"Censure" by Nick Kyme

It is almost two years since the events of ‘Know No Fear’, and the Underworld War still rages on Calth between the remnants of the XIII and XVII Legion left to fight it out by their Primarchs. The surface of Calth is a rad-soaked wasteland and even Space Marines can’t stay out there too long – not that Aeonid Thiel is one to accept what ‘can’t’ be done. When their underground base is overrun by Chaos forces, Thiel’s commanding officer commands him to escape and plan a rescue for his comrades. But how effective can a lone Space Marine really be? And is the lone mortal soldier accompanying Thiel going to be a help, or a hindrance?

NEVER LOOK AT THE CAMERA

‘Censure’ is written in third person present tense, much like ‘Know No Fear’. While I found ‘Honour To The Dead’ annoyingly transparent in its attempt to be just like Dan Abnett’s Calth masterpiece, ‘Censure’ feels like its own beast – the setting and plot would have fit nicely in the ‘Mark of Calth’ anthology, and probably would have made that compilation seem a bit more varied.

After some short stories I was indifferent about and a novel I really struggled to get through, ‘Censure’ was the release that convinced me Nick Kyme had something important to offer to the Heresy series. He writes Thiel to a standard arguably equal to Dan, though I suppose it’s an unfair comparison. While Thiel was an interesting character in ‘Know No Fear’, he was just one man in a rather large cast. Here, Nick is able to focus on him almost exclusively, and the ways his character grows are sometimes unexpected, but always welcome. An important part of Nick’s writing is that Thiel in ‘Censure’ seems to be the same person as the forward-thinking, insubordinate hero we liked in ‘Know No Fear’. It’s not a complete copy of course – that would mean there was no character growth at all – but inconsistency of characters when an authorial switch happens has been one of my main annoyances in the Heresy series, so this was a nice surprise.

The drama begins with Aeonid Thiel outwitting two invader militia troopers in a deadly ambush using rather unconventional means. In fact, Aeonid is breaking convention all over the place here: out above ground in Calth’s wasteland operating solo is not exactly the kind of thing Ultramarines are renowned for being cool with anyway, and to spice the pot he’s kind of going a bit nuts here, almost daring his superiors to slap him down with his defiance of ‘standard’ protocols. Yet with the Shadow Crusade rampaging away elsewhere, Thiel knows the pressing threat of complete annihilation has passed for the Ultramarines. As he states, “There are no true daemons left on Calth anymore… just the Unburdened”. But the possessed are danger enough, as we will come to see.

Our lead antagonist is Kurtha Sedd, “Apostle of the Third Hand”, a Word Bearer waging the Underground War with a small cadre of other Legionaries who were also left behind. If there’s any dominant theme that disappoints me about ‘Censure’, it’s that Sedd and his homies are just A. N. Other group of Seventeenth Legion loonies – their attitudes to being left on Calth aren’t really explored, beyond a brief hand-wave that they went a bit crazy in their denial of Lorgar’s betrayal. (A bit? Well, for Word Bearers, this level of insanity probably is just “a bit”.) Nick writes evil bastards well, and if any portrayal of a monomaniacal zealot was going to be justified, it’d be the Word Bearers – but this could have been handled a little better.

As an audio drama, ‘Censure’ is certainly a neater package than some of BL’s Heresy offerings. The Gal Vorbak effect of Astartes and daemon voices speaking simultaneously works much better here than in ‘Butcher’s Nails’. And the cast do good work. Gareth Armstrong, I believe, plays Thiel here, and does a good job – though I get the feeling Armstrong was told that Thiel was something of an anti-establishment rebel but didn’t really grasp the nature of how mentally focused and physically strong an Ultramarine is. He comes across as an insouciant smart-ass and it’s fun to listen to, but he sometimes sounds a little effete to be a giant hulking superman. I think Chris Fairbank – famously the portrayer of Kharn in such dramas as ‘Chosen of Khorne’ and ‘Butcher’s Nails’ – is Sedd. He’s somehow at once gravelly and slimy; a great performance, but you do wish for slightly better writing for the character – Fairbank certainly deserves it. I'm not sure who plays him, but Raud is the other primary lead. In an occasionally homogenous voice cast, Raud has a strong West Country accent (I think!) and is well played as an honourable, earnest and brave warrior. It could have easily been a caricature but good writing and a great performance make him an interesting presence, not just a human to throw Thiel’s ultra-brilliance into relief. The exploration of his origins is nicely handled as well – brief enough not to seem drawn out, but powerful enough that you get a sense of who is he is, beyond just another gun. Lastly, Voltius is excellently played, the embodiment of the Ultramarines’ devotion to order and regulation – as well as their arrogance. Raud is a good foil for Thiel, but I can’t help but wish Voltius got more of an opportunity to bounce off his rebellious subordinate. Heavy Entertainment are the production studio behind this, and they bring out some of their better atmospherics. The ominous but proud fanfares as Thiel travels into the Arcology are particularly good, and the deafening after-effects of a stun grenade are nicely reproduced.

‘Censure’ is not perfect by any means. There are a few holes in the more slapdash actions scenes. Thiel getting trapped under a load of rubble with Raud, as well as the method used to escape, really feels like it stretches the suspension of disbelief a little too much and it’s hard to shake the feeling that this would have left Raud dead twice over. Later in the story, our heroes commandeer a wrecked Rhino. Nick needs Raud to see something sinister in the rearview mirror, so never mind the fact a Rhino probably doesn’t need anything like that – we’ll put a ‘rearview reflector’ in. And of course there seems to be one fairly massive oversight at the end of ‘Censure’ – so Ultramarines can apparently now travel to and from Calth and Macragge with little issue? Then why aren’t the Word Bearers trying to escape?

And that’s not quite all. Just like in most stories set in an environment like this, as soon as a character (Raud, in this case) starts coughing, you know he’s a goner, because BL and Heavy Entertainment have very little regard for subtlety. Fair enough, I suppose, but it kind of ruins any dramatic tension this storyline could’ve had. A slow death from radiation poisoning is hopefully something I’ll never experience and I don’t know much about the realities of it – but would you still be able to walk (and fight) mere minutes before it suddenly became fatal? I kind of wish they’d gone in another direction with the poignancy and bleakness that massive rad-poisoning is given in, say, ‘Edge of Darkness’, but whatever.

While some of the fights are a little interminable, the final confrontation between Word Bearers and Ultramarines in the contested underground base is a great one. Sure it ends pretty predictably – Sedd gets Spawn’d, Thiel is triumphant, Raud dies a hero’s death – but the writing is up to a good standard. Thiel’s tearful eulogy for Raud is the only time ‘Censure’ approaches the creamed corn of ‘Honour To The Dead’, so that’s a triumph. And that one weak moment is followed immediately by Thiel’s incisive observations on the continuing war for Calth, a high point in the drama, and a high point for the character in general.

The ideal time for you to listen to this (or, nowadays, read this – it’s in the ‘Legacies of Betrayal’ collection in print format) is before you read ‘The Unremembered Empire’, since the teaser ending will make a certain scene in ‘TUE’ that little bit more shocking. If you’ve already read ‘Unremembered Empire’ and spoiled the surprise, I beseech you to seek out ‘Stratagem’, the twenty-minute audio drama which sets up where Thiel’s character arc might go in the next few years of the Heresy.

Would I like Dan Abnett to take sole custody of damn near everything in the Heresy series? Kind of, but that’s not going to happen. If Kyme takes stewardship of Thiel for the rest of the Imperium Secundus arc – or if he does what I hope he does, and makes him a prominent part of ‘Deathfire’ – then I’ll be far from dissatisfied. 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.

"Scars" by Chris Wraight

Sometimes… Shit, sometimes… I think ‘Scars’ might be my favourite fuckin’ Horus Heresy book ever.

o shit look over there son

Let’s not throw other books under the bus. There are close competitors. ‘Prospero Burns’ is a poem, an experiment with style which is divisive in the fanbase, but which I love unreservedly. ‘The First Heretic’ was a complete surprise, not a flawless one, but it brought emotional depth to some of the most cartoonish villains in the lore. And then Aaron did that again with a whole different Legion in ‘Betrayer’, also refining the structure of ‘The First Heretic’, trimming its narrative fat. ‘Legion’ is fucking amazing – but it’s so short, and as the series goes on it feels more and more like it doesn’t belong, perhaps even that its presence hurts the series in some way; it makes all other Alpha Legion appearances so disappointing, and its vision of the Crusade is so far from everything else we’ve seen (yet, I think, so much better than most of the other stuff as well). The same pitfall, in a way, befalls ‘Horus Rising’ – every time I read it, I get mad at the serious drop in almost every aspect of the story’s quality that happened when ‘False Gods’ came around. I’ll argue at length for ‘Angel Exterminatus’ being an underrated classic – but it’s not my favourite. I’ve grown fonder and fonder of ‘The Unremembered Empire’ for its distinctive writing style – but it’s not my favourite.  ‘Know No Fear’ has, I believe, the best action sequences in the whole Heresy, no contest, but it’s probably not my favourite. Probably not. That one’s a strong contender, though.

