). Thanks to their portrayal so far, as well as their general ‘fluff’, I don’t really like the Iron Hands at all as a Legion, but Kyme made me sympathise with his viewpoint character before I’d even finished the first paragraph. We’ve read about the Fulgrim/Manus duel in a few places before, but here it’s given a fresh lick of paint so it doesn’t feel too repetitive. And hey, the Morlock was lucky enough to die before witnessing that clumsy dumb-shit ‘What have I DDDDOOOOOONNNNEEEE’ moment Graham put in ‘Fulgrim’. Hey, you might like that moment, but I personally hate it. A lot. Overall I’d give this 8/10. I’d say Nick should be given a shot at another Iron Hands story, but ‘Feat Of Iron’ was… not my favourite. Maybe just ask him to write ‘microstories’ from now on?

By The Lion’s Command by Gav Thorpe: So I guess Corswain is now just a Gav character. I wouldn’t mind, but the drop-off in characterisation is comparable to the Torgaddon drop-off between ‘Horus Rising’ and ‘False Gods’. Ahh well. This is another Gav Thorpe Dark Angels story. I liked ‘Call Of The Lion’ a lot, but ‘The Lion’ was a little problematic for me (a few too many ‘why the fuck…’ moments). With Dan Abnett now the author associated with Lion El’Jonson for the HH storyline, Gav takes the plot strand of “what happened to the rest of the Dark Angels after the Lion went to Ultramar?” No Night Lords here (thank fuck, after that horrible bullshit in ‘The Lion’), so I guess Thramas is done. Instead, the First Legion are chasing Calas Typhon and the Death Guard from system to system; on this occasion, the two sides square off near a planet which has seceded from the Imperium, but not declared for Horus, and whose governor makes his contempt for both sides fairly clear. An interesting moral conundrum which is dealt with… fairly ambiguously by the Dark Angels.

Despite Corswain now just being a cardboard cut-out of a high-ranking Dark Angel rather than a black-humoured badass, there is little wrong with ‘By The Lion’s Command’. It moves along at a good clip and there’s a nice heel-turn by Corswain at the end. My only minor complaint was that there were absolutely no Death Guard characters here, but it was a short story and really, a lengthy Typhon scene would have served little narrative purpose. What’s most interesting is the direction hinted at in the last few pages. Corswain is splitting the Legion, with some of them most likely continuing to hunt Typhon (perhaps setting the First as the antagonists in the hopefully forthcoming Death Guard novel?) and searching for Leman Russ’ forces to combine their strength (setting up thousands of ‘culture shock’ buddy comedies with Adam Sandler as the blue-collar Space Wolf and Andy Samberg as the clean-cut Dark Angel) but others heading to… Caliban. I admit my dick twitched at that news, as I’ve been craving a Fallen Angels novel since ‘Grey Angel’. And the loyalist First will be headed up by Belath, which sets things up nicely for a possible Astelan/Belath showdown (what do you mean “no one cares”? I CARE!!). I assume Gav will tie this story strand in to the Cypher story he’s apparently writing for ‘Legacies Of Betrayal’.

In another anthology, with less impressive neighbours, my hype levels might have pushed this to a 8/10… but it’s 7/10 for me now. I still think Gav is much better suited to the Raven Guard, but maybe that’s because I think it takes a LOT to make the knightly pomposity of the Dark Angels interesting. Only Aaron and Dan have done it for me so far.

The Devine Adoratrice by Graham McNeill: As of yet, the only story in the collection which has been released as a standalone e-book. A prequel set some decades before ‘Vengeful Spirit’, this is concerned with the Devine noble house, who play a major part in that book as Knights on Molech. You don’t need to read ‘The Devine Adoratrice’ before you read ‘Vengeful Spirit’, but maybe you should, as I think it deepens the characterisation of the repulsively arrogant Devines, and adds more gravitas to their fall. Granted, none of these characters develop hugely as a result of the events which unfold here. They’re massive shits in ‘VS’, they’re massive shits here. But Graham writes smoothly and evocatively about an unusual, interesting culture that’s not quite the Imperial norm, and ALSO puts in some stuff where a big robot does the Hulk Smash.

The end reveal – Raeven and Lyx’s affair is even more taboo because THEY ARE TWINS! – was more of an eyeroll moment for me than a shock. I guess ‘Vengeful Spirit’ mentioned this plot point and I read that first, but I must have forgotten since then, since my reaction wasn’t “Oh yeah, I remember that now!” but “What? That’s weird and kind of dumb.” I guess Slaanesh loves incest, but we already knew that shit. As I’ve pointed out before it’s dumb to assume authors are reading the same books that I am, and the ‘degenerate incestuous nobles’ is kind of a common trope, but I REALLY feel like there’s a Jaime/Cersei theme with this shit. But hell, who cares? Me being a whiny little bitch isn’t enough to stop ‘TDA’ being a comfortable 8/10.

Lord Of The Red Sands by Aaron Dembski-Bowden: Remember that brief introductory vignette in ‘Betrayer’ with a few pages of Skane on Isstvan III, finding Kharn’s almost-dead body? This microstory is in a very similar vein. (Heh, vein.) A deepening of the World Eaters culture and way of war in just a few pages. Aaron writes about Angron’s mad rampage through the Loyalist survivors of the virus-bombing with panache and skill. It’s AD-B, of course he does. But it’s not all flying blood and viscera. Angron’s almost tender treatment of a dying Loyalist World Eater centurion he sees as worthy of respect shows that Aaron is the master of bringing dimension to characters who GW often treated as paper-thin before the HH series started. And our peek into Angron’s internal monologue regarding his ambitions and motivations… well, you might be surprised what we find. 8/10 for this; I think the writing quality is perfect, but it’s just too short to call it compulsory reading – though if you liked ‘Betrayer’, you need this story in your life. I believe you can buy it as part of the ‘Angron’ audio/ebook bundle from Black Library.

