Warhammer: I'm surprised how good it is.

Submitted by PregnancyRoulette t3_11czu6q in books

TL:DR- Warhammer is really good. It has an epic and heroic vocabulary, and powerful imagery. It's a story of familial civil war where people that thought strife was impossible come to terms that they were betrayed. We see people double-crossed, who double-cross their condemned brethren to stay alive. We see a team that bands together to fight the rebels with absolute trust and confidence and another team that would inhume each of the rebels we're the primary objective. There are stories of love and sacrifice, deception and decent into madness. Brotherly bonds and devotion to duty that inspire hope. Everything below the line is me fanboying

EDIT: Where is this getting shared? I don't think I've ever seen that happen.

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I've seen memes for years. Facebook, or when /r/Grimdark hits r/all; my son downloaded a free game where he's running around with a sword with chainsaw teeth on it. Without being entirely precise I know that in the year 40,000 the Emperor of Mankind is some ghoul on a Golden Throne receiving the human sacrifice of 1,000 psychic humans, called Psykers, there are Legions of Trans/Post Humans called Astartes/Space Marines that have been augmented war, and a princeling named Horus rebelled against the emperor; half the Emperor's sons joined him. Then I learned the 60+book series of multiple Authors that was ending very soon. I was disappointed by GRRM abandoning his abandoning GOT for prequels and Robert Jordan dying, so I've been loathe to start series that aren't finished. I prefer to read classics. But hearing that it was ending I decided to start to see if its worth racing to finish all books by the time the final book is out. The penultimate book comes out in a few days, the final is TBA.

I'm 8 books in. Its good. Its really good. I told someone that I was reading Warhammer and they scoffed because they thought it was just space marines being awesome- all the time. But its more than that. Its a story of Civil War and brothers-in-arms that thought the idea of space marine on space marine strife was incomprehensible. In this Story, the Emperor of Mankind is nigh immortal and incredibly powerful. He clones himself into 20 children called 'Primarchs', each one is a aspect of his personality, comically magnified and named. Mortarion is scythe bearing deathlord; Corax is a Raven lord that Flies into Battle, Ferrus Manus has iron hands. Sanguinus, I'm told becomes vampiric. Angron is angry. There is a scene in The Two Towers where Aragon pulls himself up when meeting the Rohirrim and is so majestic and kingly that his will holds sway. The Astartes and Primarch are like that all the time.

Part of the reason I think Warhammer is so good is that they put a lot of historical facts, phrases into the books. One of the book titles is War Without End, which so reminds me of the bible verse that was the inspiration of the Ken Follet novel "Without End"; You have a 'Father, why have you forsaken me" moment as a Primarch falls into rebellion against the Emperor. The first Novel Horus Rising has a senior military leadership council that advises Horus is called the Mournival. The four members are not only the Face Cards from a poker deck, but also represent the Four Humors: sanguine, choleric. melancholy, and phlegmatic.

The Narrative Structure is important. The first three books, Horus Rising, False Gods and Galaxy in Flames are linear. They introduce Horus and his legion, his fall to rebellion, his recruitment of other Primarchs, sudden betrayals. The Flight of the Eisenstein overlaps with previous books, covers the same characters but at different times. Fulgrim and Legion start before Horus Rising and track two primarch decision to be loyal or rebel. Decent of Angels could be skipped, or serve as a stand alone at this point of my reading. Still good. Great Charactization. It shows what happens when the Emperor shows up to your planet to and you should have a Tolkien-ish horror at the industrialization.

That being said, I do have problems. I think that Horus' fall to rebellion was poorly done. They held out a piece of information from him that should have stopped him from rebelling. They danced around it. This reminded me of one of the Twilight Movies where Edward and Mary Sue had a falling out and an collect call and honest chat could have fixed it. IMO the other Primarch's fall to rebellion that we've seen was more convincing.

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Michaelbirks t1_ja61sb3 wrote

Be aware that there is a lot of content outside of the direct Horus Heresy series.