But ‘Scars’? This book has some serious pull.

First off, don’t read this without reading ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’. Since ‘Brotherhood’ is now available in ‘Legacies of Betrayal’, even you ‘I won’t read anything but the numbered novels’ crazies are going to have no excuse to skip this masterpiece. Between ‘Brotherhood’ and ‘Scars’, there’s a switch from first-person to third-person which readers may find jarring at first, but it’s a necessary step considering the drastic increase in ‘perspective’ characters in this book.

The book begins with a prologue which cuts between Tamu (a youth on Chogoris) and Haren (a Terran boy from the region of Skandmark, which is a great name for a fake-Nordic place). The two boys are on completely different worlds, but their lives run parallel. The prologue takes you through their days as Legion Aspirants, Haren hoping to join the Luna Wolves, Tamu being a potential White Scar. Tamu forms a companionship with Yesugei the Stormseer, and Haren suffers the agony of not quite making the grade for his preferred Legion. As the two of them prepare for ordination into the White Scars, they must choose new names as part of the ritual of Ascension. Tamu becomes Shiban, and Haren becomes Torghun. Shock! IT WAS TWO KEY CHARACTERS FROM ‘BROTHERHOOD OF THE STORM’ ALL ALONG!

I don’t think the Heresy has ever really explored the Aspirant process as thoroughly as Wraight does here. It works brilliantly, not just as a re-introduction to these characters, but as an explanation for their attitudes.

This section also features probably one of the best paragraphs ever: “Many of [the Aspirants] had been taken from the Asiatic hive clusters. Haren disapproved of that. After Unity the Imperium was meant to have moved beyond racial and ethnic stereotyping, so the fact that the V Legion remained mired in the physiognomic traits of their backwater world was an irritant.” Sure it’s a nice indicator of Haren’s frustration and arrogance, but it also lampshades the idiocy of a whole Legion of Space Mongolians. (There are elements of other real-world cultures in the White Scars Legion. Torghun uses a tulwar, an Indian sword; Shiban wields a guan dao, a Japanese weapon.) When Black Library were selling ‘Scars’ as an episodic e-book series, I only had to buy ‘Prologue’ to feel confident it would be worth waiting for the hardback and reading it in one sitting. After this, you might assume Shiban and Torghun will be the main characters here. Unfortunately, I feel Torghun is never really explored or shown to the same degree as Shiban. I did find Torghun a really interesting character so I would have liked more exploration of his motives, but hey, whatever. It’s possible that could be an element of whatever comes next in this story arc.

After the prologue, we skip forward and follow the events of ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’. Ilya Ravallion is preparing to leave Chondax, concerned by the inability of the Astropaths to make contact with the rest of the Imperium. Meanwhile, Shiban is on Phemus-IV, and discovers the bodies of a White Scar patrol group mysteriously assassinated months ago – a great tie-in to ‘The Serpent Beneath’. And Torghun is creeping over to a Lodge meeting to get hella crunk. At this time, Yesugei is on Chogoris, musing over the Edict of Nikea. He comes to the conclusion that he must have guidance from the Khagan to unpick this knotty issue, and though he had been ordered to remain on the homeworld, he resolves to find his Primarch and appeal to him regarding the Edict which he believes to be a mistake. Unfortunately, due to suspicious Warp-storm activity, shit’s kinda rough and his journey will not be an easy one. It feels like by this point in the Heresy series, I should be rolling my eyes and looking at my watch whenever there are sequences where clueless loyalists scratch their heads at the strange Warp phenomena restricting their movements, but Chris does well in making this seem like a fresh new storyline.

Then, the ‘wild card’, unexpected for fans of ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’ but perhaps unsurprising given Chris’ authorial history: we cut to the Space Wolves. Their spirit darkened and bruised after Prospero, and worsened by learning of the betrayal at Isstvan, they’ve realised they have been manipulated and used. Gathering at the Alaxxes Nebula to repair their fleet, they ponder their next move. As Russ orders them to return to Terra, their plans are complicated by the arrival of the Alpha Legion. It’s really cool that we get – ostensibly – a sequel to ‘Prospero Burns’ as some bonus content to a book about a completely different Legion, and it gives Chris a chance to expand on the not-entirely-positive relationship between the V and VI Legions.

But that’s not all! Then we have a meeting on Terra between Dorn, Constantin Valdor and the Sigillite, where they discuss their possible options for squashing this rebellion, and Malcador drops this jewel: “You brothers – such a nest of rivalries. I warned him to make you sisters, that it would make things more civilised. He thought I was joking. I wasn’t.” As someone who has a shitload of aunts, I would say that perhaps Malcador is not completely correct there, but I love that line. And then (yes, there’s more), back with the White Scars fleet, we get a reintroduction to another character from ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’ – Jaghatai Khan. He’s grown closer to Ilya and she no longer feels like she’s going to have a heart attack when she sees him, though he’s still an extremely intimidating presence. He’s also given much more time on the page than he was in ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’; in fact, you could argue he is one of the main characters in this book – and I think that’s as it should be, with this being his Legion’s first novel.

Now, my intro covers a rather small portion of ‘Scars’, and I think you’ll agree that’s a lot of characters and a lot of plot strands for the first three chapters of a book. As I read it, I was flipping out – could Chris keep this many storylines in a manageable, tight story? As it turns out, he doesn’t need to; many of the storylines are dropped quickly. The Terran intrigue is just a nice bonus, a reminder that Chris probably writes Malcador better than anyone else. We don’t see anything like that again. And the Space Wolves strand is a major plot device, but doesn’t persist through the whole book, though it’s an opportunity to get some more Bjorn character development. As for Torghun, he does some pretty significant stuff, but in terms of page count he’s a secondary character we don’t spend much time with. No, ‘Scars’ really just carries on with the characters (and plot strands) of ‘Brotherhood of the Storm’, with a much greater presence from the Khagan. In fact, the Fifth Primarch is the driving force behind the book’s narrative, which is as it should be. Torn between his duty to the Imperium, and his independent nature, the Khan would rather find things out for himself than blindly carry out an order from his brother, whether that’s Dorn or Horus.

The Space Wolf/Alpha Legion confrontation is great, but a relatively brief account. Wraight’s void war was impressive, but I admit I enjoyed it more when Bjorn and his pack were fighting the Hydra face to face. And Bjorn’s angry interrogation of the dying Alpha Legionary, and his confusing answer… it’s so great. I honestly feel that by giving the Alpha Legion an almost non-speaking role, Chris has taken the first steps on the road I wish all the Heresy writers would travel: pulling it back to the remote and mysterious characterisation of ‘Legion’. As a bonus, Leman Russ has a fight against a Contemptor Dreadnought which ends so gruesomely, it actually made me nauseous. But the Space Wolf strand quickly draws to a close, with the VI forced back into the Alaxxes nebula and driven to seek aid from the White Scars – aid which Jaghatai denies them with a frostily polite message mentioning that they must go investigate the reported demise of Prospero. I don’t doubt this moment will be a point of contention when the Wolf and the Khan meet again – but it also sets the Wolves up brilliantly for the Alaxxes fight, something we can hopefully expect in novella form later this year.

With the second part of the book beginning, Yesugei joins the Shattered Legions in their fight, which is a good opportunity for him to discuss corruption and sorcery with the more tunnel-visioned Bion Henricos. (Yes, Bion Henricos. The shadow of ‘Little Horus’ continues to loom over the minds of other Horus Heresy writers, though Chris seems much less indebted to it than Graham.) There’s a telling scene where Yesugei horrifically tortures a captured Word Bearer, before being stopped by a Salamander – Yesugei’s apparent ruthlessness switching quickly to his capitulation and shame when the error of his judgement is pointed out, makes me like him (and the Salamander) even more. It also shows that even the most powerful of the White Scars are nowhere near as intractable as many Legion command elite. It says a lot about their Legion’s character.

Though Torghun and Shiban’s scenes here slow the pace a little too much – especially considering this Legion’s predilection for speed – the Khagan’s quest to find out what happened to his beloved brother Magnus more than makes up for any shortcomings elsewhere. It also leads to one of the most devastating scenes in the book: Jaghatai confronting the shade of his brother Magnus in the ruins of Tizca. Not content with defining one Primarch’s character, and redefining the character of another Primarch who had previously been rather undeveloped (we’ll get to that later), Chris actually writes yet another Primarch to a very good standard as well. There’s no dramatic change in Magnus’ attitudes from what’s previously been written about him, but his dialogue and his characteristics just seem more well-thought out and subtle than the rather one-dimensional wizard king in Graham McNeill’s book. As for their unexpected regard for each other, it’s written in a way that makes a lot of sense – it’s established fairly early on that some seem to think Jaghatai has the gift of psychic powers – Yesugei and Magnus among them. I really like the idea of Primarchs who you’d never think would get on ending up as best bros, so this is a great development. Not only that, but Chris’ Ahriman is excellent as well, much more in line with the John French books. I know I’ve banged on about being disappointed in ‘A Thousand Sons’ before, and most HH fans love that book so this probably won’t stand out as much for them. I have faith that ‘The Crimson King’ could be a fantastic book, so I’m not going to start clamouring for Chris Wraight to write all the Magnus stuff from now on… but it’s a great expansion to his character, one I hope McNeill takes a few cues from.

