Wolfsbane

Wolfsbane by Guy Haley is the forty-ninth installment in the Horus Heresy series. It revolves around Leman Russ and the Space Wolves as they launch a desperate attack on Horus to try and stop him before he reaches Terra.

At first glance, this novel has a lot going for it: a simple but exciting premise, and a long-awaited showdown between primarchs. The Wolves of Fenris versus the Wolves of Cthonia. If he had stuck to that dynamic, Guy Haley might have pulled off an excellent novel. And yet...

The biggest surprise of Wolfsbane is that it heavily features the Mechanicum, and none other than Belisarius Cawl. A new character from 8th edition of 40K responsible for the creation of the Primaris Space Marines, Cawl has existed since at least the Great Crusade, so his insertion into the Horus Heresy makes sense and gives readers an interesting insight into his early life. What role does he play in the battle between the Space Wolves and Sons of Horus, you ask? Er, none. His forge-world's system is the location of the battle, nothing more.

Cawl and the Mechanicum were interesting in Wolfsbane, but I really feel that the novel would have been better served with a Sons of Horus perspective instead. Perhaps with Slaves to Darkness around the corner that wasn't an option because it would have been too much of the same thing...but can we really have too much of Horus, literally the most important character in the series, and the core cast of villains that surround him?

The Space Wolves portions of this story were excellent, exploring everything from Russ's rivalry with Horus as the first and second primarchs found to the supernatural mysticism of Fenris's Underworld. Russ's metaphysical journey into Hel was my favourite part of the entire book, and made it clear that Haley has put a lot of thought and care into the way he portrays the Wolves and their culture. The final battle itself was serviceable, but with the outcome never really in doubt it is robbed of some of its narrative tension.

Wolfsbane shoots for the stars, but by ignoring one of the sides of its central conflict it throws off its own aim and lands on the moon. A good novel for sure, but not quite an excellent one.

Lorgar: Bearer of the Word & Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix

Lorgar: Bearer of the Word by Gav Thorpe is the fifth installment in The Primarchs series. Set on Colchis during Lorgar's upbringing, it chronicles the primarch's rise to power and the influences that shaped him along the way.

This novel is not the best, and that is mostly the product of odd choices made by the author. Gav Thorpe shows us Lorgar's discovery and upbringing through the eyes of Kor Phaeron, who at this point is an exile wandering the desert with a band of followers, and Nairo, a slave in Phaeron's group. Both characters have close, mentor-mentee relationships with Lorgar, but the primarch himself is not a point-of-view character in his own book. Only seeing Lorgar through the eyes of others is somewhat fitting, for of all the primarchs Lorgar is the least likely to choose his own path, but it also cuts readers off from the thoughts and feelings of the character we're most interested in.

The story itself is passable but there wasn't much I found exciting. Lorgar eventually forges the growing band of religious outcasts into an army which takes on the Covenant and there are a string of battles, ending with Lorgar and Kor Phaeron's victory. Gav has put a lot of effort into creating a realistic setting, even inventing a seasonal cycle to explain how humans have adapted to conditions on Colchis, but though it benefits from these details the story takes a long time to get anywhere and doesn't engender any emotional stakes in the outcome. Bearer of the Word is not terrible, but neither is it good.

Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix by Josh Reynolds is the sixth installment in The Primarchs series. It follows Fulgrim and the Emperor's Children during their first solo compliance action in the Great Crusade, which Fulgrim decides to carry out using just seven men.

When this book was released my local Warhammer store ran an event for people to review it. Rather than write a new review here, I have instead copied and pasted what I wrote for the event.

"I finished this book a few days ago, and personally I found that while it didn't quite live up to its own advertising there was still lots to enjoy. Rather than do a big long post I'll break it down into short points.

Cons:

Fulgrim conquering a world with seven warriors. Sounds awesome, but was a bit of a let-down. The seven warriors didn't get much character development and felt interchangeable. They also didn't do anything particularly cool or difficult.

The plot was okay I guess, but I had trouble getting invested. Fulgrim uses a combination of politics and war to conquer Byzas, but it felt like by trying to show both the book didn't do a great job of portraying either. The politics is simplistic and the battle scenes weren't that exciting.