It covers an amazing breath of the Galaxy of the 41th Millennium beyond just the Legions. Orks, Space Elves, dark space elves, blueberry communists, Military and its Commisars

Ad the Heresy series goes on, the continuity control amongst some of the authors can slip, and we see the same events told repeatedly (A thousand sons and Propero burns, for instance).

Also, in attempting to take itself seriously, it can take itself too seriously at times.

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja64ol1 wrote

If I had to explain Warhammer in a pithy phrase I'd say It was 'Space Rome, but Dethklok. Surprisingly good.'

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AtLeastThisIsntImgur t1_ja6923b wrote

'Dune but Bolt Thrower' makes more sense

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja69maq wrote

Also solid. The hybrid of swords, guns, genosplicing, psykers is really apt.

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pelmasaurio t1_ja9ejev wrote

It is not like dune at all, dune's setting is a vehicle for some intelectual heavy lifting, 40k is, as much I have mad love for it, pretty shallow and dumb, ofc it reminds you of dune because is just that, all the dumb things about dune + tolkien stuff thrown in there.

If dune is meat and potatoes, 40k is just the potatoes.

But i will concede you that as far as fanatic legions of super soldiers go, the space marine crusaders leave the freemen yihadists in the dirt.

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Jamandi_Aldori t1_jaahid3 wrote

>as far as fanatic legions of super soldiers go, the space marine crusaders leave the freemen yihadists in the dirt.

Maybe in a "Vs battle" sense.

As actual characters, the Fremen are far more interesting, both individual and as a group.

Like you said, 40k is shallow and dumb. I love it (I own both the ebooks and physical copies of the entire Gaunt, Eisonhorn, Heresy series, and a ton of other odds and ends, 100+ books)

But even though I love it, it's also dumb. really dumb. Pro-Wrestling-in-space dumb.

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WussyDan t1_ja68hvq wrote

Gaunt's Ghosts, Caiphas Caine, Eisenhorn, and Ravenor are all non-Astartes series that are absolutely worth the time investment to read if you like the Horus Heresy stuff

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Letholdus13131313 t1_ja6d56z wrote

Hah. I was wondering when Warhammer would be brought up in this sub.

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Michaelbirks t1_ja6eicp wrote

It's genre pulp, like Mills & Boon, or the annual Sandford or Grisham releases.

Also, we fans have a pronounced tendency to descend rapidly to "Waaaggghhh! MAKE IT ORKY!"

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Letholdus13131313 t1_ja6evco wrote

I mean yeah? But pulp is good.

Lunatics, all of them. But I do adore them.

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carnajo t1_ja6y0p9 wrote

I think many people forget (or never knew) that a lot of what we consider "classics" was pulp or serials at the time. Not saying that warhammer novels are the futures classics (who knows though) but yeah, nothing wrong with pulp and good old entertainment.

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Scungilli-Man69 t1_ja725fv wrote

Hell yeah dude. The Count of Monte Cristo is considered a literary classic, and it is serial pulp goodness at its core.

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carnajo t1_ja72v23 wrote

Yeah and my memory fails me at the moment but there are a number of literary classics that were originally published as newspaper/magazine periodicals. I believe a lot of Dostoyevsky was but I'm sure there were others including English classics.

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Disaborted t1_ja8gkx3 wrote

Edgar Allen Poe springs to mind. Most of his stories were originally published in newspapers as episodic filler.

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Letholdus13131313 t1_ja6y7a0 wrote

To be fair.

And again taking it into consideration that this series is pulp and fun.

Some of those books feel like I'm getting bullied.

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Drag0nfly_Girl t1_ja6615n wrote

I just started reading Warhammer 40k books. I'm beginning with The Founding, the Gaunt's Ghosts omnibus. Enjoying it so far. Never played the games, but love the lore & factions.

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Michaelbirks t1_ja68238 wrote

Yup. One of the good examples that 40k isn't just about Horus.

Plenty of Heresy to go around.

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Dappershield t1_ja79ie1 wrote

I'm told reading about heresy is, to no surprise, heretical.

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RockTheGock t1_ja6dnqs wrote

The Infinite and The Divine audiobook or bust.

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Eternal_Revolution t1_ja69eoa wrote

Quality definitely varies by author, and outside the 60 Hours Heresy series there are some great other series like Eisenhorn and Gaunts Ghosts. And even humor like Caiphas Cain series.

