"Corax: Soulforge" by Gav Thorpe

Gav introduced the Raven Guard to the mainline Heresy series with his novel ‘Deliverance Lost’. That book was divisive; perhaps realising that demand for a sequel might not be universal, Black Library elected to make Gav’s follow-up a limited edition novella, released in 2013, then given a non-limited reprint this year.

With this and 'Tallarn: Executioner', for a while there it seemed like the Heresy novellas might fall under a dumb new naming system which over-abused colons (pause). I was looking forward to 'Fulgrim: Judgement Day' and 'Angron: 2 Swole 2 Furious' but then the colon-free 'Ravenlord' ruined everything.

It was kind of predictable that ‘Corax: Soulforge’ would be ill-received. Unlike with Nick Kyme’s ‘Scorched Earth’ (and Gav’s ‘Deliverance Lost’, for that matter), I actually kind of agree with the poor reception ‘Soulforge’ got. I’m a big fan of Gav’s full length Raven Guard novel (some would say an apologist) and when that book ended, I was eager to see what Corax and the proud remnants of his Legion got up to next. As it turns out, the answer is… not fuckin’ much.

After the fall of the Perfect Fortress on Narsis at the end of ‘Deliverance Lost’, Corax was resolved to tackle the Word Bearers at Khalgorst. It’s clear that some time has passed since then; some of the Raven Guard make brief mention of what’s happened in the intervening time, but it’s not really gone into in detail. Seems Gav isn’t willing to pander to the fans like me who get a weirdly intense joy from cataloguing exactly where stories fit in the ‘timeline’ – and that’s fair enough. Hitting a Word Bearers vessel, Corax and his troops capture the Navigator, who hates the Seventeenth Legion as much as the Raven Guard do. She advises them of a rebel Forge World the Word Bearers are ‘grooming’ for a hostile takeover. With some of his forces diverted to fight Emperor’s Children (a fight which isn’t shown here), Corax and a minor infiltration force must appeal to the Mechanicum forces on Constanix – forces whose allegiance is unknown – and hope to deny the sons of Lorgar their prize.

‘Soulforge’ starts enjoyably; the Raven Guard boarding action is a gripping, nasty sequence with some visceral combat writing. It’s also interesting to see Agapito continuing to struggle with the limitless anger that’s dogged him since Isstvan. He’s still consumed by his hate for the traitors, and it’s starting to make him reckless – sometimes he seems to revel in the fact that the Raven Guard who weren’t at Isstvan can never truly bond with him again. Meanwhile, as Branne grows apart from his comrade, he becomes more comfortable with his role as leader of the Raptors. Speaking of the Raptors, Navar Hef and the ‘mutant’ Raven Guard initiates are still on combat duty, and their presence makes some Raven Guard uncomfortable – I’m really interested to see how this subplot plays out, especially towards the Heresy’s conclusion. The glimpse of the corruption and change wrought on the Word Bearers’ mortal crew is also nicely handled.

Following its strong opening, however, it’s a slow downward spiral for ‘Soulforge’. That’s not apparent right away: while Corax’s stealth insertion to Atlas (a floating forge-city on Constanix) isn’t too interesting, his uneasy confrontation with several machine-priests of uncertain loyalty to the Imperium is a tense and engaging scene. We see the worth of Corax as an ambassador, both in his ability to be diplomatic and also his capacity to inspire sheer terror. We also get some nice glimpses into Corax’s mind – his musings on his past and present are telling, though they aren’t really anything new for someone who’s read ‘Deliverance Lost’. The battle to retake Atlas also begins promisingly, as Agapito and Corax power through brisk but slightly bland fight sequences. For those who complained that ‘Deliverance Lost’ held too few moments of Raven Guard FIGHTAN, this is your chance to see how the sons of Corax fight… though this ‘attack, feign retreat, then attack again’ style has certainly been written about better elsewhere. Even the ‘stealth Titan’ moment (yes, you heard me) is endearingly silly, but it marks the point at which the account starts really going downhill.

One thing I quite enjoyed about ‘Deliverance Lost’ was the lack of combat. That tense Alpha Legion confrontation and the Perfect Fortress battle are really the only fights in that book, the focus instead being on the effects of the Heresy on the Legion’s state of mind and the subterfuge of the Alpha Legion. ‘Corax: Soulforge’ actually has a similar format in that the real action doesn’t start until the end. However, due to poor pacing, ‘the end’ is actually half the book. I’m not just being facetious, the last fifty pages or so drag so horrendously that it feels like the book is constantly just grinding to a close. I damn near fell asleep reading these combat scenes. They are just a series of mostly unnamed Raven Guard easily defeating a bunch of lame skitarii and other Mechanicum goons, with the slightly tougher Word Bearers coming in at the end. And then you get a couple ‘final bosses’. It’s kind of videogamey, a bit like those first two Dark Angels books – or, for that matter, ‘Promethean Sun’. There were several occasions where I got to the end of a page, turned it, then realised nothing I read had made any impression and I had to read it all again. I’d rub my eyes, get up, walk around the room, wonder to myself “Am I too tired to do this now?” and “What am I going to write about this book?” and frequently “What the fuck am I doing with my life?” - but then I’d read a few pages of, say ‘A Dance With Dragons’ or ‘Harlot’s Ghost’ and nope, it wasn’t that I was too tired – it was that when I was reading ‘Soulforge’, I was reading boring writing.

If the focus is going to be on (shitty) battle scenes, I kind of wish Gav had pulled his pretty good Raven Guard ensemble cast into it and given each one a little bit of development. Instead, we get ‘Tom Clancy: Rainbow Raven’ (don’t do fan art of that, you sickos). Gav gives us dry, boring fights, and to Legion culture he only adds an ill-executed attempt to give the sons of Corax a ‘special forces’ makeover. (Corax is wearing black camo on his face! BUT… FUCKIN’… HE CAN TURN HIMSELF INVISIBLE! FURTHERMORE, HE IS FIGHTING MECHANICUM DUDES WHO CAN PROBABLY SEE IN THE DARK! WHY WOULD HE BOTHER?!?)

As a Corax book, I’d regretfully call this a failure since I don’t believe it expands on the Primarch usefully or convincingly. But as a Raven Guard book… I’d also call it a failure, since it does very little to deepen the character of the Legion or add new blood to its shrinking Heresy-era cast. This does see the introduction of the Legionary Soukhounou, though he does very little apart from remind us that Terran Raven Guard are still a thing, and will probably form the basis of a Successor Chapter when the Heresy series finishes. Navar Hef’s barely present and the ‘affliction’ of the Raptors is hardly mentioned. Valerius doesn’t factor into the story, Branne has almost nothing to do here, and Noriz, the Imperial Fist who was helping Corax in ‘Deliverance Lost’, is mysteriously absent. The tech-priests are pretty unmemorable characters (all I can remember is that one speaks… very slowly… with laboured pauses… and ellipses… signifying his heavy breathing… Basically, he’s an augmented version of Stevie from ‘Malcolm in the Middle’). Worse, as Branne, Hef and Valerius fight a completely different war in a separate system, the primary cast essentially shrinks to Corax and Agapito as soon as the first chapter ends. Agapito’s nu-metal angst gets tiresome quickly, and Corax… well, I still think he was fun to read in ‘Deliverance Lost’, but here, he just switches between either moping or easily murdering hundreds of dudes, and (on one plot-dictated occasion) kind of losing in a fight for a little bit before the camera zooms in on his eyes and he snarls “B-Baka…”

So, this was a Limited Edition novella – BL have always tried to be a little innovative with the presentation of these things (maybe not £30 innovative, but still). With its smooth black-on-black cover, the Limited Edition of ‘Soulforge’ looks amazing – really amazing. Unfortunately, the cover is, like, matt black or something. If you like to take off the dust jackets to read them, like I do, your novella’s cover will be irreparably stained with fingerprints within seconds. Even if you wipe it down, it’ll never be the same. It also shows up evidence of either tiny scuffs or a sprinkling of dust like a motherfucker. Maybe I just have inhumanly sweaty fingers, but I don’t think I’m entirely to blame. All of the LE novellas are a bit like this, but ‘Soulforge’ is without doubt the worst-looking I own at this point. I’d like less of this, and more covers like ‘Scorched Earth’ or ‘Tallarn: Executioner’ if possible, please. It does look really cool at first, though. I also applaud the innovation they showed in printing a Quick Read-length story on the inside of the dust jacket (‘The Shadowmasters’, now available as an MP3). That’s that stealth shit. It makes up for the LE edition’s colour insert being mostly useless, though that John Blanche Corax concept sketch is ILL. In conclusion – even collectors shouldn’t feel bad if they missed the first printing of ‘Soulforge’; the ‘vanilla’ Black Library unlimited novella is far better value for money.