And speaking of writing Primarchs excellently… the brief flashback to Ullanor, just after the Triumph and Horus’ ascension to Warmaster, sees Fulgrim, Mortarion, Sanguinius and the Khan having a nice family get-together. Buried (and not-so-buried) resentments don’t take long to ruin the gathering. It’s a masterfully written scene, and makes me regret that Wraight didn’t have the opportunity to feature Primarch interaction more heavily in his books. I’m almost tempted to add another one to the list of ‘Chris might be the best at writing this Primarch’ characters: Sanguinius. Unfortunately, in a great deal of Heresy fiction, the Angel has come across as a little fey and – not stupid, but rather naïve, and perhaps lacking in charisma. More sullen than angelic. Here, Wraight shows him as (in Nick Cave’s words) a lovely creature, a conciliator amongst his passive-aggressive brothers with little in the way of guile or malice. This conversation is also a telling illustration of the Khan’s attitudes to the Imperium itself. He does not believe that Horus should have been elevated to Warmaster, not because he distrusts Horus or wishes the role for himself, but because he doesn’t think such a positon should exist. ‘Scars’ is littered with little moments like this showing the Khan’s “fuck the Feds” attitude; there’s a very telling flashback where Yesugei remembers the Khan back on Chogoris denouncing the very prospect of an Emperor able to conquer everything.

Abnett’s Russ and Guilliman, AD-B’s Lorgar, Graham’s Perturabo… The list is impressive, yet this late in the game, it feels like the redefinition of a Primarch is less and less likely. Somehow though, Chris managed it for the Khan, not just redefining his character, but his role in the Horus Heresy. Wraight began to show his skill in this arena in ‘Brotherhood Of The Storm’, and continued into ‘Scars’ (and ‘Daemonology’, for Mortarion). Something in me hopes he gets a crack at Alpharius next, as of all the eighteen Primarchs, the XX seems the most in need of a helpful push at the moment – yet if Wraight stays with the Khagan, I will be far from dissatisfied.

Jaghatai and the Magnus-shade’s conversation is one of the best moments of the book; it reads like an eloquent apology for the intensely stupid actions Magnus’ character has been funnelled into during the series. Yet it’s also a harsh reality check for the Khan, who’s been focusing so much on the horror which has befallen his closest brothers – Magnus and Horus – that he hasn’t quite allowed himself to see the wider context. A side must be chosen. Oh, man. What a downer this book is getting towards the end. It’s like the big homie Randall said, life is just a series of downer endings.

But could… wait, could Chris just… throw in a late-novel game-changer featuring a Primarch who’s been woefully underused so far? And perhaps write one of the most emotionally resonant Primarch confrontation we’ve had in the series so far? (OK, Angron and Lorgar v Guilliman in ‘Betrayer’ is pretty great too.) I’ve already gushed about this in other reviews, so the shock (and spoilers) should be low by now. But when I saw Mortarion show up in this book, it felt like Christmas had come early. I was like OH SHIT SON YOU AIN’T EVEN HAD TO DO THAT! BOOK WAS ALREADY A SOLID 9! Not only is this a great fight scene (unstoppable forces vs immovable object, Spiderman vs the Hulk) it’s a wonderful confrontation of the two brothers’ viewpoints. The Khan’s disdainful verbal excoriation of Mortarion’s self-aggrandisement is rather cutting, but I think if we look at how things played out, Mortarion had a better grasp of how things would play out on a wide scale. I strongly recommend reading ‘Daemonology’ right after you finish this book, and then reading the Death Lord’s scenes in ‘Vengeful Spirit’ – it makes a horrible kind of sense now.

I feel like I’ve compared a lot of Heresy books’ endings (favourably) with The Empire Strikes Back. With ‘Scars’, my feeling is more of ‘A New Hope’. The characters are beginning to realise the stakes, they have won a significant victory, but they know a long hard road is ahead of them. Their optimism is cautious, but it’s still there. I hate saying it, because I genuinely like the Scars so much as characters, but I can’t wait for the V Legion to go down the dark paths we know are waiting for them on this long Heresy road.

When I finished ‘Scars’ for the first time, I might have given it 9/10. I was annoyed that the Space Wolf/Alpha Legion strand was truncated so abruptly, and that all the Primarchs listed in the Dramatis Personae didn’t take a more central role. Knowing the overview of the book, and giving each plot strand the added attention it deserved, I found it to be as perfect a Heresy novel as we’ve ever had. Yes, there were a few moments where I was a little less engaged – Torghun and Shiban’s dance around the Lodges should have been shorter by a few scenes. But it’s packed with superb sequences which stand as highlights of the entire series.

I honestly can’t wait for the next ‘Scars’ novel – from my conversation with Chris Wraight at the Weekender, its publication before the end of 2015 doesn’t seem completely impossible at this point – but it’ll be bloody difficult for him to get better than this. 10/10

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

"Brotherhood Of The Storm" by Chris Wraight

Ahh, I guess I’m on a roll with the Chris Wraight titles. Let’s look at ‘Brotherhood Of The Storm’. I warn you guys right off the bat - this review is hella long.

I don't know why, but I never had much regard for this cover art. I just think there's something slightly off about it.

First released as a limited edition novella in 2012, normally it would have been mid-2014 before this saw wider release; however, Black Library luckily broke with that weird, restrictive rule and put ‘Brotherhood’ out in late 2013 so readers could digest it before ‘Scars’ came out. I’m really glad they did, since I really view these two books as one long, unbroken story. It would be very hard to read one without the other.

I wasn’t even close to caught up with the Heresy series when this was first released, but I’m sure that anticipation must have been high. While not one of the big-draw ‘marquee’ Legions/Chapters in 40K, the White Scars still have their loyal fans, and this was the first in-depth look we were getting of them in the Heresy universe. Furthermore, the Scars’ actions in the Heresy had been shrouded in mystery; it was known that they stood with the Imperial Fists and the Blood Angels at Terra, but there was little concept of what they did before that. Would Wraight provide a satisfactory explanation? Would he add something new to the Legion, or would the 30K Scars be just like the 40K Scars, except with their Primarch still around?

Surprise, motherfucker!! Wraight capably delivers on every level. He can’t fuck with the central tenets of the Legion (well, he could, that’s a Heresy writer’s right – but he doesn’t). The main characteristic of the Scars is that they’re virtuoso riders, both of bikes and jetbikes, and they love going fast. Rather than portraying them as inattentive speed-freaks, Chris shows their bike-fetish to be a natural extension of the constantly roaming tribes of Chogoris, and their cultural emphasis on glory, competition and exhilarating feats. I’ve always thought combat bikes, and to a lesser extent jetbikes, are one of the stupidest things in the 40K universe, which obviously is an arena crowded by over-the-top stupidity. But Chris wrote action scenes of a jetbike-vs-ork convoy engagement which totally floored me. It’s graceful, yet utterly visceral writing. He also expands this tactical doctrine into a split in the philosophy of the Legion. The shortness of their attention span, and their difficulty with ‘take and hold’ missions, provides a bit of a schism in doctrine between the Scars of isolationist Chogoris and those more… centre-facing. And of course, the Scars were always based heavily on the culture of ancient Mongolian tribal warriors, notably the army of Genghis Khan; Wraight stays true to this, yet also gives Chogoris its own, original culture. There are bits of Chinese and Japanese culture in there as well, which obviously worked for a giant weeb like myself. (Especially since one of the plots can be summed up as “Jaghatai-sempai noticed me!!” It’s just like my motherfucking Japanese animes.)

As we open the story, the White Scars have been fighting hard against the orks on Chondax for some time. The time: some years after the Triumph at Ullanor, when several combined Legions, with Horus and the Emperor at their head, broke the back of the expanding ork empire; the Scars have been working since then to finish the job. They’re led by Jaghatai Khan, or the Great Khan, who they tend to call Khagan. The Khagan doesn’t lead in the manner of Horus or Sanguinius. He is elusive, hard to pin down, decentralised, giving his soldiers a minimum of guidance and a great deal of autonomy. I guess in a way, he could be the closest Primarch to Alpharius in this willingness to let his sons resolve their own issues. Despite this distance from the rank and file of his Legion, it’s clear that the Primarch/Astartes bond is just as strong as most other Legions, certainly stronger (and healthier) than some. It ain’t all good, though. As we know – and the Scars seem not to know – the Crusade, and the galaxy, changed drastically in the years after Ullanor.

