The Black Library Celebration 2019

Back at the beginning of 2018, the first Black Library Celebration took place over the weekend of the 24th and 25th February to mark 20 years of Black Library stories. It looks like we can now say that it’s an annual event, as the 2019 Black Library Celebration has recently taken place, this time featuring a whole week of brand new releases as a celebration (surprise, surprise) of all things Black Library. An annual celebration of stories set in the worlds of 40k and Age of Sigmar is something I can absolutely get behind, so I thought I’d take a closer look at what was involved this year.

Expectations
First of all, a quick note about last year’s event, which was intended to be a celebration of 20 years of BL. I wrote a reasonably detailed section about it in that week’s Black Library Weekly article, which you can read here, but suffice to say I was a little disappointed as while there were some cool new releases to buy there was nothing really celebratory about the weekend itself. As a result, I think I went into this year’s celebration with somewhat lower expectations – so much so that I wasn’t too disappointed when I found out the dates and realised I was going to busy and unable to head to a GW store.

In advance of this year’s celebration there was a fair bit of information provided on the Warhammer Community site, so with that alongside my experience from last year I had pretty clear expectations. Here’s what we knew in advance was going to be available to buy over the course of the week and the weekend:

• Six brand new short stories, one released each day from Monday to Saturday.
• Four brand titles released at the weekend – three novels and an audio drama boxed set.
• Several new paperback editions of older titles.
• A new miniature of Commissar Severina Raine from Rachel Harrison’s 40k stories.
• Some Horus Heresy-themed merchandise.
• A free paperback anthology for anyone buying books in GW stores or online.

Short stories
I really liked the idea of having a week of new short stories leading up to the celebration – it’s always great to get these sorts of weeks (they occasionally pop up, like the usual Summer of Reading campaign), especially in light of all the other Digital Monday releases this year being re-released stories rather than new content. Happily, all six of the new stories were really good as well – here’s the rundown, with links to my reviews if you fancy checking those out:

• Bringer of Sorrow by Aaron Dembski-Bowden
• The Mistress of Threads by John French
• Lantern’s Light by James Swallow
• Trials by Rachel Harrison
• Ghost of Nuceria by Ian St. Martin
• Redeemer by Guy Haley

I thought these were six interesting, often unusual stories with a nice mixture of existing characters – either well-known names or from ongoing series. In case you’re not familiar, here’s how they tie in with other stories:

• Bringer of Sorrow is a sequel to The Master of Mankind
• The Mistress of Threads is part of the Horusian Wars series
• Lantern’s Light is a companion piece to The Buried Dagger
• Trials is part of Rachel’s ongoing Severina Raine series
• Ghost of Nuceria sits between Angron: Slave of Nuceria and After Desh’ea
• Redeemer doesn’t directly link to anything but feels like a nice companion to The Devastation of Baal

As short story weeks go I’d say this was one of the strongest I can remember, although there’s one thing which stands out to me as unusual – the absence of any Age of Sigmar stories. This was, after all, supposed to be a celebration of all things Black Library, so you might have expected there to be have been at least one Age of Sigmar story in there. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy with all six stories, but it does feel like a strange omission.

Weekend releases
Just in case you’re not already aware, the normal release process for Black Library titles is for them to go up for pre-order one weekend, and then be available to download, delivery and/or pick up in stores the following weekend. Happily, all of the new releases for this weekend were actually available to buy on the Saturday in GW stores. Here’s a list of everything that was available:

• The Buried Dagger by James Swallow – book 54 in the Horus Heresy
• Angron: Slave of Nuceria by Ian St. Martin – the 10th Primarchs novel in Limited Edition hardback
• Honourbound by Rachel Harrison – the first full Severina Raine novel
• Our Martyred Lady by Gav Thorpe – a 4+ hour 40k audio drama boxed set
• Horus Rising by Dan Abnett – Black Library Celebration edition
• False Gods by Graham McNeill – Black Library Celebration edition
• Storm of Iron by Graham McNeill – Reader’s Choice reprint
• Gotrek & Felix: City of the Damned by David Guymer – Reader’s Choice reprint
• Severina Raine miniature (in resin)
• The Horus Heresy sketchbook – I think you can work out what that is
• A set of Horus Heresy-branded coasters

The four brand new releases were all pretty cool, I thought – I actually already had copies of the two Heresy books (and they’re both really good), but most people won’t have had them yet and I’ve a feeling they will both have been VERY popular. I ran a quick Twitter poll beforehand and the two of them were pretty much neck and neck as the titles people were most looking forward to.