All That Remains by James Swallow: A story of Loyalist human soldiers, survivors of rebellions on their own worlds which led to them facing daemons. Shell-shocked (or warp-shocked) yet still unbroken, they are determined to carry on the fight against Horus… until they drop out of the Empyrean, becalmed for NO RAISIN. I’ll be brief here, because it’s not a heavily plot-focused story. The emphasis is on building the characters and this is done brilliantly. It’s not just humans in this story. Halfway through we are introduced to a Knight Errant formerly of the Thousand Sons Legion, and I am going NUTS trying to work out if we’ve seen this character before. The story is resolved nicely, with some more humans for Malcador’s ‘Silent Army’, and… what’s this… the hundreds of psychically capable young boys in the hold may be redirected to Titan and turned into Space Marines? FFFFUCK. If Jim Swallow gets to do a Grey Knights Founding novel, especially if he writes it to the standard shown here, I will BREAK OFF MY DICK with all the pounding. Having said that, sometimes I feel that Swallow is better at the short stories (‘Forgotten Sons’ was also excellently written). However, this feels like something from towards the end of the HH timeline – the soldiers here have seen Thousand Sons standing with Horus’ forces and summoning daemons, which certainly hasn’t happened ‘yet’ in the main HH timeline. Still, the fact that Titan is on the table at all at the moment is very encouraging and I hope they follow up on it – even if it’s set post-Heresy, I’ll buy that shit fo sho. This is a 9/10 story for sure.

All I can say in conclusion is “Shit yeah”! This reminds me of ‘Age Of Darkness’, back when it felt like almost every story was an awesome set-up for an exciting novel that would come further down the line. I continue to have reservations about BL pushing ‘event only’ anthologies – imagine what it’s like for HH fans in Brazil or Japan – but as long as we get them EVENTUALLY, I can’t be too mad. I give ‘The Imperial Truth’ an overall score of 9/10. It’s releases like this that remind me the Horus Heresy is probably my all-time favourite series of books.

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

"Fallen Angels" by Mike Lee

So after 'Descent Of Angels' turned out to be, erm, pretty OK, how does the second (and last, so far) HH Dark Angels novel stand up on its re-reading?

Apparently the dude with the big sword is Luther. Sick helm brah.

Well, there's no fucking around - the book picks up exactly where 'Descent Of Angels' left off - with Luther, Zahariel and hundreds of other out-of-favour Dark Angels landing back on Caliban, cut off from their Legion and out in the cold. Holding the fort are a load of green recruits they are supposed to train, as well as the ancient, sick and wounded who were unable to follow the Astartes off-world. We also see new Cypher - a young, mysterious knight with dual pistol skills. During this section there seems to be a lil ole Game Of Thrones reference - Luther jokes that they should raid "Master Luwin's kitchen". Hahaha you Winterfell-ass motherfuckers, you better not!!! Aldurukh remembers. Luther puts on a brave face, but has to admit privately that it looks like they'll never leave Caliban again. Quickly, it seems apparent that Mike Lee's writing is quite similar to Mitchel Scanlon's; perhaps a little better. His lack of overblown, wooden language makes the book a little easier (and quicker) to read than 'Descent Of Angels' was. The attempts at Space Marine banter here, obviously, ain't shit compared to First Claw's sniping or Torgaddon breakin' Marines' balls, but at least it makes a change from po-faced bellowing at all times.

The action quickly jumps 53 years forwards, right to the eve of the Heresy. It's here we'll stay for the rest of the book, jumping between the exiles on Caliban and the Lion's Crusade force. Soon after the book begins, we are told of the Isstvan III bombing, and the book ends with the Isstvan V betrayal yet to happen (but soon come, dread). So the timeframe is fairly short. No lengthy 'Time passed and these events happened' sequences like in its predecessor. The news of the Heresy sets up Nemiel's plot thread; the Lion can't take his Legion to Isstvan to bring Horus to book, as he's currently stuck in a dang quagmire... but he'll take a small strike-force to the rebel Forge World of Diamat, in the hopes of disrupting Horus' supply lines. (Man, Jonson is keen on leaving most of his Legion to sort shit out and just fucking off with a strike force - see also that novella 'The Lion'.)

Nemiel wasn't a 'viewpoint' character in 'Descent Of Angels' as that book was definitely focused on Zahariel. Here, we're inside Nemiel's head for around half the book. Both cousins feel pangs of loss for each other and wish the exile had not happened. Nemiel is now a Chaplain, "charged with maintaining the fighting spirit of (his) battle brothers and preserving the ancient traditions of their brotherhood". It's still very strange to me that the atheistic Empire would use a term like 'Chaplain'. It makes sense for the Word Bearers - who I think were the inventors of the role - and it kind of makes sense that many Legions would later use the position as an 'enforcer' of the Edict of Nikaea (which 'The Lion' seemed to retcon Nemiel as). But Nemiel's duties here, well - it possibly would have made more sense for him to be a well-loved Veteran Sergeant or a Company Captain or something. All I'm saying is: it's acceptable for the 30K Space Marine Legions to not always fit in perfectly with the 40K Chapters... we won't shit ourselves. On that subject, it's apparent that it was written before 'A Thousand Sons' and its ramifications were really planned out. The Edict of Nikaea isn't mentioned too much, and in fact Zahariel is constantly described as a Librarian, carries a force staff, uses his psychic powers without thinking "O NO THIS BAD" or having his brothers yell "wwwwwwwiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiitchhhhh!!" I guess it's not too much of a stretch to imagine that the news of the Edict never reached Caliban, but the Edict being such a huge part of the First Legion's arc makes this a little problematic.