On the use of old historical texts (esp Catholic) one my favorites is the Sabbatine Martyr connection from Gaunts Ghosts. Sabbatine in 40k is a Joan of Arc type character that dies a martyr (not a spoiler, ancient backstory in the books). A system is named after her, which sets up the title of one of the books “Sabbat Martyr” a play on the prayer/hymn “Stabat Mater”or “Sorrowing Mother”

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typeyou t1_ja6603g wrote

I'm not sure where to start the series. I'm highly interested. Randomly finished one book " Horus Rising" and I cant help but think that I'm missing a lot or I'm somewhere in the middle. Please help.

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Maldevinine t1_ja6j8oo wrote

Part of the problem is that by the time Horus Rising was written, it was part of a setting that had already existed with extensive storytelling within it for about 30 years. You're supposed to know who all the people in the story are already because they're major players in the history of the setting.

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hav0cnz_ t1_ja6t975 wrote

Is there a recommended reading order? I, too, started with Horus Rising after something online told me to, and I feel the same way.

This stuff should be right up my alley, but somehow it just didn't hit.

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Maldevinine t1_ja6uemo wrote

I recommend starting with the 3rd Edition Rulebook and associated codexs, before skipping to the 6th edition codexs and then to the 9th Edition Rulebook and what of the codexs they've released so far because the Necron and Chaos codexs in 9th feature the buildup and fallout of the 13th Black Crusade.

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carnajo t1_ja6y4n0 wrote

This doesn't really help someone who's only interested in the novels. My recommendation would be to jump on some YouTube channels that give introductory and background info on the setting.

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typeyou t1_ja7be6b wrote

That's it! The book read as if I already knew the characters.

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Marcuse0 t1_ja8p99w wrote

The entire series is kind of a "filling in the blanks" around a bunch of known knowns that have been pedalled throughout GW's history. Every single Space Marine and Chaos Space Marine codex came with a potted history of the heresy, the book authors have had to write around these points a lot.

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja66wnw wrote

Horus Rising is where I started because the print order told me to. I'm on book 8 of the publish order. The one one that can be skipped at this point is Decent Of Angels. False Gods and Galaxy in Flames are next in the Publishing order, but you could read Fulgrim, Legion, and Battle for the Abyss for prequels that explain how different legions decided to stand for or against Horus

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General_Josh t1_ja8443l wrote

I'd highly recommend the Eisenhorn books (starting with 'Xenos') by Dan Abnett (same author as Horus Rising).

They're a great jumping off point into the whole Warhammer universe, they don't assume you have any background knowledge.

(Also, while looking it up to make sure I was spelling 'Eisenhorn' right, I just discovered there's a fourth book that I haven't read yet. Immediate buy for me!)

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ManaBurn98 t1_ja9evrz wrote

If you are not aware, there are 2 sister series the the Eisenhorn saga. The "Ravenor" series as well as the "Bequin Saga"(Pariah, Penitent and Emperor willing soon Pandemonium). All of which are amazing reads that just further expand the story Dan Abnett tells.

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Zephrok t1_ja8hp8j wrote

I would read a book that stays away from the major events to start with. In my opinion, the omnibuses are the perfect place to start, s they represent some of the best writing in short form and they cover a breadth of the setting.

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forgotmypassword-_- t1_jabhcku wrote

> Please help.

I actually recommend starting with 40k. What kind of books do you like?

Helsreach is a generally good place to start.

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typeyou t1_jac7h5c wrote

Space oddessy, space fiction or non-fiction, historical, dark ages, western adventure, survival, biographies, supernatural, mysteries. I love all genres.

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forgotmypassword-_- t1_jacxzg3 wrote

>I cant help but think that I'm missing a lot or I'm somewhere in the middle. Please help.

Horus Rising is part of the Horus Heresy series, which is a set of prequel books filling in a story we've known the big plot beats since the 80s(?).

>Space oddessy

Forges of Mars is a self-contained story that'll introduce you to various factions.