There are scenes of worth to be found in ‘Soulforge’ beyond its strong opening pages. The lengthy scene where Corax briefs Agapito for the battle ahead gives a few opportunities to develop these important characters. (On the other hand, it feels like a bit of a space-filler, considering it’s positioned right before the actual battle, and we frankly know the stakes are not too high for Corax.) Possibly influenced by the howling of internet gibbons whenever a Primarch does something weird or inscrutable, Gav ensures that Corax begins to inform his troops of the insidious nature of Chaos and its links to the warp – information which has been hinted at but never confirmed for them. Surely his rejection of Nikea can’t be far away. And learning a little of Corax’s relationship with Guilliman is a nice bone to be thrown. My end judgement, though, is that this is a less charming ‘Promethean Sun’ – it’d read nicely as anthology filler, and may be embraced by people who are desperate to read every scrap of writing about Raven Guard or Dark Mechanicum characters, but pay £30 (or even £15) for it and you may find it hard not to be disappointed. I’m glad that only a few of the Heresy novellas have been a let-down for me, but this is definitely one of them. 5/10

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

"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.

Horus Heresy Weekender - Part Five

Forge World Book V: Tempest

Due for release in Spring 2015 – “optimistically”, said Tony Cottrell. It’s not quite out of the studio yet, and it hasn’t been printed. There will, hopefully, be early copies at the Warhammer World re-opening in May, so we can expect hopefully by the end of June it’ll be widely available.

Key points it will include:

• Ultramarines (People booed)
• Word Bearers (More people booed)
• Mechanicum (Nobody booed)
• Imperial militia (Absolutely no reaction)
• Warp Cults

In more detail:

• The story of the Word Bearers’ assault on Calth.
• Background on the XIII Legion, the largest of the Legiones Astartes at around a quarter-million Marines. (THIS is the bit I’m really interested in. I think the main fault of ‘Conquest’ was that it lacked a pre-Crusade/pre-Primarch history of a Legion and I think that’s something I really need to enjoy one of these books.)
• Further background on the Word Bearers as the changes in their Legion continue.
• Background and narrative for Knight Houses and Titan Legions both loyalist and traitor.
• A new campaign system (Ugh. Every fucking book.)
• Imperial Militia and Warp Cults army lists and background.
• Additional Legion units and rules.

‘Tempest’ will show FW trying to capture the scale of ‘Know No Fear’. Similar to that book, in ‘Tempest’, they’ll try to focus on the first 30 hours or so of this fight. The Underworld War will follow in the book after this (which wasn’t named) – as well as the continued war on Calth, it’ll also deal with the Shadow Crusade, Ultramar (Imperium Secundus?), and the World Eaters. It will hopefully be with us before Christmas 2015.

Coming up next for Forge World books, they plan to release a Horus Heresy masterclass book – in fact there will be a series of them. After that, they will probably deal with Prospero and start building all the Tizca pyramids (possibly out of Ferrero Rocher) for the dioramas of the Burning. That will most likely begin 2016. The book will feature Thousand Sons AND Space Wolves (presumably including full army lists and background for both Legions, as well as an account of the assault on Prospero).

Tempest

Calth is a microcosm for the Imperium at its height of its powers – smashed by the Heresy. Its destruction is symbolic, which of course, the Word Bearers appreciate. Expect to read a bit about Macragge. Speaking of which, Alan pronounced it “Macraije”? I’ve always said “Mah-krag”. Guess I’m an idiot. In terms of other stuff in ‘Tempest’, the Knight Houses include the loyalist House Vornherr (I can’t be sure how it’s spelled) who rallied at Ithraca (hey, remember that fight from ‘Honour To The Dead’?). They will not survive the book. They are the largest Knight House in the segmentum.

There will be extensive background on the Ultramarines and also on Ultramar – why the XIII are allowed to have an empire within an empire.

As people were expecting, the next Forge World Primarch work in progress was shown – but people weren’t expecting it to be Guilliman. The model showed him looking very noble and handsome, perhaps in a more rugged way than you might have seen him before – maybe even Dorn-esque. FW’s sculptors have come a long way since the grotesque-looking face of the Fulgrim model. There is a lot more work to do on him, especially the base – they’re hoping to get him ready for purchase at the Warhammer World opening (broken record alert). Guilliman will carry a sword and a power fist. Like all Primarchs he had an extensive armoury, but they had to limit themselves to two weapons. It might not be in line exactly with all the books or artwork, but it will be in line with his appearance in ‘Betrayer’.

The Warp Cults are meant to reflect the huge number of mortal units brought along by the Word Bearers in this conquest. It’s not going to be a giant, deep army list, but you’ll be able to put together a pretty good non-elite force flexible for multiple purposes. The list is going to represent the diversity of Imperial worlds. You could even field muskets against Space Marines, if you really want. To the Word Bearers, Calth is a mass ritual killing and it was “great fun” to add extra stuff to all aspects of the background.

They didn’t pay much attention to how Ultramarines are in 40k, as they aren’t yet transformed by the Codex. No exploration of the “We’re the best” mentality in Heresy-era. The Luna Wolves had really been the most successful pre-Heresy, not the Ultras. They did explore some origin sections of the Successor chapters.

They plan to do gladius upgrade packs for Ultramarine models.

Daemons will be present in the story parts of ‘Tempest’, but not the rules. In the follow-up there will probably be rules for them.

The new campaign system will partly be familiar, some will draw from the novel. It’ll be about small scale stuff in comparison to the massive scale of the Battle for Calth itself – you can’t stop Calth from falling, obviously. There is a scenario included which could tie in to the fight on the Macragge’s Honour.

We will see a lot of Ultramarine character rules – Guilliman, a Dreadnought that fell from space (Telemachon?), a captain (Ventanus?). As well as that, there will be some new Word Bearer characters and revisits of old Word Bearer characters (I guess Lorgar and Kor Phaeron?).

The Mechanicum in Tempest will be extra units – not a new list.

Tempest follow-up

There will be a Calth slipcase like there was an Isstvan slipcase.

Argel Tal will be in the Shadow Crusade book, probably, as will Samus. Maybe it will also feature daemon Angron.

Prospero

They do anticipate challenges for Prospero. The Sisters of Silence and Custodes will probably be the biggest challenge as there’s no framework for them yet. The Thousand Sons will probably require the most playtesting. They want to get the magic and the sub-cults feeling right (As I’ve said before, this is an area I always thought was kind of a shortcoming in Graham’s book, so it’ll be nice to see that get fleshed out, in both rules and background).

Other stuff

More Shattered Legions stuff is coming. It was meant to be in ‘Conquest’. FW would love to put them in a smaller book or perhaps into the ‘Tempest’ follow-up. It will deal with small disparate groups of loyalists, even some Marines from traitor Legions who remain loyal.

They do want to do a Mars book. It keeps getting away from them in the schedule. It wouldn’t just deal with Mars, it would deal with the wider Solar War.

At the very beginning of the project, Alan Bligh and John French tried to map out strengths and weaknesses of each Primarch and Legion. Alan Merrett also helped.

Corax will be done – work has been started on sculpting him. They reiterated that they do plan to get models out for every Primarch there are rules for, but they can’t really comment on the timeframe for that.

There probably won’t be rules for Oll Persson, though they may do a book focusing more heavily on agents of the Emperor and Warmaster – but that’ll need a stronger narrative reason for an Oll feature.

Shifting/corrupted Traitor Legions will be represented by both all-new lists and updated lists. Both sides will change as their method of war changes. We can expect more stuff like the Mhara Gal dreadnought.

While I would have preferred a bit more emphasis on Black Library through the Weekender, I definitely could see that this was the most positively received seminar of the whole schedule. The book looks very exciting and I'm really looking forward to it.

"Book Two: Massacre" (Forge World publication)

To my surprise, I enjoyed the first Forge World Horus Heresy book, ‘Betrayal’, very much – arguably, more than I’ve enjoyed a few of the Black Library Horus Heresy novels. At the time, the only other book available in the series was ‘Massacre’, and I bought it as soon as I finished ‘Betrayal’. 

GET A LOAD OF THIS SHIT! Part II

As before, the first half is ‘fluff’ (lore) and the second half is ‘crunch’ (rules). I’ll be focusing on the first half, since I don’t care too much about tabletop gaming anymore (and for all the crazy money I’ve sunk into my HH fandom, I will NOT begin a Horus Heresy-era army – that is where I draw the line). Like with ‘Betrayal’, the ‘fluff’ part of this book is presented as a historical textbook. There are vague parts where it’s admitted that nobody really knows what happened, and also some stuff that directly contradicts Horus Heresy novels… but that’s because it’s a chronicle apparently collated by one unnamed scribe on Terra (well, it’s attributed to an ‘A.K.’, so I guess today was a good day… groan), apparently writing long after the Heresy, based on first-hand or second-hand accounts from the survivors of these events. I really, really appreciate the length that Alan Bligh and co. have gone to in order to make these books immersive and faithful to the tone of the novel series, as well as informative and ‘neutral’.