‘Brotherhood Of The Storm’ is a seven-chapter novella which, each chapter, jumps between one of three first-person narrators. Our first character is Shiban, khan of the titular Brotherhood of the Storm. Shiban’s story gives the novella most of its action sequences, and they’re excellently paced – but it’s also a character study, a vital look at the Legion’s organisation (for people who geek out over that sort of thing), and also their soul. Shiban is one of the most likeable late-series Loyalists; as the books fill with psychotic Iron Hands, dour Knights Errant and nice-but-dull Salamanders, it’s cool to have a ‘good guy’ who is having fun. Of course, part of Shiban’s character arc is the cessation of fun, but that’s – for now – in the distant future. Shiban accepts that the Khan is unknowable and inscrutable, but has faith that he will not steer the Legion wrong. This kind of outlook definitely sets the Scars up as a slam-dunk for a staunch Loyalist Legion. The frequent Traitor gripe of “THE EMPEROR DOESN’T TELL US ANYTHING ANYMORE!” seems like it’d be met by a blank stare and a shrug by the Scars. However, things aren’t as simple as they seem on that score…

Our hero is joined by a force led by Torghun, another khan, from the Brotherhood of the Moon. As they prepare to assault the final ork fortress on this world, we see the difference between the Terran-born, Luna Wolf-worshipping Torghun, and the true son of Chogoris, Shiban. Their combat doctrine is different and leads to conflict. The Scars make frequent uses of feints and hit-and-run attacks to draw the enemy out – striking then retreating. Torghun, who has been seconded to the Sixteenth, appreciates the unrelenting ‘spearhead’: the direct thrust which never stops. Their disagreement is uncomfortable simply because they are both likeable characters, and Shiban is aghast at the discord between them. It reminded me a bit of that first confrontation between Lucius and Tarvitz on Murder; I cared about both characters and wanted them to be friends, but I knew the conflict was going to pay off in some awful way, somewhere down the line. Luckily, unlike the Emperor’s Children, the squabbling White Scars are not too proud to compromise. Yet Shiban’s attempt at half-measures results in the Brotherhood of the Storm being pinned down and encircled, a poor situation for a White Scar. (Or as he himself says, “I could not imagine us ever distinguishing ourselves in warfare of that sort – under siege, fighting with our backs to the wall as the sky burned above us.” Damn, foreshadow much?) As Shiban, Torghun and the other Brotherhoods on Chondax encircle and assault the last ork stronghold, Shiban’s joy at the thrill of combat is powerful. Yet even fighting shoulder-to-shoulder with his beloved brothers doesn’t match the feeling he gets when Jaghatai himself joins the fight, and Shiban fights at his side – a lifelong ambition for the warrior. Conclusion: This whole story was nothing but great. I don’t really like reading about battles against orks, I don’t really like reading about battles involving bikes, but Wraight made me enjoy both. Fucking stellar.

Our second ‘viewpoint character’ is Ilya Ravallion, a human General in the Departmento Munitorum. While she’s got a military rank, Ilya’s task is to oversee the materiel used by the Crusade, not batallions of men or war-engines. Even though she’s climbed high, Ilya’s kind of a glorified pencil-pusher in the grand scheme of things. I don’t think it’s an overstatement to say that she’s one of my favourite human characters in the series – I think because I found her so relatable; after all, of all the characters in the Heresy, this is the one whose job is not a million miles from my own. I know some have raised the complaint that Chris is doing female characters no favours by putting a woman into a ‘passive’ or ‘custodial’ role, but I have to disagree with that. Firstly, I think Ilya shows great courage and intelligence in this book and ‘Scars’, even in the direst of situations. She demonstrates that the bureaucrats and clerks can influence events in a sometimes surprising way. The character would be compelling in the same way if it were male, but I like that Chris has shown the Abnett approach of “hey, the character doesn’t have to be a man, so why make them one?” I do agree it would be nice if more human military officers were portrayed this way, but that’s a charge we can’t lay solely at Chris’ door. Next, the fact that Ilya is perhaps the first female character in the series who’s not sexualised in some way is quite refreshing. She’s an aging, slightly awkward, unspectacular-looking person. Just more reasons I find her relatable.

To be honest, Ilya is really well written and that’s all I want from my Horus Heresy female characters. If someone wants to write a weird caricature of their ex-girlfriend into their 40K or 30K fiction, and make them a promiscuous, shallow idiot who inadvertently causes huge catastrophe by their stupidity, I’ll only wave my flag and say THIS IS MISOGYNISTIC BULLSHIT if I feel it’s poorly written. (Look, I’m not saying that’s actually happened, though some of Graham’s characters come a bit close to it in some ways.)

Enough about the whys and wherefores of Ilya’s gender. What’s her actual story? Well, Ilya has been sent to Ullanor to seek an audience with the Great Khan himself. There she meets the Stormseer Yesugei, who we might remember from the Nikea scene of ‘A Thousand Sons’ (yall can peep what I said about him right here). This is the first time we get Wraight writing for a Scar speaking Gothic, and he calls attention to the weirdness of Yesugei’s broken English right away, with Ilya noting it and wondering what explanation there could be for a super-intelligent super-human warrior having difficulty learning another language. While Graham’s Nikea scene is a little uncomfortable, reading like – say – a well-meaning but hugely stereotyped Native American character from an 80s action movie, Chris seems to recognise this is an odd state of affairs and makes an effort to explain it. So Yesugei muses later that the Chogorian Scars have always struggled with Gothic, that the Terran members of the Legion learn their brothers’ language in order to integrate with them rather than the other way around, that perhaps the linguistic difficulties are a symptom of the Scars’ penchant for isolation. There are times where the stilted syntax is a bit much; in all, I’d rather this was retconned completely out of existence and that the Scars all spoke ‘normally’; I mean, it could end up as a canon conflict, but the White Scar in ‘Descent Of Angels’ seems to have no linguistic issues, so where’s the canon conflict for that? (He was Terran, I guess.) However, I think Chris put forward a convincing argument for continuing Graham’s treatment of the Legion which goes beyond “LAWWWWL BUT THEY AZN THO ^_^ pc nazi faget”

There’s a fairly excellent resolution to Ilya’s story here, as she eventually meets Jaghatai, which prompts one of the better scenes showing how difficult it is for mortals to interact with Primarchs. Even as a dissection of the Legion’s relationship with the Munitorum, with the Imperium as a whole, it’s great – but then Horus arrives, and Ilya is privy to a deeply significant moment which will resound in the White Scars’ history forever. Conclusion: While Shiban’s storyline is the meat of ‘Brotherhood Of The Storm’, Ilya gives the book its soul, and some of the best human-centred moments in the whole series.

Our last ‘viewpoint’ storyteller is Yesugei himself, who gives us a flashback to his childhood on Chogoris, back when the Khan was still fighting against his enemy, the Palatine. Yesugei has gone up into the mountains to undergo the “test of heaven”, a tribal rite for those who show signs of psychic power. Those who experience the visions of heaven will live the life of a zadyin arga, a tribal shaman of a kind. There’s a poetry to him as he discusses the nature of fate, the universe, and his love for the planet that was his home. Yet also we learn some things which may not set him in the best stead in the Imperium; he describes Imperials as ‘them’ and makes it clear he sees the people of Chogoris as outside the Imperium. He also describes, with an odd dispassion, the ‘visions of heaven’ – avatars of what are clearly the four Chaos gods and the Emperor himself appear to him. Conclusion: Yesugei’s story is light on actual ‘events’ – it’s more philosophical, a meditation on the nature of Chogoris and how significant it still is to the Scars – but that doesn’t mean the writing dips in quality or the chapters become less interesting. It stands toe-to-toe with the other strands; to know the Scars, you must know their homeworld.

At first, I was put off by the jumping narrative viewpoints for this book. What is Wraight trying to do, be all George RR Martin and shit? I may have thought. I was worried that including three distinct story strands would dilute the impact of all of them and leave no room for any plot to breathe. I needn’t have worried – Wraight knocked it out of the park, plotting the novella tightly and economically, while introducing three incredibly rewarding characters. Perhaps it’s even more developed than that – all our narrators, and their stories, present a different aspect to the White Scars. Yesugei shows the Legion’s past. Shiban shows the Legion’s present. Ilya shows the Legion’s future.