>supernatural, mysteries

If you want to go off the deep end, anything by Peter Fehervari. However, you really, really should not start here. His books are weird.

>heist

Shroud of Night is a pretty good heist book.

>historical

You might get a kick out of The Macharian Crusade. The first book is being rereleased, so it's a more affordable price.

>survival

The Night Lords Omnibus is often recommended. Do you want to sympathize with superhuman space terrorists? Because you will.

Alternatively, the Gaunt's Ghost series is basically Sharpe in space.

Helsreach is the story of a city's last stand, following the World's Angriest Man.

The Fabius Bile trilogy follows a mad scientist who tells a god to their face that they don't exist.

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Bevroren t1_ja6zb07 wrote

I'm more of a Warhammer Fantasy guy. The Gotrek and Felix novels are favorites of mine.

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BrotherRoga t1_ja7nfir wrote

Got the three omnibi on my shelf, worn down by overreading.

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Gotreksdoom t1_ja8ui6l wrote

You know there is more than 3 right? Though admittedly I preferred the first 3.

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BrotherRoga t1_ja9spmh wrote

Huh. I was not aware there were 4. I mean, I knew there were some other short stories (Slayer of the Storm God was a great audiobook to listen) but I thought they took place before the last one in the third omnibus...

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sydeburn t1_ja9wkde wrote

I've collected the omnibus' up to the sixth, and the newer Gotrek AoS books as well.
The newer audiobooks with Brain Blessed as the voice of Gotrek are pretty good too.

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Liftkettlebells1 t1_ja6jcrg wrote

Awesome, I love reading this series. 40k Warhammer rules

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Shanibi t1_ja7aat4 wrote

Had to read twice. Thought you found reading the game rules amazing :)

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triggerpuller666 t1_ja6n0oa wrote

One of my favorite books of all time is a 40K book. It's called Helsreach if you're interested. I never could get into any of the other books, although I can spend hours reading the lore of the 40K universe on a wiki. Helsreach is gold though.

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LionManMan t1_ja6qya9 wrote

Do yourself a favour and buy the Night Lords Omnibus.

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TheBigEofM t1_ja6zls6 wrote

I've been reading 40k since the first Horus Heresy novels dropped. Absolutely love all the Siege of Terra and Heresy novels, few fillers but I've really enjoyed them.

Got a lot of the other books as well. Ravenor, Eisenhorn, Bequin, Cain, Inquisition War, Space Marines battles and they're all easy to read with different levels of quality.

Lately, said quality has been a bit... Lax? There's some in game lore that has made me want to stop collecting them due to Deux Ex level nonsense around the Gods of Chaos and it just bored the snot out of me reading it.

Give the ones named above a read. Be wary at just how much lore there really is mind!

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LordDeathkeeper t1_ja7qy08 wrote

Personally I'm far more interested in the regular people of the setting so I've always kind of avoided the space marine/primarch material. But Dan Abnett has plenty of series about guardsmen and fighter pilots and inquisition folks to go around.

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DeathCap4Cutie t1_ja8384b wrote

Yeah there are some cheesy books but there’s also lots of top notch sci-fi books aswell.

If you’re looking for recs check out Night Lords Omnibus or something. I’m a big fan of night lords lore.

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DrBoots t1_ja8jdvb wrote

The first 3 Horus Heresy books are an amazing read. After that the HH series has it's peaks and valleys but never 100% meets the highest points of that first arc.

That being said if you liked Horus Heresy and are looking to get into more of the post heresy setting. I really enjoyed the Gaunt's Ghosts, and Ravenor books.

Not for nothing, but the Caiaphas Cain books are a lot of fun as well. Probably the closest Warhammer 40K gets to being an intentional comedy.

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja8vh6x wrote

>Not for nothing, but the Caiaphas Cain books are a lot of fun as well. Probably the closest Warhammer 40K gets to being an intentional comedy.

Like Robert Asprin, or Terry Pratchett?

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DrBoots t1_ja9lblv wrote

Pratchett might be the closest of the two. In tone more than style.

Basically the Ciaphas Cain books focus on a high ranking officer in the Imperial military (The titular Caiaphas Cain.)