Funnily enough, this focuses on the Dropsite Massacre of Isstvan V. The first few pages are kind of a ‘previously in the Horus Heresy…’ recap. This was a little worthless in my eyes, because who’s gonna buy just ONE of these series? It’s safe to assume people who bought this have heard all they need to hear about the events on Isstvan III. A page for a recap would be fine, but this goes back to pre-Unity! Ahh well, I didn’t mind reading it again. Having said that though there is a nice bonus here: a timeline which definitively presents events of the tail end of the Great Crusade and the beginning of the Heresy in chronological order. (Did you know that Alpharius only assumed command of the Alpha Legion three years before Kurze destroyed Nostramo? I didn’t!)

Once this part of the background is done, there’s an exhaustive account of the Isstvan V engagement, beginning with the first Loyalist ship of the Retribution Force to enter the system (a Raven Guard vessel, incidentally) and ending with Ferrus Manus’ death and the cease of the ‘formal’ military engagement. If you think ‘Fulgrim’ and ‘The First Heretic’ told you all you need to know about this engagement, you can probably skip this section of the book. But if, like me, you feel those books’ accounts (while great) only scratched the surface of one of the most significant and brutal fights in Imperial history, you’ll enjoy reading this much more dry, ‘factual’ account. Just because it takes a different approach to narrative, doesn’t mean ‘Massacre’ isn’t just as good at building tension and describing the horror of Isstvan V.

TEXT FOR DAYS SON, TEXT AND TEXT AND TEXT

This account takes in the key moments of this action, through the initial forays into the system showing that the Traitor naval presence seems to have unaccountably disappeared, to discussing the pervading confusion and anger at the command level in the Loyalist forces trying to make sense of what was happening (Horus must be mad, or under the thrall of some horrible xenos parasite; Horus the prideful bastard is trying to carve out his own Empire), to the Loyalists’ fateful decision to not wait for the rest of their force and make planetfall immediately, through to the eventual horror of the Iron Hands as they encounter the ‘changed’ Emperor’s Children up close for the first time, taking in the way the Sons Of Horus literally treated the Army units in their command as cattle and drove them against the First Wave with long barbed whips, and more obscure stuff like the suicidal ‘grudgematch’ between the Legio Arturus and Legio Mortis Titans. Whew, what a long-ass sentence. I must have been reading a Forge World book.

Even beyond this there are some gorgeous illustrations, including a two-page system map of Isstvan, as well as extra bits that nicely play with the ‘historical textbook’ format: testimony from a Raven Guard on his experiences in landing in the First Wave and a transcript of the interrogation of a captured Word Bearer. You really get a feeling here of how catastrophically the Death Guard, Emperor’s Children, World Eaters and Sons Of Horus are mauled in the first part of the battle, something I feel hasn’t come across in the HH novels. The first wave may have died in droves but they gave back as good as they got. And then, of course, the horror of the Dropsite Massacre itself. I could read another ten novels set in/around this time; it feels like there are thousands more stories to be told. The final ‘butcher’s bill’ – over 200,000 Space Marines dead, including both Traitor and Loyalist. Pour some out.

SPACE MOTHERFUCKER

Before we get to the ‘meat’ of new Legion backgrounds, there’s a small section on each of the First Four Traitor Legions – an overview of their actions in the Dropsite Massacre, an account of a significant figure in their ranks and some nice background/illustration of some vehicles. I didn’t really find the Emperor’s Children or World Eaters sections too noteworthy, but I really liked the other two; for example, we learn that following the drastic weakening of their armoured divisions in the Isstvan III battle, the Death Guard were forced to deploy reserve armour for Isstvan V’s engagement. These reserve forces also took a severe beating, and as a result, the Legion’s overall ability to deploy armour during the Heresy was dramatically reduced. And what was the role of the former Luna Wolves in the battle? Horus was cautious with his own Legion, probably because of the huge casualties they took on Isstvan III – he knew he needed to preserve his Legion’s strength as much as possible for the upcoming long war. Therefore the 16^th mostly deployed on the defensive until the second wave revealed their allegiance and the outcome of the battle was clear, at which point Horus lead from the front and joined in the massacre.

With that out of the way, we move on to the four Legions covered here. Apologies, but for a lot of people (especially those who read the White Dwarf Index Astartes articles back in the day) you’ll already know a lot of this… but most of it was new to me.

The Iron Hands: I always held the Iron Hands as my least favourite Legion. They seemed to have the arrogance and perfectionism of the Emperor’s Children and the brutality and contempt for human life of the World Eaters, but while those Legions were damned for their weaknesses and suffered severely for them, the Hands always seemed to have their failings treated as virtues by GW and the fandom in general; I found Iron Hands evangelists irritating on a level that Ultramarines fans can only dream of reaching. I think perhaps not liking Ferrus Manus as a character in ‘Fulgrim’ or ‘Feat Of Iron’, or in fact most Iron Hands characters as they’ve been portrayed in HH fiction, may also have been a factor. (Shout out to John French’s ‘Riven’, though, that’s a really good one.)

In their early years of Terran campaigning, the Iron Hands recruited from all over the world, but most significantly from Old Albia, which was also a heavy recruiting ground for the Death Guard, and I am guessing is meant to be located in the region of the modern-day Britain (Albia, Albion… maybe?). They quickly gained a reputation for relentless, well-coordinated ground war with heavy armoured support. The reunification with their Primarch came quickly, but it was not a smooth one: the proud and intractable nature of both Manus and his new Legion meant that clashes were inevitable, but most of the ‘Iron Tenth’ quickly became fanatically loyal. As well as a firmness of ethos, another important aspect Manus brought with him to reshape the Legion was the resource of Medusa’s ancient and sophisticated technology. The Iron Hands culture became tightly interwoven with that of the Mechanicum, and the tech-literate but otherwise quite savage tribal culture of Medusa informed all aspects of what the Legion became – especially their unique makeup of nearly autonomous ‘Clans’ of Astartes, all of which competed for resources and the favour of their Primarch.

These hands be straight iron, yo

Probably my favourite part of this background was the ‘what if?’ questions raised by it. Manus was highly intolerant of any perceived failure and his punishments were harsh and absolute. Sounds bit like Perturabo, doesn’t it? His Legion gained a reputation for tactlessness and, sometimes, hostility towards its Imperial Army allies or even other Legions. To Manus’ closeness to Horus and Fulgrim, his apparent callousness and implied willingness to harshly punish or even kill his own sons, add the fact that there was at one time a growing Lodge presence in the Iron Hands, and consider how differently things could have gone. Maybe if the Lodges had been associated more strongly with Horus than Lorgar (who Manus apparently had little regard for; see ‘First Heretic’) or if Fulgrim’s overture hadn’t been so badly done, or the Isstvan betrayal had been delayed by a few years… maybe Ferrus would have come down on a different side.

This part of the book was basically all I needed to make a complete U-turn on my dislike for the Iron Hands. They are actually one of the most interesting Legions if approached in the right way. In fact there is material here for a good few very rewarding Horus Heresy short stories (or a pretty hefty novel): a pre-Heresy account of the bitter competition of Clan lords trying to excel, or an in-depth retelling of the council that took place on Medusa following Ferrus Manus’ death in an attempt to decide the Legion’s course of action. And after the great ‘Riven’ I’d love John French to write a book about the dark paths that the most unstable X Legion soldiers take following the death of their father. After all, there were apparently a significant amount of Iron Hands who never even mustered for Isstvan, maybe as many as 30,000 – and that doesn’t even take into account the broken survivors who managed to get off-world. In the past I’ve felt the last couple years of Horus Heresy books had featured the Iron Hands too prominently, but now I think they’re still a rich seam to mine for the HH series; I’m glad that this (and ‘The Damnation Of Pythos’) have opened my eyes to that.

(And I’ve got Chris Wraight’s ‘Wrath Of Iron’ waiting on my bookshelf – looking forward to diving into that one.)

The Night Lords: Following AD-B’s ‘Prince Of Crows’, and the flashback sequences in his Night Lords trilogy, I felt like I had more of a grasp on the Heresy-era Night Lords culture than almost any other Legion: their gallows humour, their casual (almost… entitled) attitude to cruelty and their strange pride in their awful shithole of a homeworld. Plus, I wasn’t too keen on re-reading Night Haunter’s origin story AGAIN. But I was being unfair – there is much more to the Night Lords that Aaron didn’t touch on.