I'm just sayin' I don't think Nemiel should be baby Asmodai just yet...

Back on Caliban, Zahariel is preparing to send 4200 new Astartes to join the Legion - holy fuck! It seems they're about to begin their "19th training cycle", could they have sent 18 similar sized groups of Astartes in the last 53 years? Even if the first batches are implied to have been smaller, that's... still pretty huge. We also find that Luther has spent his years in exile 'civilising' Caliban - improving its infrastructure, boosting its population, making it more hospitable to life - basically turning it into a factory for the Imperial war machine. "I started this muthafuckin Caliban shit... and this the muthafuckin thanks I get??" Zahariel's continued psyker powers reveal to us that apparently the Winds of the Warp are strong on Caliban - possibly due to the proximity to the Eye of Terror? Oooh, this is an interesting turn for Caliban's backstory... well, if it hadn't been heavily signposted at every opportunity. Still, I was a little surprised by the revelation that the Watchers in the Dark are apparently xenos psykers tasked with protecting Caliban and containing its inherent corruption. I don't know if this is a new HH retcon, a secret finally revealed, or an established bit of Dark Angel lore since '94. Guess that's what comes of not giving a single shit about the Dark Angels until now... poor research, guys. I'm mad ashamed of myself.

One thing that made me cuss and realise my chronology of Dark Angels events was totally off is the fact that Astelan shows up as a fairly major character; he's been on Caliban for ages, which shows that 'Call Of The Lion' takes place 15 years after 'Descent Of Angels' and the ominous threat at the end of that book signified his exile, not his execution. Glad I finally realised that.

The Lion's parts of the story remind me of Guilliman's criticisms in 'Unremembered Empire'; that Jonson is too sly, secretive and private. That criticism's borne out here. Even with his favoured sons, the Lion isn't a leader who is in favour of transparency. He was born for royalty, like Guilliman was born for democracy and Kurze was born for totalitarianism. The arrogant control-freakery isn't necessarily a handicap, as he's a very good tactician, taking point in every aspect of the Legion's strategy and warfare.

The void war section Nemiel witnesses here is pretty dull and makes me wish ADB could have given some of his skillz to this bro. Not an auspicious start, as it's our first battle sequence. In fact, throughout the whole book, the action sequences aren't great. Arguably they're quite dull. As a result, Nemiel's chapters in the book are kind of a drag, as they include way more action - in fact, once you've got the setup out of the way, Nemiel's chapters seem like one long, continuous action sequence. (Despite my criticism, I can't deny that the section where Nemiel's insertion team finds the, erm, 'savage weapons' Horus seeks is brilliantly written and fucking cool.) With the creepy building foreboding of Zahariel's 'strand', Mike Lee is much more successful. Though the bit where Nemiel suspects the Lion is incapable of 'reading' his subordinates, then spends about half a page dissecting what this says about his character, is fucking great... and it also may be why Jonson KARATE CHOPPED NEMIEL'S FUCKING HEAD OFF. (I mean, we know Jonson had Watchers on deck, maybe they were reading minds and reporting back to him... xenos psykers be snitchin'.) Then again, later in the book it's implied that Jonson's motive could have been to silence anyone who could know of Caliban's taint (snarf); Nemiel and Zahariel were the last to speak to Lord Sartana, after all, and the Lion couldn't know what they discussed... so, they had to go.

Even Tony Jaa ain't do that shit Lion. Damn.

Zahariel investigates an apparently growing insurrection on the Lion's homeworld - his arc carries an interesting concept from 'Descent of Angels' - compliant worlds, even Primarch 'homeworlds', aren't sacrosanct - they get hecka plundered. You can see why the civilisations might revolt. Of course, I'd feel more sympathy if the rebellion didn't seem to be led by noblemen crying about how they got no feudal subjects anymore. But that's good, right? It'd be easy to paint the rebels as sainted crusaders the way the storyline is going. We also find that Luther is holding those thousands of new Astartes back from their deployment. I was kind of annoyed when Zahariel uncovered this information and gave in to the one of the worst HH cliches - positing the actual reason (that Luther is disillusioned with the Imperium and the Lion, and is unsure if they deserve his loyalty) then rejecting that, throwing his hand to his brow and swooning "No, NO, I must not think on't!" While this story line is far from unpredictable, I kind of like that some aspects of it at least are a bit shadowy. For most of the novel, it seems like the "accepted fluff" from 40k around this Legion - "half of 'em fell to Chaos because of Luther's selfish ways and bitter jealousy" - is just some bullshit Jonson made up after he Hulked out and blew up his homeworld for embarrassing him in front of his dad. But then, towards the end... Luther's fall to Chaos becomes much more possible.

The last third or so of 'Fallen Angels' is excellent, full of great moments - the Lion and Nemiel's suicidally brave (and arrogant) last stand against waves of Sons Of Horus, and Luther's 'declaration of independence' from the Imperium's affairs, as well as his big reveal of "Hey, I done got myself psychic powers through all my book learning!" While I'll still contend the Zahariel chapters of the book are superior and stay that way throughout, aspects of his plot strand's ending seemed stupid and rushed to me - the big reveal of the "Terran sorcerors" who serve as the book's antagonists is completely botched - who are they? what's their endgame? how did they infiltrate the arcology? THERE'S NO TIME!!! Just make 'em dicks with robes and wands and pointy hats, and fudge their motive confusingly.

