Warhammer Adventures – What’s All the Fuss About?

In a move which seems to be causing quite a stir online, the Warhammer Community site has announced the release of a brand new range of books set in the Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer Age of Sigmar universes and aimed at readers aged 8 to 12 – Warhammer Adventures. They’re not going to be released until 2019, and specifics are still thin on the ground, be we do know various bits of information.

Firstly, there are going to be two series, one for each IP (Realm Quest for Age of Sigmar and Warped Galaxies for 40k), and they’re going to be written by “best selling authors with experience of writing fantastic fiction for younger readers”. The first two are from authors Tom Huddleston and Cavan Scott (who existing BL fans might recognise from various short stories), although it’s not clear yet whether they will be writing the whole series between them, or whether more authors will be involved. The titles and covers are available for the first two books:

• Realm Quest: City of Lifestone by Tom Huddleston.
• Warped Galaxies: Attack of the Necron by Cavan Scott.

There’s already a Warhammer Adventures website, with a little bit of information and artwork relating to each of those two books and their characters, but given the 2019 release date I’d expect more information to be slowly revealed over the coming months. There’s very little more available yet – Cavan has published a quick post over on his website, ending with a ‘more soon’ caveat, so we might see information popping up there, on Warhammer Community and on the Warhammer Adventures site.

My initial reaction
I first spotted the news when someone pointed it out to me on Twitter, strangely enough in light of comments Peter Fehervari made in my recent interview with him about the idea of different ‘imprints’ within Black Library (although Peter was talking more about a Vertigo-style imprint for more graphic/adult themes). My first reaction to reading the Community article was very simple – what a great idea! Regular Track of Words readers will, I’m sure, be aware that I try to look for positives first – in this instance what jumped out to me was the opportunity that these books provide to encourage new, younger readers to learn about the worlds of Warhammer. What’s not to like about that?

The internet’s reaction
True to form, the online reaction to the news was…let’s say mixed. First of all, it’s worth pointing out that whatever the response from individual people, there’s no doubt this has provoked conversations – I checked the post that Black Library made about it on Facebook, and after six hours I think it had generated 1.4k comments! As I write this it’s at over two thousand. Compare that to the previous post (about Sands of Blood for Digital Monday) which has six comments, and the following post (BL’s obligatory GDPR-related re-subscribe post) which has five comments. Even the monthly competition post earlier in May only had a little over two hundred…so it’s clear that this has attracted WAY more attention than BL usually gets.

Let’s just have a quick look at the main points that seem to be getting raised, on both sides.

The argument for…
Let’s look at the positives, first. The main positive response seems to be quite simple – that offering a way of getting new readers into the Warhammer hobby, at a suitable age, is A Good Thing. It’s really heartening to see so many parents (and librarians) talking about how excited they and/or their children are about this. A few other repeated comments I spotted are:

• Not everyone wants to let children read main-line Black Library books (especially 40k) because they are often a bit too graphic, or deal with themes deemed inappropriate – but they do want to find a way to ‘pass on the torch’ and get kids into the hobby.
• Equally, some younger readers do try to read BL fiction (and presumably other SF & F) but struggle with books written for older audiences.
• Lots of people are commenting on how much they wish these had been available when they were younger.
• Inclusivity comes up quite a bit – showing female characters, and non-white characters, sends a good message to youngsters (which I see some main-line BL authors talking about online, although that’s a wider conversation).

So actually there are quite a lot of positive responses, which for me personally very much chime with my own opinions. Not everyone thinks that way, however…

The argument against…
So let’s take a look at the comments from people less excited about this idea. I’ve read through lots of the comments, both on Facebook and elsewhere, and a lot of them boil down to a fear that by introducing child-friendly stories GW/BL are watering down or censoring the universes (especially 40k), and as a result the games and/or novels are going to change to something more child-friendly and less grimdark. The word ‘cartoony’ has been bandied around, presumably in response to the artwork – which to be fair is brighter and friendlier than what we normally see from GW and BL.

I’ve also seen LOADS of people talking about how they got into the wider hobby, or specifically BL fiction, pointing out that when they started reading (at a young age, largely) they jumped straight into full-strength BL fiction. I’ve seen people pointing out that plenty of kids are actually very happy to deal with dark, violent fiction, in which case existing BL books are fine for them, and that they won’t need hand holding with stories written to exclude the really brutal parts of the universe. Even if they do start off with lighter books, it may be a bit of a shock to them when they ‘graduate’ to main-range novels.

Sadly there’s also a proportion of people who are taking umbrage with the very inclusivity that other people are happy about. Certain comments I’ve seen have been critical of the fact that the illustrations contain female characters, or non-white characters, or that the male/white characters are portrayed in ‘subordinate’ positions. I can cope with everyone who’s grumbling about watering down, censorship etc. (more on that in a moment) but I’m not having this nonsense about inclusivity being a bad thing. I think it’s a real shame that some people take such offence over this – that’s a conversation for a different day, but let’s just say it’s disappointing.

Pros vs cons
In terms of all those negative comments…WOAH THERE WITH YOUR ASSUMPTIONS! Maybe wait and see before jumping to wild conclusions? It feels a lot like standard internet fandom overreaction here – all we’ve seen is the covers, a bit of artwork and a TINY bit of information about the characters and stories. Until anyone actually reads one of them, however, it’s purely speculation. It might be that some of those concerns prove valid…but we just don’t know. Personally I’d always err on the side of positivity, rather than instantly assuming everything’s going to be crap.