The VIII Legion was born in the giant prison-sinks beneath Terra; subterranean cities of criminals which never saw natural light and with a fairly unpleasant way of life. Rather than drawing from the criminals, the Emperor instead took recruits from the children born in these prison cities; inmates who’d committed no crimes, children who’d grown up in a sunless world and a crime-filled environment where life was cheap. Probably the Terran and Nostraman Night Lords had the easiest ‘culture merge’ ever.

As we know, the Night Lords were something of a ‘terror weapon’; when an enemy (or ally) committed a crime that went beyond simple defiance, when the Emperor wanted to send a clear message of “that shit won’t be tolerated!”, he sent the VIII. This section talks about the Night Lords’ “tendency to moral absolutism”, something I think has been captured particularly well by Aaron. The Night Lords’ attitude to ‘guilt’ reminds me of Robot Santa from Futurama. “Thugs beating up a shopkeeper for not paying protection money… naughty! Shopkeeper not paying his protection money… equally naughty!” This early section about Legion ethos might be the best-written part of the book. Here’s my favourite quote: “Perhaps memory is too kind, perhaps we wish to believe that there is a nobility in such monsters, where in fact there is only horror. Perhaps we wish there to be a purpose behind atrocity, otherwise how could such creatures be suffered to live?”

I feel like I’ve read more than enough about Kurze’s rise to power, but I really appreciated the description of Nostraman society as it stood when the Primarch arrived on the world. I also really appreciate the discussion of how deeply Nostraman culture came to influence the Legion’s structure; it was probably a bad idea that control of these thousands of sadistic super-soldiers was given to bored foppish nobles and low-level Mafia ‘enforcers’ who’d watched Scarface too many times. (Well, basically grown up in ‘Scarface’ plus ‘The Sopranos’ times ‘Mad Max’, but, you catch my drift). The short but sweet characterisations of the Kyroptera (like Kurze’s Mournival, or maybe his consiglieres) and the Atrementar of the First Company (the Night Lords’ secret police and enforcers… but with Terminator armour) really added to the Legion flavour.

Unlike with the X Legion, I really liked the Night Lord character/vehicle gallery. Especially the one for Uros Kastax, just check this shit out: “Known to have participated… in the Yoggoth Genocides, the Fall Of The Lords Of Ephrath and… the Succoth Perfidy.” How much HP Lovecraft can you take? Plus, it’s heavily implied that this guy’s squadmates used the Dropsite Massacre as an opportunity to shoot Kastax in the back. That’s the Night Lords way, summed up in one character. (Also nicely embodied by Talon-Master Vibius, a sergeant who took advantage of the chaos of Isstvan V to kill those standing in the way of him assuming control of his entire company.)

Like I said before, I didn’t think there was any juice left to wring out of the Night Lords blood orange, but Forge World managed it. Damn.

Salamanders: For my first few years of fandom, my attitude to Vulkan’s sons was “who the fuck are the Salamanders?” Then during my last years of being a young, enthusiastic 40K fan, the Third War For Armageddon happened, where Games Workshop heavily pushed the Salamanders as an alternative to Blood Angels and Ultramarines. I was a big fan… initially. Since I started reading Horus Heresy stuff, the XVIII seemed a bit… dull. Dull as dishwater, in fact. Maybe it didn’t help that the writer who apparently has their writing privileges locked down is one I don’t really find enjoyable to read. I appreciated their altruistic outlook, and the noble attitude they had towards their role in the Imperium, but that was it. Once again, it fell to Forge World to show me the error of my ways.

The origin of all the Legions were shrouded in secrecy, but apparently that of the Salamanders was even more so; they were closely linked to the Space Wolves and the Alpha Legion in their early recruitment stages and initial deployments. One can assume that the Emperor had very specific skillset or task in mind for these three. Or maybe there was another reason. The XX Legion is involved, so we will probably never know.

But wait, the friendly and noble Salamanders aren’t anything like the savage, almost-mutant Space Wolves or the sneaky, multi-skilled Alpha Legion, right? Actually, before Vulkan was reunited with his Legion, there was a pretty heavy darkness to these guys. Even in 40K, Salamanders are known for their stubbornness and almost suicidal willingness to take on impossible odds to protect the Imperium. Back in the Great Crusade, though, this was less ‘suicidal bravery’ and more just ‘suicidal’. They were willing to spend their lives in thousands to complete their mission, and from this section, it looks like could have ended up with the fighting style of the Iron Warriors or even World Eaters if their Primarch hadn’t been a stabilising influence. Speaking of which, between the Emperor discovering Vulkan and Vulkan taking command of his Legion, there was apparently a gap of several years where Vulkan fought at the Emperor’s side. I’d love to see some more information about that, perhaps in an HH novel flashback. I really like the section on how Vulkan’s introduction of the Promethean Cult, in particular, grounded his Legion and gave them purpose and direction for their dangerous bravery, and also stopped them from falling prey to the Lodges.

Pretty amazing...

I want to mention that the ‘gallery’ section for the Salamanders is particularly nice; it’s in the nature of the Legion to create ornate, beautiful armour and Forge World really outdid themselves portraying that. And their exemplary battle is… fucking hell. If you like the Salamanders, you should read about that battle. If you don’t like the Salamanders, you should also read about that battle. Overall, I’m not as completely reversed in my position on the Salamanders as I am with the Iron Hands… but I do find them way more interesting after reading this. Almost enough to buy those Nick Kyme 40K Salamanders books. Almost.

The Word Bearers: With ‘The First Heretic’, ‘Betrayer’, ‘Aurelian’ and most recently ‘The Purge’ dealing extensively with the culture of the Word Bearers and their long road to Heresy, I went into this section with a fairly cynical attitude. After all, how much more could I learn about this Legion? Not to sound like a broken record, but more than I expected, as it turned out.

Argel Tal: "Screw you chumps and chumpettes, I'm catching the next pimpmobile out of here."

In the first days of the XVII Legion, they recruited solely from the sons of the Emperor’s defeated enemies, and were taught about the value of the Emperor’s mercy, the importance of redemption, and that one should go to any lengths to bring the Imperial Truth to the unenlightened. If the ‘Catholic Space Nazis’ meme about the Imperium holds true, the Word Bearers were the Catholic-est. But even the Church changes its doctrine when needs must. When Lorgar returned to his Legion, he began to convert the more iconoclastic Word Bearers to his belief that the Emperor was a God. Once these influential Legionaries fell, the path of the Legion was assured… until Monarchia, that is. While we know the background of this Legion well, Bligh writes elegantly about this period and gives us a fresh perspective rather than just rehashing Aaron.

I liked the way the role of the Chaplains in the Legion was fleshed out, and I enjoyed the dark hints that the Word Bearer Apothecaries were harvesting the gene-seed of any and all Legions at the Dropsite Massacre.

Those Word Bearer marine portraits are pretty beautiful (good luck painting the intricate extracts from the Book Of Lorgar onto your squads of Terminators, nerd). Hell, I don’t really have much to say because through my reviews, I feel like I’ve talked about the Word Bearers so much already… but this section of the book lives up to the standard set by the coverage of the previous three Legion.

HELL YEAH WE GOT TANKS

Then there’s a little bit of info on the Titan Legion, the Legio Atarus AKA the Firebrands, who held a resentment for the authority of Mars’ Fabricator-Genereal and a grudge against Horus for his poor use of them in one of his campaigns, and by these circumstances escaped becoming traitors. (That sells them a bit short, I guess, but I don’t really care for Titan Legions anyway.) Then we’re on to the rules, which I won’t spend much time on. First there’s a framework for a Dropsite Massacre campaign, which looks horrendously complicated. Like I said I didn’t care much about the rules as I knew I would probably never use them, but they’re worth a read anyway as there’s still some nice background information there like, especially in the unit descriptions. For example, it’s in the Rules section we learn that only the Sons Of Horus were able to field the Alpha Legion-designed ‘Banestrike’ ammunition (designed to pierce power armour) in any significant numbers. The rest went to Alpharius’ lot. We also get updates for the ‘Betrayal’ Legions, giving them new special rules, special characters, rites of war and units. The Red Butchers, a brilliantly dark World Eater unit of utterly insane warriors in Terminator armour that can be immobilised remotely by their comrades once battle is done – it’s the only way to get them to stop killing. The most significant in ‘fluff’ terms are the Kakophoni, the proto-Noise Marines of Marius Vairosean who the III Legion first fielded on Isstvan V... but by the time I got to the army lists for the four ‘Massacre’ Legions, I just couldn’t get very excited about any of it. I know some dudes buy these specifically to geek down over the Primarch stat-lines and resolve their long-running arguments over whether Ferrus Manus could have beaten Horus in single combat, but I find those people as baffling as, well, as baffling as most people find my own reasons for buying this.