This would have been way better.

By the end, Luther is certainly on the path to becoming the sinister magician we saw in 'Grey Angel'. It's kind of a cross-pollination of Lorgar and Magnus' stories - driven by bitterness and a public scorning by someone you intensely admire, you let your thirst for knowledge get the better of you. Unoriginal it may be, but Luther's arc has actually become one of my favourites in HH and I'm extremely interested in how it turns out. Speaking of 'Grey Angel', a central tenet of that audio drama was that Luther didn't know - or feigned a lack of knowledge - of the Heresy. Re-reading 'Fallen Angels', I realised this was falsehood. So did John French just forget (unlikely, but not impossible) or did the manipulative, psychically gifted Luther just read Loken's mind, realise the information he was looking for, and play dumb real good? I think I've answered my own question. But to what end? I'm assuming to buy time for his Legion...

It's still my opinion that Young Cypher is a big red herring. I believe Zahariel is the one who'll become the 40K Cypher. Still, this creepy young anonymous Cypher dude will have a big role to play in upcoming Dark Angels stories, I'll wager. We get a nice amount of backstory for him, it's just not that interesting. He's such a fucking one-dimensional chin-stroking evil puppetmaster that I can't believe they'd make him THE Cypher. Also, Zahariel is about the only Dark Angels Fallen character of note beside Luther (well, excepting Corswain, he's kind of the only surviving Dark Angels character of note, full stop). It seems unlikely that they'll waste him on death. Then again, my predictions have frequently been inaccurate, so we'll see what happens.

Here's the main problem with 'Fallen Angels'. You're switching back and forth, quite often, between two quite different stories - the slow burning political/mystery thriller on Caliban, and the straightforward BASH EM CRASH EM action movie featuring Jonson and his Crusade. But aside from its (many) minor flaws, I can't hate on 'Fallen Angels' anymore. Not when there's weirdo shit like 'False Gods' around still getting serious accolades. As a book, it reminded me more than a little of 'Vulkan Lives'. Sure I was bored at times, but I was also thinking "Oh, man, that makes that part in that book so much better!" I think reading the HH books in order of publication is a mistake, and the Dark Angels 'arc' illustrates this. Normally, introducing a Primarch would involve a big focus on description of their appearance, manner and general swagga. Sadly, you go through two whole books without ANY gripping descriptive work on The Lion. Then Dembski-Bowden's 'Savage Weapons' says more evocative shit about Jonson in its short length than both the full novels, and of course, 'Unremembered Empire', flawed as I think it is, was superb in its Lion coverage. (Then again the trip down 1st Legion Memory Lane wasn't all good; re-reading the novella 'The Lion' from 'The Primarchs' collection, which I've praised to the skies at every opportunity, I didn't find it significantly better than 'Fallen Angels' or 'Descent Of Angels' at all.)

Like 'Descent Of Angels', I'm giving this the 7/10 solution. Man, the books I was hatin' on before are actually pretty good. Seems like 'Fulgrim' and 'False Gods' are the only ones I can really summon up hate for these days...

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

"Descent Of Angels" by Mitchel Scanlon

AKA 'Decent Of Angels'. Cause it's decent, I guess...? FUCK, failure of joke. My memory of this book and also of its companion piece 'Fallen Angels' is not particularly favourable. Let's see if that is still the case after re-reading it.

Your MOM Descended on my Angel last NIGHT.

My patience is tested initially with a portentuous, overdone hand-wringing preface a-weeping and a-wailing about the fall of the Angels, the curse of Caliban and how Luther was a chill bro who gets totally misrepresented by the durn Emperor and his LIES. Our narrator for this intro isn't defined, but I'm guessing it's Zahariel. Who? Well, we'll get to that.

Once the italics disappear, the books set about establishing the character of Caliban's society before the Empire reaches it. They're essentially in a feudal state with castles, horses, knightly orders etc. However, they also have the technology for pistols, chainswords and power armour, though in crude forms. Their civilisation is harried by creatures called Great Beasts, each of which is a hideous yet unique monster. They sound very Chaos-tainted from the first time they're described, so the big secret reveal that's sold hard during 'Fallen Angels' that Caliban suffers heavily from warp-taint is, well, kind of pre-spoiled. Right off the bat though, I'm impressed - the beginning of this book is WAY better than I remembered it as. The ominous scene setting introduction, Zahariel's initiation, and the first time we see Luther and Jonson - pretty much handled impeccably. Scanlon's dialogue and characterisation is patchy, though. Especially when dealing with Zahariel and Nemiel. I can see why I hated these characters on my first reading. Also, the writing is a little shaky - not full of weird, twisted errata like 'False Gods' was, but packed with clichés, ie darkness that "seemed to reach out from... haunted depths like a living thing, enveloping (characters) in its silken embrace like an unwelcome lover." Count 'em up kids.

Early on, Lion El'Jonson's name is retconned to mean 'The Lion, The Son Of The Forest', not just a straight up stolen name from a dude who wrote a poem called 'The Dark Angel'. I would think that to make this a little more credible, the book would be full of forests with 'Jon' in their name. But no. Ah well. Anyway, Jonson's origins story is gone over in depth here - with almost 2/3 of the book dedicated to his life before the Imperium finds him, he may have the most 'pre-reunion with daddy' HH history of any Primarch in the series. The fact he was alone in the forest for the first few years of his life makes him unique amongst his brothers - most of them were quickly given surrogate father figures. Even Angron and Night Haunter - while fending for themselves - were at the centre of large societies of humans. This goes a long way towards explaining why the Lion is so secretive and has such an obsession with being self-sufficient.