I really like the fact that each character’s narrative ends with them glimpsing the Khan, and that’s what unifies these story threads. To each, he comes across as a restrained yet deeply intimidating presence; a being whose nature is indefinable, and whose powers are unmeasured. One thing seems clear. Whether it’s in the midst of combat in a colossal ork fortress, in conference on his flagship regarding the Legion’s contact with the Imperium, or in his tent on Chogoris during a time when he hasn’t yet even conquered the whole planet, the Khagan is in control, always. In Gothic, Yesugei isn’t all halting sentences. He also drops this very perceptive gem about the Fifth Primarch:

“He is not elusive, he is at the centre. Wherever he is, that is the centre. He will seem to have broken the circle, drifted to the edge, right until the end, and then you will see that the world has come to him, and he has been waiting for it all along.”

Line of the book? It could very well be.

One repeated aphorism of the Khagan is “Laugh when you are killing”. A phrase that Shiban, and many other V Legion warriors hold close to their hearts. At first reading, that could make them seem sadistic or filled with love for violence, but it really underlines that unlike so many other Legions, their nature is not melancholy. They are cheerful, quick to see the humour and joy in a situation, even in the most desperate and awful situations. It’s not the bleak humour of the Sons of Horus or the Night Lords, either. Chris’ work at establishing this is what makes their descent into rage and sadness in ‘Scars’ so devastating.

Call me a wanker if you like, but as I finished ‘Brotherhood Of The Storm’, as Shiban’s elegy for now-lost times of laughter and joy brings the book to a close with a rueful glance to the future, I actually started to well up a bit. I didn’t actually cry, but I had a strong emotional reaction to, well, a piece of art. And that’s what I’m gonna call it. There are Black Library books which are pure commerce, and books which are good but flirt heavily with fan service laziness. This is not like those books. This is next to ‘The Emperor’s Gift’ or ‘Ahriman: Sorcerer’ or ‘Ravenor Returned’. It’s a goddamn beautiful masterpiece. This is all that’s needed to cement Chris Wraight in the ‘great BL writers’ canon, but luckily, he’s dropped quite a few gems since this came out. If it wasn’t for ‘Scars’ being even better, I’d call it perfect… as it is… 9/10

"The Sigillite" by Chris Wraight

It’s time for me to review one of the best Horus Heresy audio dramas ever. This one’s just over 70 minutes, and it’s produced by Big Finish. It’s read by Tim Treloar, Ramon Tikaram and Toby Longworth.

Lots of cool stuff going on this artwork, but fuck that giant red circle.

We open in the Sigillite’s chambers in the Imperial Palace, where Khalid Hassan is awaiting with some dread his debrief about his calamitous last mission. That action is told in flashback – a tense but comparatively subtle raid against an undefined enemy in Gyptus, ending with an apparent failure to retrieve what the team was sent for. In between those flashbacks, Hassan marvels at the majesty of the Imperial Palace, at the ongoing work Dorn is doing to turn it into a fortress, and ultimately at the nature of Malcador himself. By turns kindly, unassuming, wise, sinister and utterly terrifying, Malcador’s portrayal here is probably the most compelling study of this character in the entire Heresy series. In Wraight’s words: “For all the man’s frailty, Hassan could sense the quiet power radiating from him, as deep and cold as a well-shaft.” There are discussions of the unfolding Heresy, and hints at the Webway War, but you won’t find much in the way of series-vital plot points here. Rather, it’s about building the background and showing us the growing feeling of desperation on Terra, and how the Sigillite is adapting his role to the new circumstances.

This is a one-shot, and it’s not entirely clear where exactly it sits in the series chronology, though a brief mention of the events of ‘The Outcast Dead’ provides some context for the story. Don’t try this if you’re one of the people who insist that if a book doesn’t end with the Traitor Legions a measurably closer distance to Terra than they were when the book began, then that book’s a failure. But if you’ve liked the Terra-set episodes of the story – like I have – and you’re fond of the behind-the-scenes intrigue aspect as much as the pitched battles between thousands of Space Marines – like I am – then ‘The Sigillite’ may be a winner for you. And the end-of-drama kicker, where it's revealed that the worthless cargo Hassan's squad retrieved may not be so worthless after all - well, I couldn't help but smile.

                                           

Here’s how the roles are assigned, as far as I can tell. I apologise if these are incorrect - I'm still really unsure why Black Library never provides specific casting credits for these dramas. Ramon Tikaram plays our hero, Khalid Hassan, and his squadmate Farouk. (For some reason, a lot of reviews out there refer to the main character as Hasani Sabyat; perhaps, like Ollanius Pius, this is a name he will take up later, but for now, he’s Khalid Hassan – I double checked the CD case and everything.) Toby Longworth reads the titular Sigillite and the narration is done by Tim Treloar. Yes, there are only three named characters and four speaking parts in the whole hour-plus drama. As usual, Ramon Tikaram is excellent; I’m not sure what accent he’s doing exactly, but it doesn’t at all get in the way of the character portrayal and he invests straightforward soldier Hassan with a real sense of wonder (and dread) at being so close to such a legendary figure. Toby Longworth is excellent as well. While I think Garro’s been my favourite role for him, his Sigillite is great; venerable, but full of quiet authority. Wraight’s script calls for Longworth to switch between moods with little warning, and he pulls all of the transitions off with grace. Tim Treloar, as the narrator, is good also. At times, though, he seems to stumble in phrasing and pronunciation. This is certainly a narration-heavy piece so that’s sometimes quite an obvious problem; as with so many Black Library audio drama narrators, he just doesn’t seem to know what everything he’s saying actually means. An issue we can all sympathise with, but the producers should be make the extra effort to correct these mistakes. He also unfortunately does the thing I find so annoying in nearly all Black Library narrators: he thinks that in a combat scene, it’s necessary to convey the intensity of combat by SPEAKING LOUDLY and WITH GROWING INTENSITY. I guess it’s unfair to penalise the drama for that, though, since it’s been a drawback to every Black Library audio work I’ve heard, with the possible exception of ‘Chosen Of Khorne’. Lastly, Treloar's voice is at least very distinctive from the other two actors - ideal for a narrator who will often have to interject amidst bits of dialogue.

The soundtrack is absolutely superb in this drama – the understated plinking of Malcador’s waiting room, the percussive pounding of the battle scenes, the middle-east sounding atmospherics of Hassan’s stealth ops. And it’s not just music that’s done well. The sound effects are great and varied, too. We’re nearly ten minutes in before we even get any explosions, and when there is crazy action and gunfire going on, the SFX tends to be at an appropriate volume so that you can still hear the narration easily. They know when to back off completely, too. A large amount of the dialogue has no sound effects strangling it; sometimes there’s not even any music playing. Perhaps it’s due to Wraight’s inventively written scene-setting, but there are opportunities for lots of different, non-combat audio tags in the drama, and Big Finish don’t drop the ball on any of it. What I’m basically saying is that Black Library should still be using these guys to do their audio dramas still, but ahh, I guess Heavy Entertainment ain’t so bad.

But you’ll probably already have made your mind up about whether you like or dislike BL’s audio presentation. The main draw here – apart from it being well established that Wraight is an excellent writer – will be the hope that this will answer some of the long-running questions about the mysterious Sigillite. Who is Malcador? What is Malcador? What motivates him? What help did he provide the Emperor before Unity and the Great Crusade? What is the mysterious Order of the Sigillites? Some of these answers are well-established in ‘old fluff’ but the Horus Heresy has shown a willingness to trample on that fluff if the authors can come up with something better. But, well – no. ‘The Sigillite’ doesn’t really answer definitively any of those questions, though we can certainly tell Wraight and Black Library know what people want to learn about Malcador. There are moments – like the mention of the future High Lords of Terra – which may imply that Malcador has a firm grasp on the future direction of the Imperium; they could also be taken as the author slipping in a sly wink to fans of 40K who know how things will go, and may be sometime Malcador can claim no credit for. If you go into this drama not quite sure where the Emperor has been for the whole Heresy, you’ll definitely know when this is over – but you should have been able to pick that fact up from several previous Heresy books. For me, the lack of big, important revelations was not a problem – see my explanation earlier about the appeal of this drama. But I know that more than a few people will be angry about that.

Enigmatic origins aside, a real highlight for me was Malcador’s recollection of the Primarchs as they once were, as well as his anger and guilt at the way many of them have betrayed him. This leads to maybe my favourite quote of the whole drama:

“Do you know, out of them all, if I could have saved just one, it would have been Lorgar. Even though he despises me, and even though I was… wounded by him, he was such a fragile soul. So subtle and ready to bruise. We might have handled him better. Did we make mistakes with some of them? Surely we did. Though I fear the time to correct them is now long past.”

The repressed fury, the regret, and also the tired acceptance in Longworth's voice as he reads this line is great to hear and very impressive. Not quite as emotionally wrenching, but another nice quote takes place as Hassan looks out on the growing fortifications of the Imperial palace. The Sigillite makes the wry observation:

“With each passing day it will get a little bit uglier, a little more worn. Just like us, eh?”

A great line, and again, really well played by Longworth.