Personally I was most looking forward to Rachel Harrison’s debut novel Honourbound, although somehow I STILL haven’t got round to reading it. Soon! I have, however, listened to Our Martyred Lady and very much enjoyed it – you can check out my review if you’re interested, but the short version is that if you’re interested in audio dramas then you should listen to this one. The cast is BRILLIANT (especially Emma Gregory as Celestine), the production values are phenomenal, and it’s packed full of vintage 40k lore.

As with the short stories, while I’m very happy with all of the new releases I’d have really liked to have seen at least one Age of Sigmar title (novel, novella, audio drama) released as part of the Celebration weekend. Personally I think that in order to be a proper celebration of ‘all things Black Library’ it needs to cater to fans who are only interested in one of the settings – it covered 40k and Heresy fans, but neglected AoS fans, which feels like a mistake to me.

For the paperback releases, let’s start with the Reader’s Choice paperbacks – Storm of Iron and City of the Damned – which were voted for by the fans last year. It’s cool to see them getting physical editions, especially Storm of Iron which is a stone cold 40k classic and fully deserves to be back in print. I’ve already got paperback copies of both, but I rather like the idea behind these – to give everyone the chance to get hold of copies, not just crusty old fans like me – although as with last year’s pair (Brothers of the Snake and Drachenfels) it would maybe have been nice to see them published in editions which stood out from the norm, to reflect the fact that they’d been chosen by the fans. I’m nitpicking, though.

As for the ‘Celebration 2019 edition’ Heresy novels…these felt a bit strange, to me. New versions of books one and two in the Horus Heresy series…but only one and two? Not three? That seems a bit weird, given that it’s very much an opening trilogy. Unsubstantiated rumours about book three aside, I’m surprised that this wasn’t a full trilogy given the new treatment – but even if it had been all three, I’m not sure how popular these are going to be. I mean, I’ve already got my original paperbacks plus the nice glossy hardback editions…plus Hachette 40k Legends editions! I guess they make a nice little extra for hardcore collectors, but for me personally even the author introductions and additional short stories (Misbegotten by Dan Abnett and The Wolf of Ash and Fire by Graham McNeill) don’t offer enough to tempt me.

There’s not a huge amount to say about the sketchbook and coasters – I don’t think they’re hugely exciting, but there’s nothing wrong with a bit of merch to bolster the numbers of releases a little bit. The AWESOME new Severina Raine miniature was a great addition to the weekend, however – not only is it a very cool mini in its own right, I think it sends a really positive message that GW are prepared to commit resources to making a model of a character who before that point had only been seen in a handful of short stories. Oh, and a FEMALE Imperial Guard model too, who looks every bit as badass as her male counterparts. Good work Games Workshop. Of course not all BL fans are also hobbyists, but I suspect most will be, so this should have appealed to lots of people.

Overall I think the ‘cool stuff to buy’ aspect of this year’s BL Celebration was great, and arguably better than 2018’s. No real complaints from me on that front, barring the aforementioned absence of Age of Sigmar (come on BL, please fix that for next year!).