The Lion wants to be the very best, that no-one ever was.

We also learn quite early on that the Lion has some premonitions of the Emperor and his crusade coming to Caliban. Not so special and unique now, are you Conrad? Ahh, that's unfair I guess... but I'm petty like that.

There are hints early on of how much the Order of Caliban will influence the First Legion - ie there are famed cavalry called the Ravenwing, the order has a Lord Cypher who is Keeper Of Secrets, they all wear hooded surplices over their armour... couple this with the fact we know Caliban has crude bolt pistols and chainswords, and you could argue the Lion had to make nearly no adjustments when he assumed control of his Legion. Also, when it comes down to it... ain't Knights In Space just a cool idea? Unoriginal but cool. Anticipation of this almost glosses over the fact the Lion uses goddamn CHILD SOLDIERS of 7 and up, putting them in incredibly deadly situations. But again, that totally fits with what a fucking ice-dick motherfucker he is. He also gets incredibly butthurt if anyone reminds him the Dark Angels existed before he took control. Insecure or what?

It's not all about the Lion (and I think this fact is one of the reasons 'Descent Of Angels' was quite poorly received by HH fans and still gets shit on today). Luther is a major character from the very beginning of the book. I found his character very bland the first time round, but after 'Grey Angel' single-handedly rejuvenated my interest in this character, I paid much more careful attention this time. And Zahariel is a much more interesting character than I remembered. He's outwardly cavalier and confident he's The Bravest Little Knight. But he's tormented by memories of his brutal initiation, where he was disturbed by the cruelty of the men he now calls brother. His rivalry with his close relative Nemiel also secretly disturbs him. Zahariel is terrified of the Great Beasts (a pretty normal reaction and one that makes him a much more relateable character).

So, the first quarter or so of the book is mostly scene setting and context. Then we're show the order in action when they come up against the Knights Of Lupus (RIP J Dilla). Zahariel goes on a Beast Quest (hoping to one day rhyme like Freddie Gibbs) and discovers his hidden psychic powers, as well as meeting the hidden Watchers In The Dark. The Emperor and his Astartes don't arrive until over halfway through 'Descent Of Angels'. It's a bold move, and I can see why so many people ended up pissed off and bored, but I think it ultimately pays off. We see these characters and learn their culture for a long while, so their reactions to the Imperium mean more. Already, the seeds of the Dark Angels' schism are sown...

I mean, this guy would have totally flown a spaceship if he had one.

Zahariel's discovery of his psychic abilities is pretty damn great. However, I don't see how he had to kill a Calibanite Lion. First you make this big song and dance about how the Beasts are all different to each other and there are no two the same. Then you say that the only Calibanite Lion was already killed by Jonson, a fucking Primarch. Then Zahariel finds out that no, guys, there's totally another Calibanite Lion and he just goes and kills it. I get that the purpose of this was for Zahariel to catch the Primarch's gaze - not in a totally favourable way, either ("NOW I DON'T HAVE THE HIGH SCORE ANYMORE!!!!! GRRRR!!") - but why not have it be a different, equally badass beast? It's still impressive for a teenager to triumph in that way, why double back on your own mythology to emphasise it?

In my opinion, the plot (and some of the action sequences) of 'Descent Of Angels' are surprisingly good. It's just that there's a bit too much exposition and dialogue handled in a stumbling, haphazard way. All the more reason to wish that Dan, Aaron, John French or Chris Wraight get the next Dark Angels full length. We got the brilliant 'Savage Weapons' from ADB and the Lion's excellent treatment in 'Unremembered Empire' from Dan, but that shit ain't enough. I want a full First Legion novel where they talk a bit more like normal people - I mean, I know they're pompous, honourable knights but that doesn't mean they have to spout awkward Tolkeinesque drivel. Regardless of the blandness of the writing, and sometimes of the characters, the lasting gift of 'Descent Of Angels' is the relationship between Luther and Jonson. It's a little bit fraternal, a little bit unspoken (sexual?) jealousy, and a little bit political power-struggle. Tough to describe. You really get the feeling that while there's envy there, Luther loves the Lion and wants him to succeed. Few Primarchs we've seen have a contemporary like this; I'm thinking a little bit of the Abbadon/Horus relationship, but even there we're always reminded of their military hierarchy.

The Knights of Lupus episode (as well as many more moments through this book) shows Luther as the smoothie in the partnership. Luther is the diplomat to the Lion's intractable, tactless bastard. If they'd stuck together, I've no doubt they could have achieved great things. The KoL episode, though, also really illustrates what a shit the Lion is. This segment starts with a gripping siege scene, albeit a very videogamey one - kill these guys! breach the walls! this guy is pulling on a lever - oh no, more Elites! Shit, a giant boss battle! Oh, a final cutscene, this guy's gonna tell us some history and accuse us of being the REAL monsters... IT'S LIKE MASS EFFECT 3 UP IN THIS BITCH. After this, we get a glimpse of how naive and short-sighted the Order's goals are: what do they think will happen after the Great Beasts are gone? (This is reinforced as poorly thought out in 'Fallen Angels', when we realise the importance of the function Great Beasts played on Caliban). Furthermore, we start to suspect that Jonson massacred an entire knightly order just to get a peek at their forbidden library of knowledge. Another question always in my mind was: how does the open, even-tempered good guy Luther in this book become the disquieting, slimy presence in 'Grey Angel'? I guess I will have to re-read 'Fallen Angels' to find out.