Pros:

Josh Reynolds has paid a lot of attention to the wider setting and it shows. The book is set early in the Great Crusade when only eight of the primarchs have been found, and this effects all sorts of dynamics. Part of Fulgrim's motivation is that he wants to impress everyone because the two primarchs who have been discovered since him, Rogal Dorn and Roboute Guilliman, had both achieved a lot more than him before they met Big E. There's also some details dropped about the Second Primarch, who has yet to 'vanish' from all records at this point.

The past. Josh Reynolds intersperses Fulgrim's thoughts with references to things from his past, building the sense that he is a being with history. Events we've never heard of before colour Fulgrim's thoughts and influence his decisions just like they do for real people. They're also great seeds for short stories.

The cover. It is easily the best in The Primarchs series so far, and one of the best in the entire Horus Heresy.

Overall it was all the juicy little stuff that made me like the Palatine Phoenix. Goes to show that even bland meat can make a good meal if well seasoned." 

The Ladder: 

1: Perturabo: The Hammer of Olympia by Guy Haley
2: Leman Russ: The Great Wolf by Chris Wraight
3: Fulgrim: The Palatine Phoenix by Josh Reynolds
4: Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero by Graham McNeill
5: Lorgar: Bearer of the Word by Gav Thorpe
6: Roboute Guilliman: Lord of Ultramar by David Annandale 

The Burden of Loyalty

The Burden of Loyalty, edited by Laurie Goulding, is the forty-eighth installment in the Horus Heresy series. An anthology, it collects six short stories and two novellas previously published elsewhere.

I'd like to say first that The Burden of Loyalty is quite a good anthology. I enjoyed all of the short stories to varying degrees, skipping the novellas which I have read (and reviewed) before. The Thirteenth Wolf  was a fun inter-dimensional game of hide-and-seek between Space Wolves and Thousand Sons, Into Exile was a moderately interesting look at Arkan Land's flight from Mars, Ordo Sinister and The Heart of the Pharos examined little explored, more esoteric aspects of the universe, The Binary Succession was a surprisingly gripping political drama and Perpetual was a delicious sliver of Dan Abnett goodness.    

That said, there's really not a lot to discuss about this one. It feels like this book was thrown together for the sake of creating a home for Cybernetica and Wolf King, the last two previously limited-edition novellas not already republished or slated for other, more thematic anthologies. The six short stories seem like they were chosen at random and thrown in to bring the page count high enough that this book could be published as a full anthology. There's no overriding theme that holds everything together; more than any other book, The Burden of Loyalty feels like nothing more than the inevitable consequence of Black Library's drive to cram every piece of Horus Heresy material into the numbered series.

Which I'm fine with. I just hope they see the irony in charging as much for this as for a new novel, knowing die-hard collectors like me will buy it on principle, and calling it The Burden of Loyalty.    

Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero & Perturabo: The Hammer of Olympia

Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero by Graham McNeill is the third installment in The Primarchs series. Set fairly early in the Great Crusade, it follows Magnus and the Thousand Sons as they evacuate a dying world named Morningstar alongside Perturabo and the Iron Warriors.

Master of Prospero is an interesting novel in several respects. Graham McNeill uses it as an opportunity to revisit Atharva, his protagonist from The Outcast Dead, at an earlier point in his life. He also uses it to explore the relationship between the Thousand Sons and the Iron Warriors, pairing Ahriman with Forrix for most of the novel. Most interestingly of all, Master of Prospero has Space Marines fighting not aliens or each other but apocalyptic forces of nature. Morningstar is being torn apart by its own magnetic field, and the Thousand Sons and Iron Warriors must evacuate the population.

Those points of interest aside, Master of Prospero makes it clear that Graham McNeill has run out of ideas for Magnus and the Thousand Sons. The story is vaguely interesting, but it doesn't add anything substantial to the lore or deepen readers' understanding of Magnus or his legion. McNeill's writing remains crisp and engaging, but this book gives the impression he's suffering from Thousand Sons fatigue. A different author might not have been able to capture these characters with the same assuredness but they would have brought a fresh take, something this primarch and legion need. As it is, McNeill's entry in this series is the first lash falling on a dead horse.