You can also find rules for the VIII Legion Terror Squad, a unit headed up by a Big Punisher who's known to pack a Mac in the back of the Ac.

So how does ‘Massacre’ stack up to its predecessor? I honestly think it’s better in every way, and keep in mind that ‘Betrayal’ featured three of my favourite Legions – the Sons Of Horus, Emperor’s Children and Death Guard (not that I’m not fond of the World Eaters as well). My only real complaint from ‘Betrayal’ has been dealt with – no longer are there pages two-thirds dominated by images of Forge World vehicles and units with a faded sepia filter. There are still some of them in effect, but they’re much smaller and more judiciously deployed. (Well, the ‘giant space filler’ stuff does still happen a bit, but mainly in the rule section, where you’re going to get a fair amount of ‘dead space’ anyway due to the nature of stat/rule sheets.) Furthermore, the ‘staged’ images with Forge World models are overall of a much higher quality and tend to be in vivid colour rather than all bleached out. Just look at some of those Dropsite shots. On top of that, the introduction of black and white ‘sketches’ of Astartes units (generally special characters) in the Rule section is a brilliant idea; it’s suited perfectly to the rather dour monastic tone of the book. Jesus, look what an evil bastard Sevatar looks; with that sneer, I half-expect the picture to tell me to go get my fucking shinebox. The quality of these sketches got even higher in ‘Extinction’ – here there are a few questionable choices, but overall they’re pretty great. The illustrations of Legionaries have also been changed in format slightly. Unlike in Book 1 where you would get four pictures of Astartes per page and a few sentences about each, they’ve decided instead to have one, much larger, picture of a Legionary and his gear, and several paragraphs of background. The increased depth (and larger image size) are a great idea and while it doesn’t feel like you quite get the ridiculous scope that ‘Betrayal’ gave you (with, say, three Legionaries per Legion rather than sixteen), it’s overall a much better approach. While they look amazing some of these didn’t really live up to their potential for me. I feel like Bligh and co. have a gift for writing ‘big picture’ lore that doesn’t necessarily translate to inventing compelling characters (I really didn’t get anything from the Iron Hands heroes/vehicles section, for example).

Calas Typhon. He looks like a former Premier League footballer... Which one? ANY ONE.

And of course, we have the age-old Forge World/Black Library/Games Workshop question: does this seem to have been proof-read? In this case, yes. There are a few instances of typos, (“death-throws” rather than “death-throes”, “the remaining populous” rather than “remaining populace”) but less than I seem to recall in book 1.

‘Massacre’ is about as close to perfect as any book in this format is going to get. The only thing stopping it from being a perfect 10 is that, well, about half the book is much less interesting to me than the other half. I know it’s a little unfair to penalise it for that but I can’t help but wish there were 100 or so more pages of lore. I still feel it’s prohibitively expensive – publish it in paperback for £30, £70 is obscene – but I won’t factor that in to my score this time. And so I give this 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.

"Honour To The Dead" by Gav Thorpe

Oh boy, here we go with another AUDIO DRAMA REVIEW!! As with all audio dramas, spelling of character names is going to be a bit of a fudge. Be warned.

MAKE THE ROBOTS FIGHT MORE

When the HH anthology 'Mark Of Calth' came out, we were told 2 additional stories were on the way, linked to this collection, in audio form. Here's the first in terms of the Calth timeline, Gav Thorpe's 'Honour To The Dead'. This drama takes place in the city of Ithraca, which is in upstate Nrew Yrork. Ahhh, geography based humour. Is this thing on? I kid. 'Honour To The Dead' is set on Calth, of course.

Our main "character" is the Titan, Invigilator. Unfortunately, its princeps, Mikal, is an incredibly dull character from the very first time we set ears on him. His dialogue is standard princeps techno-gabble; fair enough. It's also delivered in an unbelievably wooden way. The beginning of the drama is extremely impressive, with a quite dispassionate description of the Betrayal and the commencement of hostilities. Definitely influenced heavily by the writing style of 'Know No Fear'; while Gav isn't quite as good at capturing the sheer weight of horror that Dan did so well, it's still compelling. While we're talking about what's good here, David Timson's narration is excellent, as usual. While hammy, Timson has nowhere near the gammon levels of Toby Longworth. The smooth, declarative style of his narration is completely suited to the 'Know No Fear' aping, present tense 'factual' approach of this story.

The sound effects here - screaming crowds of civilians, explosions, bleeping Titan command consoles - struck me as excellent. I'm not crazy about the SFX that strangle a lot of Black Library dramas. But if you gotta do it, do it right, and Heavy Entertainment DO THIS SHIT. I gotta say, the Titan battle horns are very similar to the Reaper horns from Mass Effect 3... but hey, they probably stole that from somewhere else. (Inception?) The thing is, the sections with the Legio Praesagius loyalists are by far the best thing here. The 'good guy' Princeps is hella wooden, but that's kind of a nice gear shift from the rest of these over-emoting clowns. The real star is the narrator who keeps it pretty steady throughout, and Thorpe's actual description/exposition is very good.

Unfortunately, when the drama reaches Verinia, the second of our characters, it chokes. Oh boy, does it choke hard. Ugh. This is really gonna be painful...

So, the story takes a massive turn for the worse with the introduction of Verinia, a woman caught in the terrible ground war between Titan brigades. Concerned about the fate of her husband (in a military unit in the centre of the now-burning city) and her infant son, tears just burst out her wig. In fact, all she does is weep and moan and while that's an understandable reaction, it's... a little overplayed. I quite respect Gav Thorpe as a writer... usually... but my opinion of him took a real pounding during these sections. They're horrendously overacted, but I can't put the blame on the voice actors. How the fuck are they gonna have one of the only female characters seen on Calth - nay, in the whole HH series! - be just some screaming damsel in distress? In the grim darkness of the far future, womens be takin care of business themselves yo. Like Lotara... or Euphrati before her character was neutered and given a halo... not THIS fucking bullshit!

Ugh, the part where she has to hide from the (Russian-sounding) Colchis/Chaos Cultist looters and plugs up the baby's mouth to stop it from making a sound is soooo contrived. Has she killed him??? That'd be the sort of thing to happen in an Abnett book, but no risks of that type are going to be taken by Gav.

How to put this? It feels like Gav decided to focus on the "human aspect" of the Calth atrocity, and to do this by tracking the struggles of a civilian woman to regain her infant son Paxilius. Reasonable, though they totally could have had a dude for this character instead... since the Imperial Army is hella equal ops after all. "Everyone's welcome to become a flesh-cog in our hideous death machine!" The problem is that the actor portraying Verinia seems to have been given the direction "MORE HYSTERICAL, I WANT YOU TO SOUND LIKE EVERY HIDEOUS FEMALE STEREOTYPE POSSIBLE. What's that? You think that'll make your lines harder to hear? Don't worry, you've got like 3 lines in this whole script, it's just you repeat them again and again, so the listeners will pick up what you're saying eventually." So yeahhhhh, bad acting exacerbates shitty characterisation in the writing. A bummer all round.

Much like Tom Jane, Verinia just wants her kid back.

We then go to princeps Tai, or Tigh maybe. Fuck it, I'm calling him Tai. Urgh, this guy is basically just Zadkiel from 'Battle For The Abyss'. With one line and its terrible delivery, my interest in the character is killed dead: "Seeeee the ants spilling from their nessts to be crushed, sooo weak and pathetiiiiic!!"

Luckily, for a great deal of this drama (probably 40-45 minutes of it?) we're just with Mikal seeing Titan battles. He may be as interesting as a breadcrumb sandwich, but Mikal sees some interesting shit. I've never been a huge fan of Titan battles in the 40K/HH stuff I've read, but these were pretty dope. Maybe I would have liked them even more if there was even a single good character involved.

But then we get the Ultramarines characters. Shock: They don't want to disregard their search-and-destroy defense against the Word Bearers in order to safeguard one civilian to an evac point. Worse shock: after a bit of crying, they relent and agree to play nursemaid. Even the XIII can't resist when a dame turns on the waterworks, am I right boys! Crimony! I'm really not good with this plot point. Though the 'autism conditioning' wasn't as intense in 30K, even at this point, the Astartes would have reacted to a screaming, terrified human making irrational demands of them with disdain and repulsion at best. Even a noble, humanitarian chapter like the Ultramarines. I guess the cynical, world-weary Brother-Sergeant Aquila learned about the nature of hope and faith from this weak human!! What horseshit.