All we wanted... was the right... to live... and breed horrible Chaos monsters...

The 'payoff scene' where the Stormbirds of the Imperium finally arrive is excellently handled. I really like the initial chapters where Calibanite and Imperial are just feeling each other out. In these novels, we haven't really been shown what happens a) when a Primarch meets the Imperium or b) when the Imperium meets a feral but obviously 'compliant' world. It's not pretty, as their ecosystem, social structure and even beliefs are rendered down in a matter of weeks as mulch for the Imperial regime. It's not long after our heroes have passed their trials that we are whisked forwards in time - the process of Astartification (?) is glossed over. There could be an excellent HH book that spends most of its time on the process of implanting the new initiates with gene-seed, but 'Descent' isn't it. (I don't understand why a lot of reviewers seemed to lambast the book for its incredibly slow pace during its 'Caliban' sections, then got angry when a lengthy 'WE ARE TURNING INTO ASTARTES' sequence wasn't included.)

Instead, we're off to the Great Crusade. We learn quickly that the respected senior members of the Order were taken along with the Astartes and slotted into their ranks - shit, old Hadariel is even a Chapter Master. Seems like the existing Terran structure of the 1st Legion was very accommodating to the Order (or, more likely, the Lion would brook no disagreement). We're not in the new-look 1st for long before we're off to Sarosh, an apparently unobtrusive, compliant world. Actually it's totes corrupt and Chaotic but rather than resisting the False Emperor in the usual way, they're outwardly compliant and burying any real progress in endless bureaucracy. The description of this is weirdly funny, but also deadly boring. Man, the White Scars are ill-treated in these books, eh? On Sarosh, we get a friendly White Scar dude who just says alternative phrasings of "DON'T TRUST EM" again and again. Christ, at least he's better than Hakim... or the White Scar Librarian in 'A Thousand Sons'. I will never get tired of bringing up those racist-ass characters. Still, I read the first chapter of Chris Wraight's 'Scars' and it looks like he is gonna redress that balance, so... cautious optimism. BUT WE'RE HERE TO TALK ABOUT THE ANGELS SO MOVING ON...

Like the White Scars dude said...

Overall though, the Sarosh segment - which wraps up the book and sets up the concept for 'Fallen Angels' - is great, as Scanlon ratchets up the creepiness excellently. From the featureless golden masks all Saroshi wear, to the fact that projected census data shows 8% of the planet's population is simply unaccounted for, there's clearly Some Wrong Shit Goin Down. When the planet does, inevitably, erupt into Empire-defying violence, it's extremely chilling. Having said that, the "suicide bomb shuttle" plot detail is fucking stupid and depends on an incredibly retarded Mechanicum contingent on board the Invincible Reason.

"You guys, this shuttle the diplomats are coming in is really old and busted."
"Bor-ing! I'm so OVER it already. Don't even BOTHER scanning THAT shit."

It does at least lead to one of the book's best moments - the tense sequence where Luther debates whether or not to actually defuse the bomb... how badly does he want the Lion to stop overshadowing him? Dramatic.

The end of the book is abrupt, and comes when an intense action sequence is seemingly just getting underway. I guess the HH writers quickly learned the lesson of the exhausting 'Fulgrim' - always leave 'em wanting more... Suddenly, Zahariel, Luther and many of their brothers are packed off back to Caliban. With the Lion becoming increasingly capricious, those who are out of favour are to be swept under the rug and forgotten about. Ostensibly, they're "overseeing recruitment on Caliban" but everyone knows the real score. It's worth noting that at this point, we're still over 50 years before the outbreak of the Heresy. I'm not sure what to think of the Future Fallen Angels being 'benched' so quickly, basically a few months into the 1st Legion's involvement in the Crusade. In fact it seems to contradict the 'Grey Angel' section where Luther implies his involvement took into account several significant battles alongside 7 or more other Legions including the Luna Wolves. But this may just have to go into the growing file of "Stuff that shows HH readers don't read each others' shit too religiously."

I was kind of dreading this re-read. But I really enjoyed 'Descent Of Angels' the second time around. The writing is often clunky, and it very rarely surprises. Still, I can't see why I hated it so much before. All that's changed? I actually CARE about the Dark Angels now. Stuff like 'Grey Angel', 'The Lion', 'Unremembered Empire' and especially 'Savage Weapons' have got me interested in these humourless dicksmackers. It's crazy they got benched so quickly - for a while it seemed like nobody wanted to write about these dudes at all. More recently, there seems to have been a thawing of the ice towards these guys, so we'll see what happens. First read-through, the stilted, overly formal and often clichéd writing style really annoyed me. However, I now think it's intentional - Scanlon wants to create a mythic ambience to the book. First read-though, I shared the still-prevalent HH fanboy opinion - "All this shit is irrelevant, it's just for DA groupies - give us stuff that has a bearing on the actual Heresy!" Now I think this stuff is pretty relevant to maybe the sleeper hit of the HH series - the character studies of the Lion and Luther's natures and motivations. At this point, it seems very unlikely that Scanlon will be asked back for another book, but I don't think he's the shithound that many BL fans seem to paint him as. And therefore, I'm giving this the cautious thumbs-up of a 7/10.