Unlike the majority of Warhammer 40K heroes. He's a coward and a scoundrel who spends most of his military deployment trying to find a place to hide from all the horrors of the galaxy that are trying to kill him. In doing so he ends up falling ass-backwards into greater and greater victories just by sheer dumb luck. Which just puts him in greater peril as he's mistaken for a military genius and a hero.

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MagicusPegacornus t1_ja93xyu wrote

I love warhammer! I recommend anything by Dan Abnett especially the Eisenhorn series. I also recommend for a lighter read the Ciaphas Cain series by Sandy Mitchel

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Snackromancer t1_ja90v1m wrote

This. I'd put the first chapter of Xenos, by Dan Abnett up as one of the best first chapters I've ever read.

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Intelligent_Genitals t1_ja92d51 wrote

40k novels are a strange beast. All of the heavy hitters are mostly centred on big Space Marine men doing bigger manly men stuff in a universe full of alien horror. While I'd recommend parts of the Horus Heresy to a degree (quality between novels is a rollercoaster) there is some solid sci fi hidden in the periphery when authors are willing to step outside the expected boundary.

The Twice Dead King duology by Nate Crowley are both excellent. A character study of an Egyptian robot Pharaoh fighting over crumbs in the face of space Rome.

Forges of Mars by Graham McNeill was hugely enjoyable. It gives a little bit of everyone 40K; Scale, aliens, continent sized space ships. Each chapter is a different protagonist too, so it keeps it fresh.

Brutal Kunnin by Mike Brooks is about as loud and stupid as things get. A short read about the most technologically adept faction attempting out smart an army of football hooligans.

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ChaosAE t1_ja7w4x2 wrote

There is a comedy series on YouTube called If the emperor had a text to speech device that spends a fair bit of time poking fun at the worse parts of the Horus heresy. Basic premise is a way to talk with the emperor is found and he is just really pissed at what everyone has done since.

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Marcuse0 t1_ja8pmtv wrote

If anything, it's a worse source for actual lore than anything else. It's kind of a fan parody that requires you to know about the weird ins and outs of 40k to get most of the in-jokes. Vulcan wanting to boop a Catachan Barking Toad is way less funny when you're hearing about it for the first time in that episode of TTS.

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cgee t1_ja7zujx wrote

I love Warhammer 40k books, but this comment I read in the /r/40kLore subreddit an hour or so ago perfectly sums it up

https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/11cvpwq/whats_something_40k_is_actually_very/ja5tes8/

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja8ac4x wrote

It would be WWI, if they spake with a grand Quixotic prose. If there was a bible version written in that language most congregations in the USA wouldn't use it because their parishioners can't operate on that level.

I think its more complicated than WWE. Part of the rebellion is >!Logar; he has great faith, but with no where to go is it wrong to serve Chaos? Are any of them that turn wrong if they apprear to be the legitimate Gods of this place. The Emperor is secular, but belief in him and holding out a talisman will defeat warp enemies. I'm currently at the part of Battle for the Abyss where the lone person that was able to infiltrate the Abyss was a world eater, whose Primarch was a rebel. !<

The absolute pargetry is over the top. Planning smooth an entire continent for a change of command, constructing massive review towers. I had to stop when I read the sentence, servitor guided missile. Servitors are one of the most abhorrent things I've ever read.

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Marcuse0 t1_ja8qbmn wrote

If you spend even a little time on the 40k sub, there are eternal battles that rage about certain plot points:

Did Magnus really do nothing wrong?

Why are the Space Wolves like they are?

Fuck Erebus (this one isn't controversial, but everyone hates Erebus, there's even a sub on reddit for it)

Why did the Emperor not rescue Angron's people (when he was found)?

Why did the Emperor let the heresy happen?

And so on.

The story is absolutely ridiculous, but it's fundamentally fun and engaging because it's simple enough to be easy to follow while having enough moving parts to be complex out of the sheer number of characters and moving parts. It's engaging but undemanding.

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Kamakaziturtle t1_ja8he5t wrote

This comment reads like someone why follows the overarching lore and less the books and the like, which is honestly a very fair take from that perspective.

