I’ve been meaning to blog about something for a long time. I got ready, I got ready… and finally I got ready.
So, I wanted to tell you a little about Warhammer. Well, not about Warhammer as a whole, because this topic is immense, but rather about one important part of this phenomenon, which most fully reveals the universe – about books. About their artistic content and how much their reading influences the perception of Warhammer as a whole. I won’t go too deep into Wach’s background, I’ll just go over the books I’ve read and talk a little about their value, both literary and for the same background.
To begin with, I would like to note that, like many others, my acquaintance with Warhammer began with the game. And if for most it is some kind of Dawn of War, then for me it is Space Marine. Simply because I don’t really like strategy as a genre and DOVs somehow passed me by at one time, however, I couldn’t miss the action with huge brutal guys armed with chainswords and power axes. To tell the truth, I became interested in the universe after the first trailers and, of course, having learned that there were books about the Ultramarines appearing there, I immediately rushed to look for these books.
Reading Graham McNeill’s work was difficult for me. I must explain that I read books regularly, and different ones, and I know my way around domestic and foreign science fiction quite well. What I mean is that I have something to compare with. So, what McNeill writes should be sold at the subway in paperbacks. The language is very difficult to understand (although perhaps the translators did their best here), unconvincing and downright stupid characters, mediocre action. This is not what I expected from a book about huge men with chainswords. Where is the epic? Where is the heroic pathos that people love to mention about Vakha at all sorts of lurks?? I don’t argue, there are some rudiments, but overall it’s classic pulp fiction.
In order not to be unfounded, I will give a couple of examples. Here we have a main character – Uriel Ventris, recently promoted to captain of a space marine company. Before that, for at least two hundred years he was engaged in the massacre of all living things in the name of the Emperor, and for some time already in the position of one of the senior officers of the company. Hence the question: where does he get so much cohabitation from?? And the second question to follow: where are at least the rudiments of tactical thinking?? I did not see the elite of the armed forces of the Imperium in this book. McNeill turned out to be not daring special forces, but some thugs with powerful guns. Although for the pretentious overpowering at the end the first book can be given one plus sign, simply because at least it exists.
The next books in the series were also nothing amazing. I already read “Black Sun” literally through force, and I completely abandoned “Kill Zone” after a couple of chapters.
Nevertheless, I did not www.rush-casino.co.uk despair, having decided to try my luck with another author and, accordingly, another Order. My choice fell on William King and the series about the Space Wolves. And she did not disappoint me, even when the author changed and the quality of the writing dropped to the same level. Almost all the books in this series are good fantasy action films, where the heroes are heroic, and the commanders command, and do not smear snot.
The first book tells about the development of an ordinary boy into a brave space marine. It is told in detail, adjusted to the customs of the Order, of course. Unlike McNeill, everything is cheerful and dynamic. Well, quite informative, on top of everything else. I think it’s because of this series that the Order of the Space Wolves became one of my favorites. And how can you not be impressed by these dashing space Vikings, who, in between battles, do not pray collectively or individually, but throw feasts with booze?! Why, they even have a peculiar sense of humor!
But the Imperium is not filled with wolves alone, and therefore it’s time to move on to a series of books about the Blood Angels by James Swallow. In essence, his books are the same standard space action films, only less original than King’s and more digestible than McNeill’s. I remember them primarily because the first two books describe the split of the Order due to another chaos conspiracy. The third book is also quite remarkable – it shows the life of the Angels and their relationship with the successor Orders. The fourth is a standard spacequest with a lot of battles and overcoming. The weakest book of all.
Separately, it is worth noting the main character of the books – the space marine Rafen – for he turned out to be an extremely holistic character, which is quite unusual for this kind of literature. The same Ventris was described in a very one-sided and stereotyped way. Rafen, throughout all the books, is shown to the reader from different sides, which, undoubtedly, allows you to watch his adventures with much more interest than if he were just a dummy around whom all the action revolves. So, he is not a dummy, the action does not revolve around him, but he himself tries to somehow influence the chaos and lawlessness happening around him, which, in fact, is described in the first two books.
In general, the series is solid, significantly shedding light on the Order of the Blood Angels, although not in as much detail as it was with the same wolves.
For a change, I’ll tell you about the Chaos Space Marines series by Aaron Dembski-Bowden. So, I never forced myself to read the first book in the series, and I can’t name the exact reason for this, because there are two equivalent options here. Either I just don’t like chaotic aesthetics, or Dembski-Bowden writes simply disgusting quality reading material. In any case, I didn’t master almost anything of what he wrote. So I don’t presume to judge the Lords of the Night, I’ll limit myself only to what didn’t suit me personally.
I suppose you can also remember the series about Ben Counter’s Soul Drinkers, who can also be considered chaosites. I’ve almost read the first book and the verdict is the same – bad. And I doubt that the subsequent books in the series will be much better. Although, the image of a space marine as a stubborn bastard, confident in his superiority over pathetic little people, is fully revealed here.
In conclusion, I would like to mention a couple more books. So, Nick Kyme "Salamanders". It seems like this is the beginning of a series about – who would have thought?! – Order of the Salamanders, but since only this can be found in the Russian translation, I consider it as a separate book.
I’ll say right away that the book is good at least because the Salamanders themselves are described in great detail. Their worldview, customs, rituals, combat doctrine – you can learn about all this in this book. As for the plot component itself, it is shamelessly merged. At the very beginning we are told about the pathetic death of one of the captains during a clash with the Chaos Space Marines. The idea of revenge on the offenders runs through the entire book and goes nowhere, we need to think about the upcoming books in the series… We can only watch the intra-squad squabble, but not a very interesting space quest. However, if a sequel comes out, I won’t miss it.
I almost forgot! There is one funny moment in this book, namely the appearance of the Order of Evil Marines. Either the translators did their best, or the author decided to make fun of them and in the original they are really Engrimarins, but it turned out well. These kind of poor relatives from the Space Marines, who poke at everything that is bad, don’t like their wealthier colleagues, and in general they’re assholes. I would love to read a separate book about them!))
And finally, I’ll tell you about Dan Abnett’s book “Brothers of the Snake”. It was literally published in Russian translation, and it was the impressions from reading it that prompted me to write this article. I won’t say that the book is very good, but it does its job quite well – it introduces the reader to the new order of space marines, the Iron Snakes. The order is not standard and interesting. If the Spacewolves are dominated by Scandinavian motifs, then here they are clearly ancient Greek. With corresponding traditions and features. In fact, the book is a collection of stories about one of the branches of this order. Some of the stories are interesting, others not so much, but in general Abnett did a good job of describing the background for the whole Order through the misadventures of one small unit.
That’s all the books about space marines of the forty-first millennium that I read and managed to remember. I would like to note that it is specifically about the Space Marines, and specifically about the forty-first millennium. If anyone was interested in reading about this, I can remember books about other components of Warhammer, although they are not as extensively covered as Space Marines. Or books on the Horus Heresy – also an inexhaustible topic with many interesting, not so, and downright crap works.
P.S. In general, this is my first post, don’t judge strictly what else they say in such cases. Oh, yes – I expressed only my opinion and it may not coincide with the opinion of… someone else. I look forward to your feedback and suggestions, if any.