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

"The Unremembered Empire" by Dan Abnett

'The Unremembered Empire' is, on balance, probably the least impressive book Dan Abnett has contributed to the Horus Heresy series. It's arguably also an incredibly necessary one.

OMG SPOILERS.

Now, 'least impressive' seems like stark terms to describe a book by one of my favourite authors, but like my opinion of his short story 'Blood Games', just because I feel it's nowhere near as good as the others, doesn't make it bad, by any definition. Dan's the victim of his previous track record here. 'Horus Rising' started the ball rolling and we've probably all got very fond memories of it. 'Legion' is seen by many as the pinnacle of the entire series and I definitely agree that it's a masterpiece. 'Prospero Burns' is probably my favourite work of Space Marine fiction ever, in HH or outside of it. 'Know No Fear' is incredible and I doubt we'll see any subsequent book in the series able to sustain its intensity; even the Siege of Terra will probably be spread out across several books. In comparison, 'The Unremembered Empire' just doesn't stack up. Perhaps my expectations were too high but Dan was four-for-four until now, which might be why I pre-ordered this in hardback and finished reading it less than 24 hours after I ripped the cardboard packaging open.

Let me explain why I'm using the word 'necessary'. While many HH Abnett books (and also quite a few HH books from other authors) are better and more enjoyable than 'Unremembered Empire', they don't always give us this much narrative thrust. From 'Legion' and 'Prospero Rising' we got a shitload of incredibly interesting background, but in terms of plot points that were relevant to the larger series, only a few (OK, it was a BIG ONE for 'Legion'...). I know I've said in the past that people who want to shove the narrative forwards, and have no patience for 'world-building' interludes, are what is killing the Horus Heresy series. But sometimes it is a good thing for a book to be overcrowded with significant events - it won't necessarily be too great to read, but subsequent books will build on its revelations and, given more space, they'll be able to put more detail and art into what we first read. Like 'Galaxy In Flames'. I wouldn't say I enjoyed that book at all, but the events and characters have been used as a foundation for much more interesting stories by a lot of authors in HH series.

'The Unremembered Empire' is a follow-up to the events of 'Know No Fear', the 'Mark Of Calth' anthology, and 'Betrayer'. What transpired in those books shapes the story here, though don't expect to see a return of characters like Ventanus, Lorgar, Angron, Kharn, Kor Phaeron, Tetrarch Nicodemus, etc - it's more like, this centres on a Guilliman incredibly scarred by the monstrous events of Calth and the Shadow Crusade, and haunted by fears for the sons he left to fend for themselves in the Underworld War, which began over two years ago. However, in terms of stories and characters being picked up, 'Unremembered Empire' is a follow-up to... so many things. Most significantly, 'Vulkan Lives', but it also draws on 'The Lion', 'Rules Of Engagement', 'The Iron Within', 'Prince Of Crows', and 'The Crimson Fist'. And I'm not saying you get a brief glimpse of one character from each of these stories as 'fan service' and then they're never mentioned again. Dan does his best to integrate all these storylines naturally into his own. It's a massive task and he manages it very well; at no point was I thinking "You're here? But why?" A plot-heavy book, tying together a lot of the diverging storylines which have been left dangling or vanished in previous books, may well be exactly what the Horus Heresy series needs right now. However, the combination of all these different storylines comes at the expense of a lot of the things that made the previous Dan books so great: a clearly defined and fast-moving narrative, lashings of gallows humour, excellent dialogue, superb action sequences. All these things are THERE, certainly, but... less than I'd like. Power struggles and squabbling between Loyalist legions seems like a meaty topic Dan could really get his teeth into... so I'm not sure what happened.

My first, and most petty, complaint is that the cover of the book is misleading (this isn't exactly Dan's fault, I know). I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, but that's Guilliman and Sanguinius, right? Yet Sanguinius makes no appearance until the end of the book, making this cover an actual spoiler (since it depicts an event which is literally a couple pages from the end of the book). DANG YOU BLACK LIBRARY! You made me think Sanguinius was going to be a major character here!

The lengthy introduction of this book is a bit of a slog, I won't dress it up. At first, I thought a novel entirely about Roboute Guilliman playing politician while slowly losing his mind would be a fun time. What can I say, sometimes I love it when series totally de-rail and also piss off their more inflexible fans. (For this reason, I also love the Star Wars Rogue Squadron book 'The Krytos Trap', which pauses a series about dramatic, high-stakes starfighter dogfights to... tell the story of a lengthy, politically motivated court case.) But this book drags a little. For a lot of the story setup, Guilliman and co. are just sitting around, going stir crazy, wondering what's going on at Terra, and arguing amongst themselves about the direction 'Imperium Secundus' will take. (The difficult second album, eh? It was doomed to be poorly received.) This is topped off by Guilliman seemingly having to convince himself constantly that he's not secretly hoping to usurp his Emprah, and thinking about the temptation to do that A LOT. This whole storyline does certainly shed light on his comments at the end of 'Rules Of Engagement' though. You can't accuse these HH dudes of not planning ahead!

While not every scene is gripping stuff, the actual writing is excellent; an early highlight is a brutal fight between Guilliman and a ten-strong kill squad of Astartes, one of the best action sequences in the series, outside, well, 'Know No Fear'. Guilliman's heightened reactions and superhuman ability to calculate the current 'practical' make this one of the best uses of on-page 'bullet time' (for want of a better phrase) I've ever read. But much of the first half of 'Unremembered Empire' is just... setup. Characters and events being manouvred into place, slightly clumsily, for when the plot can finally kick into gear. 'Vulkan Lives' felt like it followed the same school of thought - pages 0-200 set 'em up, pages 200-400 knock 'em down - and that wasn't my particular favourite book either. Having said that, around the time of the Lion's arrival, and the near-simultaneous arrival of John Grammaticus (and... some others) things do finally step up in pace. Sluggishly at first, but the feeling of quickly-increasing tension is very well done. It's just a shame we're nearly 200 pages in before the shit starts flyin'. And then, when the action starts, the problems don't exactly stop, though the book certainly becomes much more enjoyable.