I think the books do a good job of setting up interesting characters. The issue is that the major players in the Universe are typically not allowed to have any major development in order to move the universe forward for the game. These characters constantly make bad choices . It's a TTG first and foremost and they need a reason for there to be a universe ending threat coming form chaos for that next edition, and they need the Space Marines to save the day last minute to keep the story going.

This means the overarching storyline and the main drivers of the plot tends to be extremely basic as they only exist to move the world forward for the next edition. It's usually the books exploring underdeveloped characters, or the history of the main players, that do some decent development.

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Impetusin t1_ja8a2lv wrote

I just finished the Rogue Trader series. It was good, but it ends pretty abruptly and leaves a lot of very important plot threads hanging. I’ve been slowly making my way through these books for the past few years. They’re usually quite a slog, but very interesting to read because of the well fleshed out universe they are in.

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Kamakaziturtle t1_ja8g0op wrote

Warhammer is a massive series with some outstanding worldbuilding. Everything is over the top sure, but a lot of authors do a great job of capturing what it would be like to live in said universe (and usually why it's terrible)

As a note, a lot of authors have had their hands on the series which can cause some of the overarching lore to get a bit muddy every once in a while, and quality can be hit or miss. But it's still a lot of fun, theres a reason why theres a large fanbase for Warhammer despite arguably most not actually playing warhammer.

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Marcuse0 t1_ja8orwm wrote

It's worth noting that when the Horus Heresy series was conceived, they did not envisage a 54 book series, with a supplementary multi book Siege of Terra series. So the first three books seem really rushed, and Horus' downfall was super truncated. Then the series opens up with many books about different features of the heresy and it turns out there's plenty of things to talk about.

Having read about 75% of the HH books, I would recommend the books detailing the Word Bearers, The First Heretic, Know No Fear, and Betrayer. The stories around the White Scars are supposed to be good (Scars and The Path of Heaven). The duo of A Thousand Sons and Prospero Burns is pretty much essential to understand the underlying issues of the heresy. The Master of Mankind is a direct look into the Emperor's plans.

While the Siege series has it's ups and downs (why does Gav Thorpe write???) it overall has been an awesome ride. I just finished book 1 of The End and the Death which is the first of the two part finale (with book 2 yet to be released) and I really enjoyed it.

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TerraSollus t1_ja8r9bz wrote

Gaunt’s Ghosts is particularly amazing if you wanna read some normal soldier stuff and don’t mind depression

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AkaiMegami t1_ja8sxze wrote

The interesting part of the lore is how eldar created chaos in the warp.

The emperor was merely trying to restore order from the remains of the human golden age.

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mhardin1337 t1_ja8t2sz wrote

Warhammer is just flat dope. I have listened to a lot of the audiobooks while painting figures.

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piers_plowman t1_ja92kaz wrote

I’ve always been interested in Warhammer, but have no idea where to begin. Any recommendations on where to start? Do Warhammer 40k and Warhammer Fantasy have novels worth reading?

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja95sso wrote

This post is me arguing that they are worth reading. The canonical reading list starts with Horus Rising; other books start prior and show us other people's motivations as they catch up to Horus' rebellion. As well as some outriggers in the same uni.

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belac4862 t1_ja939wp wrote

I don't know why I'm surprised there are nooks on Warhammer. What's the first nook in the series, I may ha 3 to check it out!

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PregnancyRoulette OP t1_ja956bl wrote

I got the main story reading list off the internet. Horus Rising. There are several books that start before this, but they show the motivations of side players- whether defect, or not.

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forgotmypassword-_- t1_jabh3y9 wrote

> Then I learned the 60+book series of multiple Authors that was ending very soon. I was disappointed by GRRM abandoning his abandoning GOT for prequels and Robert Jordan dying, so I've been loathe to start series that aren't finished.

Ironically, the 60+ book series is the prequels. 40k is the "main timeline", 30k is more of a flashback.

> Ferrus Manus has iron hands

You forgot that he leads the legion named the Iron Hands.

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Tobacco_Bhaji t1_ja7vr6f wrote

Maybe 5% of Warhammer fiction is any good. Most of it is truly terrible.

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