The last battle here is very well done in terms of action, but motivations and characterisation are suspect. Once again, an Ultramarine sacrificing himself to protect a human seems like bullshit. Practical: Hundreds of thousands of humans have died on Calth already. Theoretical: Denying an Ultramarine's death will hurt the XVII more than denying a 'mere' human's death. Despite the lengthy explanation the surviving Ultramarines give about how babies make it all worth it, I don't give a shit. But that's NOTHING compared to princeps Tai looking at a tiny baby's unafraid eyes (wow, those Titan viewscreens have good resolution obviously) and having a huge spiritual epiphany, or if you prefer, a fit of intense stupidity, and ALLOWING himself to be killed. What the fuck? Boy, the archenemy lost one of its stupidest soldiers that day.

Continuing the Arrested Development theme, TAI IS A MONSTERRRR!

Only Mikal's valedictory speech gives the drama a little bit of dignity back. The last five minutes of unassuming heroism almost makes it worth it. It's a pale echo of the cathartic moments in 'Know No Fear' where the Ultramarines finally rallied and started to hurt the traitors. But at least it's trying.

'Honour To The Dead' would have worked much better as a print story. In fact, this would have got rid of the largest impediments it has (terrible voice actors for two of the three main characters, and one who's passable but boring). Yet that couldn't have changed the hideously manipulative attempts at pathos, Ultramarnes who jump in front of laser blasts for dying humans, Chaos princeps who are taught a lesson in appreciating the smaller things in life, and, well, HORRIBLY DULL CHARACTERS. Now, 'Deliverance Lost' was surprisingly good but I'm starting to think that Gav should be relegated to short stories buried in collections, nothing 'flagship' like this.

I give this 5/10. And dudes... fucking step up your attempts at making good female characters. Jeez.

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

"Aurelian" by Aaron Dembski-Bowden

Yipes! It's been a long time since I started this review. Let's get right down to it.

Still one of the best covers in the series (I guess I say that a lot).

'Aurelian' works best as a companion piece to 'The First Heretic', but that's by no means the only HH book it's linked to. Ostensibly this novella is split into two sections, and cuts between them effectively. Firstly, at the end of 'Pilgrimage' (part II of 'The First Heretic'), Lorgar went into the Eye of Terror on the advice of Argel Tal, his trusted son who he'd just damned to daemonic possession. The primary thrust of 'Aurelian' deals with what he saw/experienced/learned there. But the beginning and end of the novella show the period immediately following TFH's conclusion, with Isstvan V in ashes and Horus' plans moving into their next phase.

If I said this book featured every traitor Primarch, would you get hyped? HELL YEAH YOU WOULD. Sadly, this is a novella, so for reasons of space this primarily focuses on Lorgar's relationships with Fulgrim, Magnus and (to some extent) Horus. The verbal sparring between Lorgar and Angron is an excellent prelude to the dynamic ADB worked so well in 'Betrayer', and Alpharius' brief appearance is very cool (and, I can't help but feel, somehow deeply significant), but Perturabo, Curze and Mortarion are just there to make up the numbers. No space for the incredible antipathy between Lorgar and the Night Haunter, or recriminations for their... unpleasant encounter with Corax on Isstvan. And I get SO butthurt every time a book mentions Mortarion then does nothing with him. (So thanks for taking care of those blueballs, 'Scars'!) But... fuck. Can't get greedy; let's focus on what IS here.

'Aurelian' follows Fulgrim's revelation to Horus at the end of his titular book that the preening, compulsively perfect III Legion Primarch was now a daemonhost. As you might recall, Horus reacted with distaste and discomfort, but seemed to accept it as a necessary evil. At this novella's opening, Lorgar finds out the same information and takes a far more hardline stance, beating daemon-Fulgrim's ass like he stole somethin'. Even when calm is restored, Lorgar doesn't hesitate to put Horus in his place when Lupercal attempts to assert "big bro" status, and heavily threatens Fulgrim's 'passenger' with some diabolical shit. It's a harsher side of Lorgar than we might be accustomed to.

Retreating to meditate in his sanctum, Lorgar gets another visit from Magnus' psychic projection. This is another great character development segment, fitting in nicely with the two brother's chat in TFH and setting the foundations for their wound-salting talk in 'Betrayer'.  Even with his best-loved brother, though, Lorgar can't resist flexing his muscles and trying to cause him discomfort with his psychic strength (Magnus is meant to be the leader among the Primarchs as far as psychic power goes, but we get the feeling Lorgar's giving him a run for his money now) as well as obliquely warning him about Ahriman and the Rubric. The conflict prompts Lorgar to reminisce back to 43 years before Isstvan, and we see what happened in the Eye of Terror all that time ago. On the surface of one of the Crone Worlds, Lorgar meets with his Legion's self-appointed spirit guide, Ingethel. They have a well-written and illuminating but maddeningly tense conversation about the Warp, daemons and the fall of the Eldar. Lorgar kills an ancient, desiccated Avatar (not as impressive in terms of combat feats as Fulgrim punching a hole through an Avatar's head, BUT STILL), experiences a vision of the Siege of Terra, and fights a colossal Bloodthirster Lord. All the experiences Lorgar has within the Eye are lessons in some way and his conclusions - as well as the not-always-reliable information Ingethel gives him - play a big part in forming the man Lorgar's become by the time of the Heresy.

Complaints? 'Aurelian' falls prey to the only flaw ADB's writing has for me: dude seems committed to never using the word 'day' again. Seems like a lot of the time when it would be natural for a character to say 'day', they say 'night'. I do understand the rationale behind the phrase (more so when he's writing Night Lords, who are heavily influenced by the culture of a planet which had, in effect, no concept of 'days') but I feel like he could stand to use it a little less. That's basically the only problem I have with the book, and it's a very minor one.

A personal favourite moment here is Lorgar's vision of the Imperial palace, first in its 'peacetime' majesty, then in the thick of the Battle of Terra. Terra-related stuff is some of my favourite material in the HH series and ADB's is some of the best - I not only look forward to 'The Master Of Mankind' when (if?!) it emerges, but also any HH books ADB gets to write set during the Siege of Terra. Lorgar's horrified reaction to seeing his Legion completely changed and ravaged by Chaos seems genuine. But though he seems to take comfort from the fact this vision isn't guaranteed truth, we know that ultimately, the Urizen will come to embrace that shit. After much prodding and conniving by Erebus and Kor Phaeron maybe, but we see the beginning of that acceptance here.  There are some great, chilling moments where Ingethel tells Lorgar of different realities where he has died already, and of future situations where he will die if he's not careful. This explains his apparent "cowardice" that so disgusted Kurze at Isstvan - Lorgar knew if he were to draw a weapon against Corax, there was a good chance he would be killed, and he would rather choose humiliation in battle than dying with his work incomplete. It also explains why Kor Phaeron was so terrified when Lorgar went to confront Corax (which I always used to see as a bit disrespectful of his Primarch's combat ability).
Lorgar even gets to time-travel and see the Planet of the Sorcerors - visiting Magnus and his Legion just after the events of 'A Thousand Sons'. There's a great moment where Lorgar notes the Thousand Son's flesh-changed Astartes are vastly different from the much more... functional changes of the Gal Vorbak. Last of all, Aurelian is visited by a Tzeentchi ambassador, Kairos Fateweaver; I understand this guy's a pretty big wheel in 'modern' 40k fiction. His section is also badass and supplies another bit of prophecy/backstory explaining Lorgar's action/inaction in certain situations.

Back in the present, there's an inconclusive square-off between 'Fulgrim' and Lorgar again, but this time Lorgar plays it a bit closer to the chest, and by the ending he's obviously aware of when and how the "true" Fulgrim will re-take command of his body. I'd still like explanation on this, A LOT MORE OF IT, but I'm willing to wait. I'm confident it will be explained in time. And what a cool moment to end the book with.
Along with TFH, 'The Underworld War', 'Butchers Nails', and 'Betrayer', this book forms the best arc by a single writer in the entire HH series. Hell, the best arc IN THE SERIES full stop, if we add 'Know No Fear'. On its own, I give it 8/10. But who's going to read it on its own? I'd be surprised if you can read it and NOT want to read (or re-read) Lorgar's whole saga. Here's one last complaint, not to do with the book itself: the fact this was limited edition means a VITAL part of the Calth/Word Bearers arc was not readily available to fans until recently. And that's fucked up and stupid. BL's eagerness to charge double price for a 'limited edition' novella makes financial sense, but fucking hell. Two whole years delay until it's widely available? What the hell. And that's why I'm gonna be buying all of them as soon as they go on sale from now on... even the Nick Kyme ones, haha...

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

"Battle For The Abyss" by Ben Counter

For a long while, 'Battle For The Abyss' was not just my least favourite HH book, it was one I actively disliked. Fan reaction to this novel has stayed near-universally negative, so I'm not alone. But having enjoyed 'Galaxy In Flames' way more than I anticipated on my re-reading of it, I was interested to see whether 'BFTA' was still dreadful.