Of all the audio dramas, this one screams out most obviously for a follow-up. Perhaps it’s a little unfair since so many of the audio dramas I like have already had obvious follow-ups: ‘Butchers Nails’, ‘Wolf Hunt’, ‘Grey Angel’, ‘Sword Of Truth’. But I’d absolutely love for this to get an explicit sequel. Sure, Wraight returned to the Sigillite in ‘Daemonology’ – and ‘Scars’, I think – but I’d love a novella or short story from Wraight exclusively focusing on this enigmatic figure. He obviously knows how to hint at the mysteries of Malacador without it just being a bunch of arch pouting. With ‘The Master of Mankind’ on indefinite ice, perhaps that would be a nice Terra-focused stopgap? Really, we don’t even need a Malcador story – a Hassan story would be awesome as well. Since Malcador’s networks obviously go beyond Knights Errant, Hassan might be a nice guide for that world. Then again, if forced to choose between Chris Wraight writing more Malcador or more White Scars, I shamefacedly admit I’d go with the V Legion.

Is it a flawless drama? No. There are moments in ‘The Sigillite’ that take me out of the drama a little bit, and break immersion. For Malcador to hold forth about how Horus will bring them to the “barbarity of despotism” seems hypocritical. Horus is certainly WORSE – but the barbarity of despotism under the Emperor is pretty harsh, Jack. It’s just easy to forget about that when you’re in the middle of a cool-ass museum. The fact he’s also currently laying the groundwork for the Inquisition, and the direction that organisation will take in future years, makes his claim of the moral high ground even tougher to swallow. And that strange little moment near the end I – perhaps wrongly – assume to be a discussion of the Bible? That’s going to be problematic for some listeners. Yet I’d say even at the moments I didn’t like, I respect Chris Wraight’s authorial choices. He writes both action and dialogue with excellent craftsmanship and aplomb; some of these conversations are just as tense as the fights. ‘The Sigillite’ is damn-near definitive in several ways: as a character study for the Sigillite, as a Heresy drama tackling the Silent War, as a portrait of Terra in decline, as an illustration of how Warhammer-themed audio dramas can be done with subtlety. In a word, it’s excellent. 9/10

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

Short Fiction Round-Up Volume 2: "Distant Echoes of Old Night" by Rob Sanders / "Lost Sons" by James Swallow

Since I quite enjoyed writing the reviews for ‘Child of Night’ and ‘Daemonology’, I decided to write about some other ‘exclusive’ short stories Black Library has published. Usually, these are only available digitally, but with my new Kindle, reading eBooks is going to be a lot more enjoyable than using that lame-ass Magicscroll extension. Let’s see what I picked out this time.

Short Fiction Roundup: Now with 50% less skulls

‘Distant Echoes Of Old Night’ by Rob Sanders: As you might know, I’m a big Death Guard cheerleader (yikes, that’s a horrifying image) and I’m always eager to read more about Mortarion’s sons. So I was pleased to read this story, originally published in the ‘Games Day Anthology 2012/2013’, and so far not available to the public except in that book or as a download from BL’s website.

In this story we follow Death Guard Chaplain Murnau as he leads a group of Destroyer units on the forest moon Algonquis, seeking the remnants of an Imperial Fists force whose ship has crashed here. An engaging setup, and an excellent opportunity to see the 14^th Legion in action. You could argue that in the first four books we saw the Death Guard fight quite a few times, but I always felt they were lost among the other Legions in that context. Here, it’s all Death Guard. There are nice moments here, especially regarding the 14^th’s attitude to physical hardship and the way they fetishise endurance. The problem is, Rob has to convincingly deepen the culture of a Legion which has remained fairly unexplored, as well as showing hints about the Death Guard’s dark future, and (let’s not forget) tell a story at the same time. He probably would have been better off picking one thing and sticking to it.

So, the Legion hasn’t fallen yet; in fact, chronologically, they are the furthest off from their fall in the Big Four. But Rob still really goes in with the foreshadowing. In fact the signposting of the 14^th Legion’s fall to Grandfather Nurgle is awkwardly obvious at points. The Death Guard are fighting on a noisome swamp-world which was once a lush forest? Well, we’ve seen a Nurgle-dedicated ‘plague moon’ before, and it feels like the Death Guard probably are quite capable of war on other terrains. It’s well-established that the Death Guard bombard worlds with chemical weapons before they invade them, so, sure, fine. But it really feels like Rob picked a forest-heavy setting so he could trot out every well-established cliché about Nurgle. What about a desert? Or an urban environment? The setting choices here give me a lot of ‘False Gods’ and ‘Galaxy In Flames’ flashbacks and to be frank, those aren’t flashbacks I really want.

This story does, at least, succeed in showing an appropriate role for a Chaplain in a Traitor Legion that’s not the Word Bearers: motivating the troops and chewing up the scenery. Murnau is engagingly mental, but at times just seems like a silhouette with big devil horns, not exactly a fully fleshed-out character. He is also straight up preaching the gospel of Nurgle here, with his talk of “seeds of doubt [blooming] into gardens of darkness and despair” and his obvious enjoyment of the decay he witnesses in Algonquis’ ruined woods. I guess this could be a holdover from the culture of Barbarus and its harsh environment, but if that’s the case, I think it could have been explored much more interestingly. As for the rest of the Death Guard… fuck em. While the physical descriptions of the Destroyers were compelling writing, their actual personalities made little impact, and when they all start dying my reaction was generally “Wait, who was… was he the one with the… let me go back and check” rather than “Oh no, I hoped that guy would stick around for the sequel”. The narrative also starts in media res and ends a little abruptly. This detail, along with a few details around the Imperial actions here, makes me think that this was meant to be the beginning of a much longer Death Guard story or even novella (including the actual crash of the Fists vessel and more exploration of the Fists as characters) but then Rob went ‘ahh fuck it’ or Black Library said ‘nah bro’. Of course, this is all speculation and most likely total horseshit.

For a while ‘Distant Echoes’ was the best story available about post-Isstvan Death Guard action. Then those Forge World books came out and did a much better job of portraying the beginning of this Legion’s slide into corruption and madness. I’m not saying they’re superior in every way. ‘Distant Echoes’ is a story, not a scholarly essay about a military action: it’s arguably much more visceral than the Forge World material. Unfortunately, it suffers in comparison to ‘Scars’ and the newly published ‘Daemonology’: I feel Chris Wraight’s study of Mortarion’s prejudices and his instabilities is a much more telling document of the Death Guard’s character than this story. There are also moments where Rob Sanders’ writing slips into space-fantasy cliché: a ‘Battle For The Abyss’-style insistence on Murnau always “hissing” or “glaring” at his comrades makes him even more cartoonish. I’ll give this one solid point though: I really liked the Destroyer stuff here; while this is ostensibly a Death Guard story, it’s more convincing to call this a Destroyer story. I did also quite enjoy the downbeat nature of the ending. I had some feelings of ‘well, why the fuck did any of this matter then?’ but ultimately it was an appropriate finish for the story’s tone.

It’s funny, ‘The Serpent Beneath’ was such an efficiently-written, engaging bit of work which was brilliant at avoiding clichés (or rather, it used clichés from a genre other than space-fantasy/40K fiction) and I’ve found every other story by Rob to be so lacking in every way by comparison. This is probably one of his better efforts, but overall, it’s still a disappointment for a lot of reasons. 6/10

‘Lost Sons’ by James Swallow: Not to be confused with ‘Forgotten Sons’, this was a short story which followed on the heels of the controversial Blood Angels Horus Heresy novel ‘Fear to Tread’. It was published in the Black Library Weekender 2012 collection, and became available as an eBook in 2013.

Just because Jim is most associated with the Garro dramas in the Horus Heresy series, doesn’t mean that Nathaniel is the only Knight Errant he’ll focus on. Here, we get a Rubio story! Well, still more of a Blood Angels story, but Rubio is in it. Our main character is the IX Legionary Warden Arkad, who is frustrated with his duties; the stewardship of Baal is a wearisome duty for someone who would rather be out in the cosmos winning glory with his Legion. But it’s more than boredom Arkad has to contend with. He and nineteen of his brothers have watched over the Blood Angels’ homeworld for the past five years, since Sanguinius departed for the Signus Cluster. Three years ago, word reached them of Horus’ rebellion. No word has yet reached them from Sanguinius or any of their brothers, cut off from them by the Ruinstorm. They know the spirit of their orders was false, but they don’t want to disobey the last command from their Primarch. So they wait, slowly going mad with frustration. Until finally, a starship approaches, and a warrior with grey, unadorned armour lands on Baal, claiming to bring orders from the Regent of Terra. The Knight Errant, Librarian Tylos Rubio, carries a black scroll, the sign of the disbanding of a Legion (something which “twice before [has been] delivered to the homeworld of a Legiones Astartes” – damn!). Malcador’s reasoning for this is brutal, but sound. Yet there’s no way these proud Blood Angels will accept being sidelined again – will their continuing loyalty to their Primarch drive them to take up arms against a loyal agent of the Imperium?