Perturabo: The Hammer of Olympia by Guy Haley is the fourth installment in The Primarchs series. It follows the Iron Warriors as they prosecute a campaign against the Hrud, as well as chronicling Perturabo's early years on Olympia.

The Hammer of Olympia is an extremely good example of the kind of novel The Primarchs books should be. The choice to explore the Iron Warriors' nihilistic struggle against the Hrud is perfect, because it is both an excellent example of the kind of thankless campaigning that drove the Iron Warriors towards betrayal, and a pivotal period in the life of Barabas Dantioch, the novel's secondary protagonist. We've already met Dantioch in the Heresy series and it's a real treat to experience the events that left him crippled and cast out, knowing that sweet vengeance will be his in the future.

Of course, Hammer of Olympia's main protagonist is Perturabo himself, and Haley has done an exemplary job of deconstructing him as a character. The novel delves deep into Perturabo's psyche as it follows his growth from foundling child to tyrannical warlord on Olympia, and if some of the earlier chapters are a little slow then that is forgotten in the drama of the denouement as the Iron Warriors return to put down their homeworld's rebellion. The time spent with young Perturabo and his adoptive family is paid off as the primarch's last surviving sibling eviscerates his character, laying his flaws bare and explaining that it is not his circumstances but his own misguided reactions to them that have made him a monster. Hammer of Olympia makes it clear that Perturabo's is a self-made tragedy, without even the malign influence of the Warp to blame. It is a powerful ending to an enthralling tale of war and disgrace that deserves the label of masterpiece.

The Ladder

1. Perturabo: The Hammer of Olympia by Guy Haley 
2. Leman Russ: The Great Wolf by Chris Wraight
3. Magnus the Red: Master of Prospero by Graham McNeill
4. Roboute Guilliman: Lord of Ultramar by David Annandale
     

Warhammer Chronicles: The Rise of Nagash

Welcome to Warhammer Chronicles, the newest Black Library series to grace this blog! Since the destruction of the Old World paved the way for Age of Sigmar, mountains of fantastic fiction set in the world of Warhammer Fantasy has been rendered obsolete...until now. Warhammer Chronicles is a series of re-releases published by Black Library making the fiction of the Old World available once more, and I couldn't be more thrilled! From now on I will be interspersing my reviews of the Horus Heresy and The Primarchs series with reviews of Warhammer Chronicles books, beginning with Mike Lee's awesome Rise of Nagash. 

The Rise of Nagash by Mike Lee is an omnibus of three novels chronicling the rise and fall of Nagash, the greatest necromancer who ever lived. Originally published as part of the Time of Legends series, Mike Lee's trilogy takes us to ancient Nehekhara, the first human civilisation to exist in the Old World. Each of the three books spans a different period of Nagash's life (or unlife), while also devoting much of their attention to the diverse peoples and powerful characters who shaped the history of Nehekhara during those turbulent times. Gathered together the three novels chart not just the lives of Nagash, his allies and his foes, but also the origins of the Undead and the Tomb Kings and the fall of the greatest human civilisation the Old World has ever known.

Nagash the Sorcerer, the first novel in the trilogy, spans more than a century. It is built around two plotlines: one following a war between Nagash and an alliance of rebel kings, and one set decades earlier chronicling Nagash's original rise to power in Khemri. The two storylines complement each other, the earlier one gradually revealing the origins of many of the second storyline's plot elements and eventually catching up to its beginning right towards the end of the novel. Each storyline offers something different: Nagash's origin story gives readers insight into his goals and motives and puts his rise into historical context, while the war storyline lets us see Nagash's reign through the eyes of his enemies as it follows their campaign to overthrow him. In both Mike Lee brings ancient Nehekharan society to vivid life, exploring its politics, religion, culture, traditions and methods of warfare. Lee has put an incredible amount of effort into imagining the setting and it pays off, making Nagash the Sorcerer the best of the three novels for understanding ancient Nehekhara as well as the best war novel in the trilogy. It concludes in spectacular fashion with the Siege of Mahrak in which Nagash is finally defeated, bringing an end to the first period of the Great Necromancer's biography and spinning out plot threads that will bear fruit in the second and third books.