"You alright bro?" "Oh shit, I think I'm gonna hurl."

In terms of publication order, this novel is the introduction of the Ultramarines/Calth/Word Bearers arc. (In terms of reading order, as well as chronology, I don't think many would argue when I say 'The First Heretic' is a far more suitable intro.) Keep in mind, this book was the successor to 'Legion'. It's clear Black Library wanted to un-blow our minds and keep expectations low. This  book starts surprisingly close to Terra, and we're introduced quickly to Zadkiel, our primary Word Bearer antagonist. Zadkiel establishes himself right away as a zealous follower of Lorgar and the Word. In fact, all the character traits he'll display for the whole book are laid out on his first page. What, you were expecting a character who changes his behaviour or whose motivations can be questioned throughout the narrative? That was foolish of you. Here's a line I especially don't like: "His grey, turbulent eyes conveyed vehemence and surety." No Ben, the author is meant to 'convey' that. The beginning moments also set up the novel 'Mechanicum', introducing Kelbor-Hal as a character and showing that Mars is about to erupt in civil war, so pick up that book soon, kids. I do like this element of HH novels, even though it's kind of a gross shill... when you re-read them, you can always see a few strands included that you know are 'teasers' for novels that came later. I like Kelbor-Hal's ruthlessness here, though it kind of just makes me want to read 'Mechanicum' instead...

Zadkiel closed his eyes amidst the maelstrom of devotion and savoured, drank deep of the zealotry.

The stakes are high, and we know this before the Word Bearers' plan is even outlined. Zadkiel has 1000 Astartes at his command - a full Chapter (shh, I know the Chapter sizes have been flip-flopped a lot in this series, IT DOESN'T MATTER TO THE NARRATIVE, nerds). The warship, called the Furious Abyss, an Abyss-class ship (helpful) is also introduced right away in the narrative and described compellingly as a real nice piece of work. It doesn't take long before we find out what Zadkiel's cooking. He's gonna reach Macragge, bomb one of its moons into fragments and then virus-bomb whatever survives the catastrophic meteor shower. An impressively Dr. Evil-like plan. Along with the strike against the bulk of the Legion at Calth, this attack would (if successful) left the Ultramarines broken beyond repair.

We then move to some Ultramarine characters - this lets us know that the call for the Calth muster has already gone out, which should give you some big-time chills (especially when you think of how long it took BL to actually DO anything with that plot point). Almost instantly though, our blue-armoured heroes are killed by the Furious Abyss, a slightly hacky but very effective plot device which probably gave me one of the only moments of surprise in the whole book. Then we move to some piece of shit space station and get to meet Cestus, our actual Ultramarine hero, plus his life partner Antiges. They're something of a Loken/Abaddon pairing, with Cestus being thoughtful and sensitive (comparatively) while Antiges is brusque and forthright. Then there's Saphrax, who is a real tightass even for one of the XIII. We also meet Brynngar, a mead-swilling, void-barbarian type of Space Wolf. You know, the cliché Dan killed (or the lore he ruined, depending on who you ask) with 'Prospero Burns'? To be fair, we can't expect Ben to anticipate a book published over 2 years in the future. Brynngar is a walking archetype but in this book, that's kind of the entry criteria... borne out by our next entry into this genhanced Dirty Dozen, Mhotep, in one of the lamer intros of the book, well... see for yourself:

"Hooded eyes spoke of intelligence, and skin, so tan and smooth that it was utterly without imperfection, suggested the nature of his Legion: the Thousand Sons."

Huh?! What a confused mess. I know Counter's capable of writing with power and clarity, so why this bullshit? Well, the theory that's been passed around quite frequently is that this was a rush job, completed under pressure so that BL could keep to their release schedule (maybe 'Mechanicum' was delayed?). There's no proof for that though, so I guess we can theorise however we want. Anyway, Mhotep is a lot like the Thousand Sons marine from 'The Outcast Dead'. He's suave, mysterious, and makes HH-reading babies cry about how overpowered his psyker abilities are. While supposedly heading to Prospero, Mhotep decides to join up with the other Astartes on the station due to INSCRUTABLE THOUSAND SONS REASONS.

Slogging through the daemonic horde... he felt the pressure on his sanity increase.

So, after that ship in the first chapter of the book realised it was getting killed, it sent a distress signal to the shitstation; due to his proximity to a malfunctioning reactor, or due to GHOST RAYS (pick one), Cestus is the only one to see the 'missing piece' of the message which states that Macragge is in danger (but wait, how could the dying ship know that? Did Zadkiel tell them his evil plan 'offscreen' before he killed them?). Cestus therefore has some important information but because it got to him through suspicious means he doesn't want to tell anyone due to his ULTRAMARINE ultrastraightness. It's some real soap opera "I was hiding in Rodney's closet stealing his coke stash, and I saw Tarquin fingering Annalise - what a dilemma! I'm in trouble either way" shit. Understandable I guess, but it becomes annoying and contrived quite quickly. Luckily, he doesn't take TOO long to confide in his homies. After the initial shocking development of the named, good-guy Ultramarine character being introduced and then almost instantly dying, Counter unfortunately makes it apparent that of the 50 or so Loyalists who flock to stop the Word Bearers, only a few will live long enough to develop anything that might be called 'a character'. I mean, only around 10 of them - if that - are given names or dialogue that doesn't go like this: "One marine with him, not mentioned before, was called Plasticfish. Plasticfish reloaded his bolter and said maaaan these Word Bearers don't like these explosive rounds. (Five pages pass.) The volley of bolts knocked Plasticfish's head clean off. I DON'T LIKE IT EITHER were his last words as his head flew down the corridor."

For all its faults, 'BFTA' has some pretty great moments. Unlike so many HH writers, Ben Counter can write a compelling void war sequence, arguably almost as good as Abnett (nowhere near ADB though). Also, the pace is good (this is the problem that ruins 'Fulgrim' and probably 'A Thousand Sons' for me). It's in ceramite-crunching action scenes that Ben excels, explaining the somewhat exhausting 'action sequence after action sequence' pace of the book. We're less than 100 pages in before the Word Bearers reveal their treachery and, though their motives are sooo mysterious at this point, it clearly sets up the situation. The baddies will race to the finish line, and the goodies will stop at nothing to thwart their evil plan, for the rest of the book. Standard action movie stuff. With this in mind, 'BFTA' does its job pretty well. It's kind of like 'Speed' with the desperately increasing tension, or perhaps 'Die Hard' in space. Of course, it has the common 'dumb action movie' problem of all the characters being fairly one-dimensional, the villains most of all. The Word Bearers have no characteristics aside from loving Lorgar and hating the Emperor (and Guilliman, kind of as an afterthought). Compared to 'The First Heretic' and its nuanced characterisation of the XVII Legion and their rivalry with the Ultramarines, it's laughable, but that's a pretty unfair comparison. The nature of that entire book was exploring the Word Bearers. This is all about CRASH BASH NAGASH. In fairness I should say that the relationship between Zadkiel and Ultis, an ambitious young Word Bearer line soldier, is kind of interesting. But only interesting by comparison with the rest of the relationships in the book (and it has zero payoff).

Oh yeah, here's a great moment. The Furious Abyss has a giant book on its prow. Makes sense, what with the Word Bearers' iconography, right? Now, considering the size of the ship, this book is probably the size of a fairly large high school. At one point, the book slowly slides open to reveal A MASSIVE GUN. Probably the dumbest Wacky Races-type bullshit I've ever read but it's played 100% serious. I just pictured Cestus on the bridge throwing his helmet on the floor and jumping on it going "OHHH THOSE DAMN WORD BEARERS HAVE GONE TOO FAR THIS TIME!!"

Confusingly, a lot of characters refer to the Warp as 'the abyss', which isn't much help when one of the main ships is an Abyss-class cruiser called the Furious Abyss. Also, sorry, but Furious Abyss sounds like something a livejournal poet would use as a euphemism for a vagina. (Just me?)

So, after the void battle, the Word Bearers flee into the abyss in the Abyss, the Abyss (see what I mean?) and fuck about with the Warp to make pursuit extra difficult, as Lorgar and his sons are wont to do. The Loyalists follow anyway, and struggle to make headway; tempers are frayed, as are the Gellar fields, leading to daemons manifesting on the ships and running amok. One of the ships is ripped open and killed by the Empyrean, described as a sea of deadly emotions which feed on the crew (OK, I know it's established fluff that this is the nature of the Warp, but when it was put in those terms, I could not help but think of this song when reading this scene, and just about wet myself as a result):

Anyway, Mhotep banishses a big scary-shit daemon by yelling and cutting the shit out of it with his special custodes spear that totally isn't a custodes spear. Dude is pretty overpowered, I guess I can see why some people whined about this but it's kind of tempting to overlook his Draigo Junior antics as he's really one of the only memorable characters (apart from the awfulness of Zadkiel). Skraal the World Eater is less forgiveable, I guess because while Mhotep is kind of every generic son of Magnus in the whole HH series, Skraal can't be reconciled so easily with the World Eaters stuff post-'Tales Of Heresy'. The Butchers' Nails aren't mentioned, just generic battle-rage; mind you, it is possible to assume dude has the Nails (as he is pretty much out of control and hulking out for most of the book, and when not in battle he's hostile and twitchy).