Interestingly enough though, I can sort of see where some of those hasty criticisms are coming from. To make stories more suitable to 8 to 12 year olds, it’s a safe assumption that some of the darkness (i.e the real in-your-face action, the more brutal deaths, and so on) is likely to be toned down. Black Library already has pretty strict guidelines on what is and isn’t appropriate, and I’m sure that’s at least partly because a large proportion of Warhammer fans – of any sort – are children. As such, it’s already not appropriate to portray certain things. You won’t find real-world swearing in BL fiction, or sex scenes, or violence against genuinely helpless characters, or – believe it or not – overly, gratuitous violence. I know some people have an issue with this, but it’s true. Violence for violence’s sake simply doesn’t appear in BL.

So with that in mind, sure – Warhammer Adventures is highly likely to be less violent and less overtly ‘grimdark’ than mainline Black Library books are. HOWEVER…in my personal opinion, not only is that a good thing (kids who want the darker stuff can always move on to other books), it’s in no way going to affect my enjoyment of ‘normal’ BL stories. Do I believe for a moment that the creation of a line of books (or indeed any products) intended specifically to start children off on a path to engaging with the wider hobby is going to lead to a ‘dilution’ of what I love about the hobby? Nah. Nope. I don’t see it. I mean…why would it?

Games Workshop wants to attract youngsters to the hobby – which is very sensible. Those youngsters who do get into the hobby, and stick with it, and get a bit older, and want to dig into the lore a bit more…they’re not going to want to carry on reading books aimed at 8 to 12 year olds. The point is that this is a gateway to something bigger, and – yes – darker. Not a wholesale adjustment of the background. Maybe people have seen that sort of thing happen before with other IPs; I’m not really engaged with other IPs, so can’t comment on that. Perhaps I’m being a bit naive, but I simply can’t see GW going down that route. It doesn’t make sense.

More than that, however, I’d actually dispute the idea that books for younger readers can’t be dark. Kids LOVE darkness. I think it’s another rash assumption to say that Warhammer Adventures is going to COMPLETELY tone down the darkness – while I don’t imagine we’re going to see anything too violent, graphic or straight-up weird, I wouldn’t be surprised to still see plenty of action and fighting, and characters coping with violence and death. Look at Harry Potter – aimed at kids, but pretty dark in a lot of places. Hell, anyone remember the Redwall books by Brian Jacques? Plenty of characters died in those books, and we’re talking anthropomorphic animals! I’d say wait and see – these might be a little darker than you’d expect. After all, Cavan Scott already has form writing 40k fiction featuring both young characters, Space Marines and necrons, in Flayed and Hidden Treasures, both of which are super dark, but still easy reads.

As for the positive comments, like I said before I think most of those chime with my own feelings on this. I don’t have children, or indeed know any children aged between 8 and 12, but personally I don’t think it’s necessary to have children to understand that giving kids more options for getting into Warhammer is a good idea. I was reading pretty widely at a young age, and indeed got into Warhammer fiction through things like Ian Watson’s Inquisition Wars trilogy and David Ferring’s Konrad trilogy, but I also enjoyed reading books designed for my age group as well. I don’t think the two things are mutually exclusive!

For me the key thing is that this provides another option. Some younger readers will be perfectly happy to start with main-line BL books, and remember that some BL books are darker than others – I could see youngsters getting into things like Andy Clark’s Kingsblade, for example, a bit more than the Horus Heresy. Equally, some might prefer to start by reading things aimed at their age group – in which case Warhammer Adventures gives them an option that they currently don’t have. That’s all good, in my mind.

Might kids who love Warhammer Adventures subsequently find main-range Black Library stories a bit too dark for them? Sure, I can see that happening…sometimes. Some kids are going to love adventure stories, and be ok with the idea of necrons and Stormcast Eternals, but balk at the full-strength bleakness of 40k or the intensity of what the Chaos gods really mean. I don’t really see the issue, though. Is it going to be any different to someone reading another sci-fi or fantasy book for young readers and then giving a BL novel a go? Not really. It’s just another option.

Final thoughts
One of the most interesting things I’ve noticed with the online reaction is that there seemed to be a surge of anger at first, followed by LOADS of positivity. I haven’t read every single comment on Facebook, and certainly haven’t followed every thread in Twitter and elsewhere, but it does feel like there’s a minority who take genuine offence at the concept of Warhammer Adventures, and a majority who see it as a great idea. In between that there are people who remain – fairly – on the fence, who have concerns but don’t see the need to rant and rave. And that’s entirely fair enough.

Ultimately, two things come to mind. Firstly, we’re not going to know exactly what these will be like until we get to read them – in which case productive, open, polite discussions are absolutely appropriate, but will remain speculative until we have further information. Secondly, as adults I think it’s worth remembering that at the end of the day these books are not for us – they’re for young readers, who see things differently to how we do. I’m going to be particularly interested to see the response from the actual target audience once these books are released – that’s going to be the true litmus test.

Until then, I’m happy to wait and see, and to trust in both GW/BL and the authors to deliver something which remains true to the spirit (if not the letter) of the Warhammer universes, whilst also being exciting and appealing to young readers. It’s possible that the end result will prove some of peoples’ fears correct, but personally I think these are going to be great fun. I’m in my thirties and I still love reading books for younger readers, because they tend to be really great, entertaining stories first and foremost.

I’m definitely going to read at least the first couple of the Warhammer Adventures books, and I’ve a sneaky feeling I’m going to love them! I also have a suspicion that this is just the first of many new products we’re going to see from Games Workshop in future, which branch out from the core games and series…and I’m excited to see what we get.

Let me know what you think about this in the comments below, or on Facebook or Twitter. Also let me know if you’re interested to read reviews of these books, and if so what you’d like to see the focus of those reviews be – I’d love to hear what you think.