Nagash Unbroken begins at the nadir of Nagash's character arc, wounded, exiled, and succumbing to madness. It coincides with the low point of the trilogy, for Nagash Unbroken covers an obscure portion of Nagash's story that felt like it could have been covered in a few chapters rather than dragging out for a whole book. In the middle novel of the trilogy Nagash discovers the mountain that becomes Nagashizzar and learns the secrets of warpstone, waging a war upon the primitive human society that inhabits the area and gradually crushing them beneath his power. This whole plotline really feels like a footnote in Nagash's history, something that could have been glossed over in favour of accelerating his upcoming clash with the skaven. Thankfully, it only takes up half of Nagash Unbroken. The other half is set in Lahmia, the Nehekharan city that rises to prominence in the wake of Nagash's downfall, and follows the rise of Neferata, sister to the king, who becomes the city's ruler and, eventually, the first ever vampire. Neferata is an intriguing character and the chapters devoted to her story are what make Nagash Unbroken worthwhile, as well as linking it to the final book in the trilogy.

Nagash Immortal, the final book in the trilogy, brings Nagash and Neferata's stories together through Alcadizzar, a warrior-prince raised by Neferata who flees upon learning her true nature and ultimately unites the kings of Nehekhara against Lahmia, destroying the city in a climactic battle and driving Neferata and her vampire coven into exile. Meanwhile, Nagash's legions of undead contend with a massive skaven invasion of Cripple Peak, fighting a bitter underground war that eventually grinds to a stalemate and then an uneasy alliance. This plotline is focalised almost entirely through the skaven, who bring their unique and amusing flavour to the story. Nagash and Alcadizzar then go head-to-head in the invasion of Nehekhara, the culmination of everything the trilogy has been building to. Alcadizzar whups Nagash and sends him to bed without dinner, but the Great Necromancer cheats and through a series of terrible spells turns Nehekhara into the land of the dead.

The Rise of Nagash isn't flawless, the second act drags too much for that, but it's pretty close. The only major problems are not textual but to do with the much-revised lore of the Vampire Counts, earlier versions of which are retconned by Lee's writing. According to Vlad von Carstein's expanded backstory he was originally a Nehekharan noble who became Neferata's husband, later fellow vampire, and fought in Nagash's army against Alcadizzar. As such he should be one of the most important characters in Nagash Immortal, but he doesn't even appear. This aside, The Rise of Nagash is an excellent trilogy, an epic tale of war and tragedy that spans the downfall of Nehekhara and the rise of the Vampire Counts and Tomb Kings. It is essential to understanding the backstory of Nagash, one of the most pivotal characters in all Warhammer fiction, and is quite simply a bloody good read (pun intended). I heartily recommend it.                

Roboute Guilliman: Lord of Ultramar & Leman Russ: The Great Wolf

Roboute Guilliman: Lord of Ultramar by David Annandale is the first volume in The Primarchs series, a prequel to the Horus Heresy. It follows Guilliman and the Ultramarines as they bring compliance to the Ork-held world of Thoas during a time of internal tension for the Legion.

Lord of Ultramar starts off The Primarchs series with a dud note. The problem isn't David Annandale's writing (if anything he is improving steadily), nor is it that the series begins with a primarch and legion widely seen as overrated. It is simply that this story didn't need to be told.

There is nothing about the Ultramarines campaign on Thoas that makes it noteworthy, so the military aspects of the story barely registered my interest. Yes, we like stories about Space Marines making war, but that doesn't mean we need hundreds of pages dedicated to every inconsequential battle of the Great Crusade, which is what this felt like. Furthermore, the fact that the 22nd Chapter's issues with their new commander form the main conflict of the plot is laughable; who cares about a few Ultramarines getting their noses out of joint? The story of Lord of Ultramar is pointless and flat.

Part of my frustration with this novel comes from the huge opportunity it misses. The Primarchs series is clearly Black Library taking advantage of the Horus Heresy's popularity, and so in return it should at least offer us insights into interesting and formative parts of each primarch's history. I wanted this book to be about Guilliman's war to unify Macragge or the campaign against the Osirian Psybrids that nearly broke the Ultramarines and forced them to re-examine themselves as a legion. What we got was an inconsequential waste of words.