I’ve kind of spoiled 95% of the story there, so why stop? ‘Lost Sons’ ends its tense standoff with word from Raldoron reaching Baal: Sanguinius is alive, and the Legion is battered but intact. The Blood Angels rejoice, and send Rubio on his way with no bloodshed.

The format of ‘Lost Sons’ – monologues committed to tape by Arkad as his frustration grows – really seems suited to an audio drama; I’d love to hear what Ramon Tikaram could do with this as a script. Adding to its ‘documentary’ feeling, we also get the text of the fateful order from Horus which sent Sanguinius to the Signus cluster. But don’t let me imply it’s bad as a written short story, because I really think it’s one of the best in the series. Jim really does well at capturing the anguish and annoyance of Arkad and his brothers at their situation, but also the nobility and humanity of the IX. There are a few sly nods towards the future of the Legion, too: It’s shown that Baal’s guardians have had visions of the horrific mauling of their Legion and Primarch by Ka’bandha and his daemonic horde – the Blood Angels’ psychic bond to their Primarch, especially in his darkest moments, will ultimately be their doom, so it’s kind of chilling to have that signposted here. The Death Company foreshadowing is a little heavy-handed, but it’s also really effective (you can almost hear the dramatic music swell as the black-armoured Blood Angels face down Rubio). This also has a small teaser for ‘Garro: Shield of Lies’ which I didn’t catch on my first reading. Overall, proof that Jim Swallow has a good grasp on the wider context of the Heresy series and isn’t just blindly churning stuff out. So what about Jim’s ‘other’ flagship storyline, the Knights Errant? As a character, Rubio continues to not really grab my imagination so much as Garro or Varren do – the reason I like him in the audios is that I dig his whispery emo performances. Yet he’s nicely built upon here; there’s a steel to him we sometimes don’t see when Garro is overshadowing him. I have faith he will continue to become an interesting character, if given the space to spread his wings.

At the risk of repeating myself I’m feeling more and more that short stories are the best use of Jim’s talents – though his audio work is great, ‘All That Remains’, ‘Gunsight’ and ‘Lost Sons’ are some of the very best Heresy material of the last few years. It’s a bit of a shame he may not do another Heresy novel but as long as he’s doing short stories I can’t complain. Here’s hoping that Swallow gives Rubio some more shine in the next Knight Errant story – though I’d actually prefer if Varren got a ‘solo’ mission (he’s the only ‘main’ Knight who hasn’t got any short story love). And if he cedes the Blood Angels Heresy stuff to Andy Smillie, well, that’ll probably mean more love for the Garro storyline, so it’s all good.

‘Lost Sons’ takes a little vignette which on the surface seems to be of little import, and masterfully turns it into a meditation on the Blood Angels as good as any published in the Heresy series. I know Swallow gets a fair bit of hate from Blood Angels fans, not least for ‘Fear to Tread’, but haters could do worse than giving this story a chance – I think it’s a very distinctive offering, higher-quality writing than ‘Fear to Tread’ which I did enjoy but which was quite straightforward. Here, Jim has addressed my main issue with ‘Fear to Tread’: that the Blood Angels’ personality often didn’t come through. This is different; this is IX Legion to the very core. 9/10

Boo-hoo, my Primarch died, waaah waaaah

So, the Blood Angels and the Death Guard. Two Legions which many would argue haven’t got their due in the Horus Heresy series. Things will probably continue to be pretty bleak with the Death Guard, as rumour has it there’ll be no XIV Legion novel in 2015. As a staunch Mortarion fan I’ll keep holding out (with an obligatory air of grim pessimism) for a Chris Wraight-penned Death Guard book but if that does happen, it won’t be for a while. How about the sons of Sanguinius? Many fans of those David Boreanaz-ass motherfuckers are rejoicing at the news that Andy Smillie seems to be taking a strong hand in the Imperium Secundus arc, and of course, ‘Dreadwing’ will likely feature an Abnett-written Sanguinius heavily. Something I’m definitely looking forward to, as Dan has always brought something new to Primarchs he depicts, and Andy has written some pretty great Blood Angels/Flesh Tearers stuff for 40K. Yet I never thought Jim Swallow was a bad fit for the Blood Angels (well, I’ve given both of his BA HH offerings 9/10). I’ll bow to popular opinion that perhaps he disrespects the fluff but I’ve always considered the quality of his writing to be sound. It’s just a shame the Blood Angels have been pretty much absent from most of the HH series – but perhaps that’s because they didn’t have much to do yet. As we move into the second stage of Imperium Secundus, this may very well change…

"Mechanicum" by Graham McNeill

It’s weird to think that this book is six years old already, appearing a year after prequel ‘The Kaban Project’ showed up in a Games Day chapbook. I re-read that story as a palate-cleanser before leaping into ‘Mechanicum’, and I’m still not really sold on it… but my memory of ‘Mechanicum’ is mostly positive, perhaps even "the point at which Graham got good". Let’s see how my second read-through of this book (first read-through in a few years), leaves me feeling.

"Hah! Now I'll never lose my assault cannon again... Oh, fuck. I've only gone and glued my hand to my chest!"

The Mechanicum, then. A very different organisation to the Adeptus Mechanicus of ‘modern’ times. Early on in the book, it's described as “competitive, uncooperative, suspicious and insular”. It’s a bit of a mystery, and as you might have gathered from the title, this book features the organisation heavily. So how does it do at presenting this force (in some ways as significant in the Heresy as the Legiones Astartes)? Wellllllll…

I’d forgotten that the ostensible main character is a woman, Dalia Cythera. Considering how female characters have tended to fare in Graham’s HH novels, this might be a bad sign. Right off the bat, we learn that she’s a teenage prodigy with a photographic memory. Awful visions of a Graham-penned Lisbeth Salander occurred me, but that’s not something that happens here luckily (though she does have the Repressed Psyker trait, long before it became a ridiculously common plot device in HH). However, we do start with a bit of a howler: Mistress Zeth, our heroine’s apparent benefactor, is based in a forge complex built on a lake of magma. I mean, even in the frequently nonsensical universe of 40K, this seems like a stupid thing to do. Graham can try to cover that one with pseudo-science but amongst all the robots built using human corpses and spaceships that look like city-sized cathedrals, this really stands out as a bad idea. I’m sure it won’t be used as a convenient plot device in the shocking finale.

Simultaneous to the introduction of Dalia, a group of three patrolling Knight Paladins encounter the Kaban Machine as it attacks a facility they are defending. This section reminds me that Graham is great at writing mechanised combat sequences and also gives us some background: political and ideological tensions have been growing on Mars, but not to the point that armed conflict between two elements of the Mechanicum isn’t a huge shock to these Knights. In the aftermath of the Kaban Machine conflict, we see a council of Titan Legio commanders assemble in the hopes of averting a disaster. This is another great scene that gives us further insight into the culture of the rival Titan factions, particularly the arrogant, sinister Legio Mortis. I know I often complain when a HH character is unambiguously villainous from the beginning, sapping their betrayal of any dramatic weight, but goddamn, Graham has made a satisfyingly evil antagonist here.

With that, Graham’s set up the two narratives he’s going to flick between for the rest of the book. The growing hostility between the Martian factions, and Dalia’s quest to DO A THING with the help of her plucky team of misfits. Dalia’s colleagues are nowhere near as engaging as I’d remembered, and they’re all fairly shallow and archetypal. For example, Zouche is an example of the fantasy Dwarf, going beyond his diminutive height; bellicose, bluff, tactless. I chose him as an example because he’s the only one whose backstory and motivations are interesting (actually, it provides a really useful insight to pre-Unity Terra). The rest of them are just pretty boring. Dalia herself quickly becomes a bit of a damsel. For example, when she’s motivated by empathy to save a psyker caught in an experiment gone wrong, she just makes the situation worse. Her intent is admirable but her actions are truly fucking stupid and all the screaming and crying just makes me think of that dreadful character in ‘Honour to the Dead’. That dumb incident, though, does set the narrative lurching forward. Given a terrifying glimpse of forbidden knowledge, Dalia now develops her own agenda.

Scrapcode plays an important part in ‘Mechanicum’, though the way it shows Kelbor-Hal’s corruption through AN EVUL CHAOS COMPUTAR VIRAS is pretty dumb. But the spread of devastation across Mars caused by the code is nicely done. There’s a great, tense scene showing a Titan confrontation with the first combat use of the corrupted scrapcode. Abnett did write this better in ‘Know No Fear’ – but still, the High Noon-style standoff between Legio Tempestus and Legio Mortis is a great moment.