Following Mhotep's daemon fight, the brotherhood splits regarding his POSSIBLE HERESY (they even call it 'heresy', even though the Imperium is atheist as fuck at this point) with Space Wolf and Thousand Son taking harsh stands against each other. Dialogue is particularly poor in this section, there's a point where two Astartes say to each other in a very overblown way "You're a stanky liar!" "Well, he who smelt it dealt it!" "NO, YOU!!" I kind of wish this conflict subplot wasn't in here as it just seems too 'on the nose', accentuating the Russ vs Magnus faction-grudge and Nikaea ramifications that were dealt with in the Prospero 'duology'.

Skraal kept watching with abhorred fascination

Hey, Kor Phaeron shows up as well! He's... a sinister asshole dripping with arrogance. Whew! No fluffbreaking here. Actually, the information on Kor Phaeron is a little inconsistent. He's travelling to Calth with a bunch of powerful Chapter Masters, who aren't given any character development (well, not a surprise by this point) but are also, as far as I know, not mentioned again in the whole series. I guess they weren't so all-fired important after all. Or they were Foedral Fell and Morpal Cxir and co. travelling under pseudonyms...? I guess the Word Bearers would have a LOT of Chapter Masters, since their chapters can be as small as 300, but... I'll admit, one of my pet hates is inconsistency like this. "This character is super important and involved in making plans with another major character. You will never see a trace of them again." Also in these sections, mention is made briefly of that dude Sor Talgron, the boring not-Argel Tal from 'Scions Of The Storm'. (I had to look him up later though.) Anyhow, apparently he's close to Terra and keeping up the pretense of loyalty to get closer to the Throneworld and not provoke suspicion. Sounds like grounds for a pretty interesting story. Shame they appear not to have done anything with this one... yet.

Over halfway through this book, important characters start to die. The Loyalists make a bold attempt to board the Furry Abyss (...well, it made me laugh...) while it's docked for repairs. Surprisingly, using stealth as your weapon when you command Space Wolves and World Eaters doesn't work out!! This leads to a pretty great, yet predictable, battle scene - suddenly generic Marines are getting named, in a frantic effort to give their almost instant deaths some emotional weight... it doesn't really work, but great sequence. I was kind of surprised Antiges went out so quick, but at least Cestus didn't drop to his knees and go NOOOOOOOOOOOO...!!! That's reserved for McNeill books I guess. As this thread resolves in ignominious defeat for the Good Guys, with Skraal marooned on the Abyss all on his lonely. I really like the sequence where Zadkiel messes with Skraal's head, telling him the truth about his Primarch's allegiances. Skraal's response is predictable - "FAGOT LIES! I KILL U WITH BAER FISTS!" - but I like that they tried to mess with the guy's mind. Such as it is. Skraal actually goes to some pretty dark places on his Rambo-style journey through the Abyss; there's a part where he sees some 'From Hell' type shit going on to Antiges' corpse as the Word Bearers try to discern the future in his innards.

"They tail us ever doggedly, my lord" uttered Reskiel as he considered the reports of Navigator Esthemya clutched in his gauntlet.

Once a second daemon invasion happens to the Blue Team's ship, it really feels like Ben's out of ideas and blatantly padding the book - this sequence adds little (though it's a little better written and engaging than the first one, certainly ONE of them could be cut). The same kind of stuff happens again, and the only difference is that they actually see Mhotep breaking a daemon's asshole open, rather than just surmising that's what he did... but we're not given time to concern ourselves with that - as almost right away, Cestus and Brynngar are dueling to decide Mhotep's fate. The Brynngar strand kind of fucking loses it at the end, also dude says at one point "You're a sore sight for my eyes." HOW CAN YOU FUCK UP THAT PHRASE? Also, Cestus' hallucination/'spirit journey' into the mythic Hells of Macragge myth is... a bit much, but well-written - I like the conflict between the Ultramarine's cast-iron faith in rationality and his belief those old myths are bullshit, coupled with his old pre-Legion folk beliefs which have been reawakened by a load of crazy shit that he thought was impossible. I also like that in Ultramar, apparently rebels and non-conformists are consigned to one of the inner circles of hell, dying horribly as part of a giant machine that crushes them. Marx would probably have some shit to say about that...

This next bit is just gonna be a 'cleanup' scattering of tiny complaints that didn't actually bother me that much...

• Some misspellings I'm not 100% sure are misspellings: 'reclusium' (Abnett says 'reclusiam'), a tech-adept called 'Magos Epsolon'... hmmmmm. 
• A few times characters warn against "sacrificing (x) on the altar of (y)", a phrase I don't love and one that doesn't gain anything with repetition. 
• Too often here, the Ultramarines just act like 'modern' 40K Space Marines - just brainwashed Ecclesiarchy "Put your trust in the Emprah!!" dogma. So the book does compare poorly to writers who've tried to show the nuances of the 30K setting's attitudes to the Emperor and how the Legions are very different to the Chapters of 'today'. 
• Still, I'll give Counter some credit. His daemonic creatures are creatively done, unlike with so many HH writers, who seem to be happy to just describe the daemon models Now Available From Your Local GW. Counter actually puts effort into making some freaky-ass warp entities. 
• Unfortunately, most of them tend to get fucked up by Mhotep before they get a chance to really DO anything. 
• The ending here is in keeping with the rest of the book - cool/dumb action sequence where BIG SHIP GO CRASH. But DID MHOTEP DIE? Probably. But don't rule out an audio drama soon where Malcador sends Varren to Formaska ONLY TO FIND that dude is still alive and has been eating space-rats for years to stay alive.

Having re-read 'Know No Fear' again as well, Kor Phaeron's plan seems reeeeeal sloppy. So he was gonna trust one ship (a giant one, to be fair) to kill Formaska and Macragge all by itself? In that case, why would a load of other Word Bearers show up at Macragge and observe from a distance? Cause when they see the suicide mission FAIL BADLY, and then all go "Wellllll... we best get to Calth in time for 'Know No Fear' to start I guess... no loose ends here. Certainly none of US have the technology or armaments to destroy that moon ourselves with cyclonic torpedoes or concentrated fire or anything like that." I mean, the assault on Calth itself was meticulously planned, but it seems... LUCKY that in the day or so of build-up after Kor Phaeron arrives in the Calth system in the Infidus Imperator, no ship shows up from Macragge going "Yo, some giant Word Bearers cruiser appeared in system and acted suspiciously, then blew up, we went inside and there was all kinds of wacky Chaos shit in there, so I sez to myself Guilliman will want to know about this, that's what I sez." Yeah OK, the explanation barely needed to be included - the Word Bearers fucked around withe the Warp to stop any information reaching Roboute, like they do so many times in the series. But it would have been nice if 'Know No Fear' had addressed this. I mean, 'Betrayer' managed to acknowledge 'Battle For The Abyss'... no matter what their opinions on the material, I prefer it when the authors don't retcon previous plots out of existence.

Last of all... Counter kind of goes nuts here trying to avoid use of the word 'said'. People are bellowing, hissing or intoning instead (often their voices are choked with awe or thick with rage, too). I don't subscribe to the Elmore Leonard view that authors should only ever use 'said', on pain of death but I mean damn, you can say it SOMETIMES.

'Battle For The Abyss' is too entertaining for me to keep hatin' on. But there's too many dumb turns of phrase, and thesaurus-abusing word choices, for me to give it a high score. I give it 6/10 (though I did enjoy it much more than 'False Gods', that book is, well, better written than this one, and has more important scenes). I also give Ben Counter an apology for the stuff I said about him being the WORST GUY EVER. I'd not object at all to Ben coming back to the series, just give him enough time to write the novel and give him a good editor, after all, 'Galaxy In Flames' was pretty great. Mind you, most of the good ideas/enjoyable parts in this novel were re-done elsewhere much better, not least the 'mismatched Marines try to halt great evil against the odds' plot reuse in 'The Outcast Dead'. But then again, that was widely hated as well... except by me...

I'll leave you with the dream casting for Cestus, captured here facing the prospect of assaulting the Word Bearers' kingship.

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