Leman Russ: The Great Wolf by Chris Wraight is the second volume in The Primarchs series. It tells the story of the joint Space Wolves / Dark Angels campaign to pacify Dulan, and the origins of the legendary feud between Russ and the Lion.

Right off the bat, The Great Wolf improves upon Lord of Ultramar by being about a pivotal and interesting part of the Space Wolves backstory. The novel opens somewhere in M32 with a newly initiated Space Wolf who has been given an important axe and encounters Russ deep in the Fang, who tells him the saga to explain its significance. The bulk of the novel is a straightforward military story that follows the Space Wolves and Dark Angels conquest of Dulan, but it benefits from crisp writing and having two different legions to follow. A side-plot follows a few members of the Wolves trying to retrieve a captured comrade who has succumbed to the Curse of the Wulfen before the legion's secret gets out, but this felt a little contrived. The Great Wolf is a good enough story without it.

The climax of the novel comes when the Lion executes the Tyrant of Dulan whom Russ had claimed as his own, resulting in their famous duel. The details differ quite a bit from the legend it has become, but the result is the same. The axe is the initiate bears was wielded by the Lion in that famous fight and used against him by Russ, making it a legion relic.

The Great Wolf was a satisfying novel, and its frame story in particular is excellent. It is proof that The Primarchs series can live up to its potential.

The Ladder 

Choosing the rankings for these two novels was easy, as it was a simple case of deciding which was better. My decision will not surprise anyone.

1. Leman Russ, the Great Wolf by Chris Wraight
2. Roboute Guilliman, Lord of Ultramar by David Annandale    
   

Dark Imperium

Dark Imperium by Guy Haley is a Warhammer 40K novel set after the cataclysmic events of 8th Edition, released to accompany the launch of the Dark Imperium boxed set. A gigantic warp storm has torn the galaxy in half, plunging half of the Imperium into anarchy, but in this darkest hour a primarch has arisen from near-death to lead a new brand of Space Marines in defense of humanity...Roboute Guilliman has returned.

That grand introduction I just did is a bit misleading, because it doesn't capture the spirit of Dark Imperium. Haley's novel, the first to chronicle any of the events unfolding in this brave new 8th-ed galaxy, doesn't have a grandiose, overly-dramatic story arc. Its pages aren't clotted with the viscera of battle scenes, and the chapters don't grind out the same drumbeat of endless war we've heard a thousand times before. Haley has written a much smarter novel than that.

The new status-quo introduced in the 8th edition of Warhammer 40K simply cannot be encompassed by a single novel. What Haley has achieved is a book that gives readers a sense of the broader picture without collapsing beneath its weight. Set mainly in Ultramar, Dark Imperium brings the Indomitus Crusade to a close as Guilliman hurries home to combat the threat of Mortarion, providing varied insights into the changing Imperium along the way. By sticking to this loose narrative Haley is able to explore many rewarding aspects of the new setting, from the dissolution of the Primaris Space Marines into their parent chapters to the clash between Guilliman's 30K mindset and the grim darkness of the far future. He handles the primarch himself with aplomb, crafting a nuanced version of Guilliman whose struggles against the immense difficulties of his new position humanise him in a way I haven't seen before. His dislike of Cato Sicarius is the icing on the cake.

Dark Imperium lacks a singular antagonist; while Mortarion makes an appearance he never confronts Guilliman. Instead, the power of Nurgle itself is made the enemy, literally manifesting through a subplot that plays out in a hospital on Iax. The human soldiers convalescing there provide a counterpoint to Guilliman's rarefied perspective, anchoring part of the story in human experiences. Introducing Nurgle as an insidious threat that builds to breaking point was a masterstroke, and the panoply of horror that results is as glorious to read as it is repulsive. I expected Guilliman to come to Iax's rescue and therefore tie the main strands of the story together, but that isn't the story Guy Haley has written. Dark Imperium is an introduction, and the big picture matters more than narrative structure.

It isn't often that a novel subverts my expectations in a good way, but Dark Imperium did. It is a collection of different elements that together tell a story that was needed rather than one that was expected. It is both a continuation of all that has come before and the stepping off point for a whole new paradigm, and I cannot think of anything that embodies the spirit of 8th edition more than that.