I’ve used the ‘d’ word earlier in the review. Let me just take an overly long detour to elaborate on this ‘damsel’ thing. Like many of Graham’s female characters, Dalia just wants a big strong man to hold her and tell her it’s all OK. Am I exaggerating? A little bit, but not much. On reading Dalia’s sections of the book, my main feeling was “I really don’t remember it being this bad”. (Then again, I also remember the techno-friends’ dragonquest road trip being most of the book, while it actually doesn’t even start until over halfway through, so my memory is clearly unreliable.) She’s mostly capable and useful in a support capacity… but when there IS a combat situation, Dalia loses her shit. I’m torn on whether to condemn this or not. On the one hand, a standard human non-combatant without any kind of combat training would probably be utterly terrified if huge evil robots were trying to kill them. So maybe I should applaud Graham for realistic character actions. But from another perspective, this focuses so much on a female character’s weeping hysterics that it comes close to being a defining trait. 

I’m not saying a conscious decision has been made to show that women are weaker or more cowardly than men… but that’s the message I get, especially when her male companions’ response (also fear) is barely focused on. Compare to, say, Abnett in the Gaunt’s Ghosts series, where he is excellent at showing the bowel-destroying fear troopers both male and female encounter in combat: the portrayal is a lot more subtle and even-handed and, to my recollection, never falls back to simplistic pantomime overreactions. Yeah, yeah, not every writer can be Dan, and not every reader gives a fuck about this aspect of 40K; in fact from what I can tell, a lot of Black Library fans are deeply resentful of any ‘agenda’ they suspect of being pushed regarding gender equality in the grim darkness on the future. But this goes beyond my flag-waving political correctness, it’s just lazy character writing. I think Graham’s come a long way with this stuff for sure, but that doesn’t make this, ‘Fulgrim’ or ‘False Gods’ any less tough to read. I absolutely do give him credit for Adept Zeth though: she illustrates that Graham makes no distinction between the men and women of the Mechanicum. It's a shame, then, that she's barely developed as a character, only having time for a few interesting hints of something more to her than there first appears before her premature end.

That’s just a little lecture about the evils of gender role stereotyping comin’ to you from a guy who listens mostly to misogynistic rap music and is scared to even talk to women. Fuck this blog, right?

In the last part of the novel, we see the long-promised civil war finally erupt on Mars. The rise of Kelbor-Hal’s ‘Dark Mechanicum’, while lacking any subtlety, gives us some great scenes. The repercussions are felt even on Terra, where Malcador and Dorn worry about Mars even as they resolve to first squash Horus at Isstvan V. (Dorn and the Sigillite’s portrayal as close confidants here is certainly at odds with what’s come since – but that’s something which understandably happens a fair bit in these early books.) I loved that brief mention of Sor Talgron's creepy machinations; it feels like ‘The Purge’ was in the pipeline for years, perhaps ADB’s Word Bearer domination delayed it a bit?

After a spectacular Titan battle, the book ends, quite suddenly. My feeling is that Dalia’s fate is a setup for some 40K novel or event (possibly even Graham’s ‘Mars’ series, which I’ve not started yet) since it certainly doesn’t look like it’ll have any future relevance for the Horus Heresy. When thinking back on that section of the book, then, it’s hard to restrain the feeling of “who gives a fuck?” Like ‘Nemesis’, that’d be fine if the story was original or interesting to act as a ‘standalone’, but to be brutally honest, I just don’t think it’s strong enough. Meanwhile, the Civil War thread spends most of its time building agendas and characters embroiled in this power struggle, only to ultimately murder most of them in a riot of Forge-destroying violence. Graham has a tendency to do this with his characters; see the III Legion officers in ‘Angel Exterminatus’. I applaud him for killing almost indiscriminately – this is WAR, after all – but couldn’t he leave some room for series-spanning character arcs? With the Loyalist forces near-annihilated, I don’t know this ‘war’ will continue, but keep in mind this was only a snapshot of the conflict focusing on a ‘small’ but significant part of Mars. Ultimately, we leave ‘Mechanicum’ with a fairly limited context for how the planet-wide struggle is going.

Through this book, Graham’s dialogue is sometimes a little shaky. For someone who’s keen on characters making some big, portentous speeches, there are a few too many “fair enough”s and “I suppose”s here; the casual nature of it seems forced, and context-inappropriate. But that’s a minor issue. The structure of ‘Mechanicum’ is not dissimilar to ‘Deliverance Lost’, in that full-blown action only occurs near the end of the book. Possibly encouraged by ‘Legion’, this book skirts a cautious acceptance that BL readers don’t need a battle every fifty pages to maintain their interest.

There is dumbness galore here, not on ‘Battle For The Abyss’ levels, but sometimes close. Kelbor-Hal’s rather literal manifestation of ‘corrupted data’ calls for Michael Biehn to blast him with a shotgun and rasp “needs a reboot” or “reformat THIS, sucker!” or similar. Something about Graham’s books, especially during this era, screams “80s action movie”. Often really dumb and fun to read, but sometimes you find yourself thinking “That’s some fucking stupid shit.” The ancient Adept our heroes meet on their quest for the Dragon of Mars is dripping with ‘Writing for Nutsos 101’ clichés to the extent that I’m surprised he doesn’t shriek “Mad! They called me mad! Blind fools!” Mind you, sometimes the craziness is a boon. For example, the bizarre story of how the Dragon of Mars was imprisoned by the Emperor and how it’s linked to the origins of the Imperium… it’s so bonkers I’ve actually got to love it. Oh, apparently, most readers more au fait with the current 40K fluff than me concluded from hints in the book that the Dragon was actually a C’Tan. I don’t really know what that means or give that much of a fuck, I just thought I’d mention it.

As usual for a Graham book early in the Heresy series, criticism can be made of the lack of character ambiguity. Kelbor-Hal and his cronies are never less than loathsome; Adept Zeth, while occasionally heartless, is pure as snow when it comes to loyalty to the Imperium. Consider Deltrian, the Adept in the Night Lords series by ADB – that was a character whose portrayal showed clearly the Mechanicum was about as subject to black and white notions of “good” and “evil” as the shadowy upper echelons of the Imperium were. To show either side as cackling monsters or stern-faced saints seems to cheapen the schism a bit.

You might be able to tell how this is going from all this complaining. Sadly, re-reading ‘Mechanicum’ was less enjoyable than I had hoped. Perhaps the first time I read it I was relieved at the slight uptick in quality compared to ‘Fulgrim’ and ‘False Gods’ – after all, this time Graham wasn’t shitting all over characters Dan had written brilliantly. Yet at a second glance, his characterisation and dialogue hadn’t got any less shallow. The book also takes a great deal longer to get started than I remember; while I do like the intrigue of the Martian power moves, I don’t think Dalia and co. turn out to be worth the time spent on them. Only Zouche is interesting and the weird blink-and-you’ll-miss-it hint that he might have a deeper, more sinister agenda makes me hope we’ll see him again.

And speaking of that...

I’m still very interested in the Mechanicum storyline in HH and it’s a real shame it’s been dormant this long. Like most early HH Graham books, I can’t help but wish Graham had put the good bits (notably the Titan and Knight combat) in a novella and someone else had tackled the bits which called for more subtlety, like the actual culture of the Martian priests, or the behind-the-curtain political manoeuvres of Horus’ emissaries, or the motivations of Kelbor-Hal for revolt (beyond a couple sloppy pages which are the equivalent of some asshole saying "WE'LL GIVE YOU GOLD!"). I’m ‘bout to throw out some dream roster shit. David Annandale would have been great to write about the Dragon of Mars stuff, John French could have been excellent for Mechanicum Machiavellian plotting, Chris Wraight could have shown the actual day-to-day logistics of Mars’ government and how it interacts with the Munitorum, Aaron could have shown the claustrophobic desperation of the Imperial Fists’ scramble to secure supplies… OK, the involvement of all of those authors with the Heresy series was some way off. But I’d also nominate Matthew Farrer, with his excellent ability to write about the 40K Mechanicus (or the Heresy Mechanicum, as ‘Vorax’ showed), as a person who could have made this book the visceral, disturbing novel it should have been. Of course, Dan would be my first choice for rewriting any of the first 10 HH books, but Dan was cooking up some marvellous shit about Prospero during this time, I think… I realise I seem to trash McNeill quite a bit on this blog, but with his “PurpleHeresy’s Most Improved” medal for ‘Angel Exterminatus’ and ‘Vengeful Spirit’, Graham himself would be a nice choice for a sequel.

Anyway, all this wishlisting is a waste of time, since Rob Sanders is apparently in line to come in with the sequel for this in novella form sometime next year. Here’s hoping that he will at least be able to match the original.

Well, I went in with a positive attitude, no one can deny that... but this falls short of the greatness it deserves – like too many of the early Heresy books. Y’all haters who shit on ‘Deliverance Lost’ and ‘Angel Exterminatus’ might need to re-read the late-2000s novels and check whether it really was all better back in the day. 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.