Free anthology
If you bought anything on the BL or GW websites, in GW stores or – as I did a little later on – in some independent stores, you could pick up a free copy of an anthology featuring six short stories. These have all been released before as e-shorts, but only two have previously been available in physical format, so it was a good opportunity in particular for anyone who isn’t into ebooks to get hold of some cool new stories. Here’s the contents of the anthology, with links out to my reviews of the individual stories:

• The Board is Set by Gav Thorpe (also available in Heralds of the Siege)
• Grandfather’s Gift by Guy Haley
• Endurance by Chris Wraight
• A Company of Shadows by Rachel Harrison
• Gods’ Gift by David Guymer (also available in Gods & Mortals)
• Ghosts of Demesnus by Josh Reynolds

There are some great stories in there, with a nice balance across the different settings including – thankfully – a couple of Age of Sigmar stories. Taken as a whole it would be a great way for someone new to BL to get a feel for the kind of stories available across the ranges, with links out to loads of interesting ongoing series. Chances are most hardcore BL fans (apart from the digitally-phobic) will have read most or all of these, but then there’s no harm in having a physical copy as well! Overall it’s a great little anthology and continues the positive trend in this respect started with last year’s celebration.

Atmosphere
You’ve probably noticed a theme throughout this article – a focus on stuff to buy. That’s all well and good, but in my mind a ‘celebration of all things Black Library’ should also bring with it a sense of excitement, of bringing the fan community together and doing something interesting or unusual for this one week/weekend a year. This year the week of short stories helped build a little bit of atmosphere, and got people talking a bit – I certainly felt like it contributed to more discussion than the Digital Monday releases had done, and I felt myself getting excited each morning to find out what each story was going to be about. I hope BL do that again next year, for sure.

I’m often disappointed by how little Black Library-related content shows up on the Warhammer Community site, so it was good to see a post every day during the celebration week, although I felt that most of them rather diluted the message they were trying to get across. It seemed as though each one was trying to do two not-very-related things – provide some context to the day’s short story (usually with a paragraph from the author) and talk a bit about how to get started reading stories in the various settings. I get why that was the approach, but I’m not sure it really worked – this one, for example, started off with James Swallow talking about his new Primarchs story and then weirdly segued into talking about Age of Sigmar.

In my mind that just doesn’t work – there’s not enough detail for either of the two parts, and they don’t naturally fit together. The Age of Sigmar post was probably the most extreme example, but overall I felt that they didn’t deliver on either of the two intended purposes, and ultimately they didn’t really contribute to what I’d hoped would be a building sense of excitement. Maybe next year the Community team could split those posts out – each day post one article looking at the new short story with thoughts from the author and suggestions of what to read first/next, then another article talking in a bit more detail about one aspect of Black Library. That would feel more appropriate to the celebration, and demonstrate real commitment from GW.

If it feels like I’m being overly critical here, it’s just a sense of frustration at the lack of additional fanfare around the celebration – there just didn’t seem to be any real WOW factor around the overall community. I really love BL fiction and I feel like the Black Library Celebration deserves to be something big and exciting which reaches all corners of the community and gets a proper push from GW. Maybe I missed things – like I said earlier I couldn’t make it down to a GW store as I was busy all weekend – but I didn’t hear any stories of awesome events or people really getting excited by the celebration, which I think is a shame.

I’d have loved to have seen BL reach out to reviewers, podcasts, vloggers etc. and get people involved in the event somehow, and I’d have REALLY loved to have seen a load of author appearances booked in at GW stores or high street bookstores. I know Rachel Harrison was at GW Paris on the Saturday signing copies of Honourbound, which is very cool, but I didn’t hear about any of the UK stores getting authors involved. If that did happen, it was kept very quiet! I did try to do my bit by getting LOADS of Rapid Fire author interviews ready to post over the weekend, but I feel like BL missed a trick by not asking people like me (and all the other awesome advocates online) to actually get involved in the run-up to help build a genuine buzz. Ah well, maybe next year.

I really can’t complain about the new content that was available during the celebration week – I think Black Library nailed it with the short stories and the brand new releases, and while the paperbacks and the merch left me a touch cold I can see the appeal for some people. Hopefully next year there will be some Age of Sigmar content too! Taken as a whole, however, for the second year running I feel like the celebration didn’t quite live up to expectations, largely because it didn’t tap into the wider community of fans and readers. There are lots of us out there – I’d love to see BL trying to make this a proper celebration next year (as well as the usual awesome releases)!

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As always, if you’ve got any thoughts or comments on the Black Library Celebration please do get in touch via the comments section below or on Facebook or Twitter.