SHIT JUST GOT REAL (pg. 200)

There were a few odd choices made in the writing of this book. In place of Abnett's trademark biting down-to-earth wit, the dialogue seems oddly stilted and... Shakespearean. Weirdly, it works very well. I wonder if it's because some people felt 'Know No Fear' showed the Ultramarines being too 'normal' in their speech? I'd much rather have that style as Dan is superb at it, but I can't deny that the more ornate language fits in with the 'family tragedy' theme the book has. Another strange thing is that Abnett sometimes refers to single Astartes as plural ("the Ultramarines sat with his feet up, eating an ice-cream sandwich" "the Dark Angels was an expert at karaoke"). Is this how they're meant to be referred to? Or a search-and-replace spellcheck gone wrong?

Also, there's a chronology issue I'm hella confused by. 'Vulkan Lives' ends with Vulkan escaping Kurze and teleporting to Macragge. This teleportation happens very near the beginning of 'Unremembered Empire'. 'Prince Of Crows' begins with Kurze in a coma after being badly wounded by the Lion; he's in a coma for most of the story, which ends with him teleporting onto the Lion's flagship. We're told in 'Unremembered Empire' that he ran amok on the flagship for around three months and is still loose down there when the Lion comes to Macragge. So... 'Vulkan Lives' takes us right up to the beginning of 'Unremembered Empire' in terms of Kurze's actions. And 'Prince Of Crows' and the Lion's exposition do the same... but the two timelines don't reconcile in my head. The only way I can understand it is if the entirety of 'Prince Of Crows' plus another 3 months transpired in the apparently split-second gap between Vulkan thumbing Dawnbringer's teleportation switch and Vulkan appearing in Macragge's atmosphere. I suppose that's not impossible, with the nature of time being famously fluid in the 40K universe... but I'd like a little bit more explanation on this... I'm sure they'll clear it up eventually (or maybe they'll just say "Ahriman is responsible"). Just like the timeline fuckery in 'The Outcast Dead', this didn't have any impact in my actual enjoyment of the story; in fact I only realised the weirdness after I'd finished the book. But you know, that's gonna make SOMEONE pretty angry... someone out there. 40K nerds seem VERY hot on this shit.

HH chronology confusion? The chickens are coming home to roost, y'all.

So the 'day-to-day running of a new Empire' aspect of the book is something of a non-starter. It sort of feels like Abnett could have dealt interestingly with the plot of the first third or so of this book as a novella, and then the high-octane action stuff could have been handed off to a Gav Thorpe or a James Swallow. However, that would cut out perhaps the most interesting plot point here: the troubled relationship between Guilliman and Lion El'Johnson. A Primarch groupie such as myself is always on the lookout for expansion of these characters and Abnett certainly delivers in that regard. Their rivalry is presented in a way that makes it easy to be sympathetic to both sides. Part of Guilliman's great unease at the Lion's presence is not knowing how his brother will react to the overturning of the edict of Nikaea. Yet we already know from the novella 'The Lion' that Johnson has gone far further in acting against their father's anti-psyker rule than Roboute had even dreamed of. This is just one of many plot points that reinforce the fact these two brothers just can't talk to each other maaaan. The increasingly tense confrontations that they have in this book make you wish that any other Loyalist Primarch had been the first to answer Macragge's call.

Does 'Unremembered Empire' feature the tragic infamy and mind-breakingly huge battles of 'Betrayer'? Is it a fast-paced page-turner like 'Angel Exterminatus'? Is it an edge-of-your-seat masterwork of storytelling like 'Know No Fear'? Is it an uncomplicated, ceramite-splintering romp that requires almost no effort to enjoy like 'Fear To Tread'? No fucking way. But it does seem a hell of a setup. With Kurze still at large on Macragge, with Vulkan... possibly... not being dead, with the three loyalist brothers here consolidating their power, and with John Grammaticus' story taking a new and strange turn, it definitely sets things up nicely for the next few books. But I'm hoping that for his next chapter in the HH saga, Abnett doesn't bite off more than he can chew.

In my ideal world, he'd return to writing about the Sons Of Horus ('Little Horus' really piqued my interest in Abnett writing about those dudes again) but if this book tells me anything, it's that it might be a good idea for Dan to be given a new Legion to write about every time he does a book, as this is the first time he's 'returned' to a Legion he's already written about and it sometimes seems like he's a little... bored. So... remnant Iron Hands, or perhaps the Death Guard, could be a nice idea... but hell, it's probably a little early for all this - I'm sure we've got several more volumes to come before we get another Dan HH novel. Since Gaunt's Ghosts and the Eisenhorn/Ravenor sagas are getting better and better, maybe he should focus on those for a while... and considering how good 'Embedded' was, non-Black Library fiction by him would be just as interesting to me.

I will give 'Unremembered Empire' 7/10 for now. 8/10 is a strong possibility the more I think about it, but we'll see. Depending on how the setup in this book is actually utilised, perhaps I'll look back on this as the foundation for something great. Or perhaps as another slightly disappointing HH book, from an author who can do much better.

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