Welcome to this instalment of Rapid Fire, my ongoing series of quick interviews with authors talking about their new releases. These are short and sweet interviews, with the idea being that each author will answer (more or less) the same questions – by the end of each interview I hope you will have a good idea of what the new book (or audio drama) is about, what inspired it and why you might want to read or listen to it.
For this interview I spoke to the prolific Mike Brooks about his new Warhammer 40,000 novel Brutal Kunnin’ – the first ever Black Library novel to be written from an ork’s perspective! It’s available to pre-order as of Saturday 12th September, so if you’ve ever wondered what it’s really like inside an ork’s head while he’s getting stuck into a good fight…now’s the time to find out!
Without further ado, over to Mike…
Track of Words: How would you describe your new novel Brutal Kunnin’?
Mike Brooks: It’s a novel about the orks of the TekWaaagh! invading the forge world of Hephaesto. It’s primarily told from the point of view of the orks, although there are also Adeptus Mechanicus POV characters.
ToW Without spoiling anything, who are the main characters and what do we need to know about them?
MB: The main character is Ufthak Blackhawk of the Bad Moons clan, newly-promoted boss nob in the TekWaaagh! and eager to prove himself. He’s a typical ork nob in that he’s big, tough, and good in a fight, but he’s also a bit more cunning than your average ork, with a tendency to think up plans which succeed more often than not, even if it’s in nothing like the way he originally envisaged.
The two main AdMech characters are Zaefa Varaz, Hephaesto’s Lexico Arcanus, whose role it is to interpret the data of the orks’ offensive and who has to deal with the whims of her Tech Priest Dominus, and Secutor Haphax Mitran-da, who leads the forge world’s defenders on the battlefield. Also featuring is Kaptin ‘Flash Git’ Badrukk, who happens to have arrived at the same time as the TekWaaagh! and has his own designs for the planet and its booty.
ToW: Where and when is it set?
MB: It’s set on the forge world of Hephaesto, and in terms of timeline it’s roughly concurrent with the ‘current’ 40k timeline of the Indomitus Crusade, but I haven’t nailed down an actual date for it.
ToW: Are these the same characters from your short story Where Dere’s da Warp Dere’s a Way? Would you recommend readers check that out before the novel?
MB: Mainly the same characters, yes! And obviously I’d recommend people check it out, be-cause then I get more sales commission 😉 But in all seriousness, that is not an essential lead-in for this, it just gives you an introduction to Ufthak and some of his cronies, and explains how he came to be boss nob, how he got his impressive hammer, and why his head is stapled onto a body that used to belong to someone else…
ToW: Black Library stories from non-human perspectives are relatively few and far between. What inspired you to write a full novel from an ork’s perspective?
MB: I LOVE ORKS. Always have done. I’ve drifted in and out of 40k, but any time I’ve played it, it’s been with orks. They’re tremendous fun, whether that’s playing as them, or in the lore. Part of the reason I wanted to do this was to prove that it can be done, and partly (I must admit) because I wanted to be the first person to write a 40k ork novel, but mainly it was because it felt like one of the most fun things I could be paid to do.
ToW: Of all the possible ork stories you could have written, what made you go for this one?
MB: Humans had to be involved, that was one of the criteria. Black Library were understandably tentative about a xenos-focused novel: Where Dere’s Da Warp Dere’s A Way showed them that I could manage it to their satisfaction style-wise, but they still felt the orks needed a human adversary for anyone to really care much. Given that restriction, I felt the Adeptus Mechanicus was the best fit, as they are in many ways the utter antithesis of the orks. Watching the AdMech’s logic-led brains trying to deal with utter chaos of an ork invasion – and in many ways I think that 40k orks are actually rather more chaotic than Chaos itself – was immediately amusing to me, and I wanted to show the mix of fascination and horror which I was sure would ensue.
ToW: Did you look outside of Warhammer for influences when writing this? Where do you look for inspiration when writing a story like this?
MB: Not particularly, other than the various pop culture references I threw in with reckless abandon (most of which got caught by the editing process: I still can’t believe Will didn’t let me keep the Back To The Future joke). In terms of inspiration, I simply went with the experience of playing orks for 25+ years, across 40k, Blood Bowl, Gorkamorka, Inquisimunda, and even an old Necromunda Ash Wastes campaign where I pleaded to be allowed to use my Gorkamorka orks under Inquisimunda rules.
ToW: Can you talk a bit about how you go about writing orks, capturing the important balance between humour and horror in them?
MB: I think Guy Haley has said it before, but the key to orks is that they seem funny, unless you’re the one they’re happening to. It was interesting approaching it from the ork POV however, because of course to orks, what they’re doing isn’t horrific, it’s normal. So I was describing fights and scenes of slaughter for which, had it been from a human perspective, I would have been using words that really brought home the gruesomeness of what was occurring. When seeing the same events from an ork perspective, it’s much more matter-of-fact.
There’s one scene in particular which would have been utter bloody horror for the humans involved, but for Ufthak it’s just a brief, slightly confusing diversion. A Chaos Space Marine, for example, might have gloried in the slaughter and the terror: Ufthak just kills a few humans and then looks around for a more challenging fight. So far as orks are concerned, fighting is the best thing in the galaxy, and they’re not sure why few other species seem to enjoy it as much, or aren’t very good at it, or even want to avoid it entirely.
ToW: How did you find the writing process for this one, compared to your previous Black Library stories?
MB: This was probably the easiest and most fun novel I’ve ever written, and I had an absolute blast! In part I think it’s because I already knew the characters: Ufthak and his ladz have been the subject of various pieces of flash fiction which I would write down and upload into the Facebook groups of whatever campaign they were appearing in at the time, so I already had a handle on how they act. Ufthak’s smart in a sort of counter-intuitive way; Mogrot Redtoof is a beast in combat but about as intelligent as a concussed squig; Nizkwik the grot is simultaneously eager to please and terrified; I even got to include Ufthak’s pet squig Princess, about which I am utterly delighted (yes, there is a reason the squig is called Princess, but you’ll have to read the novel to find out: also yes, this might just have been me finding a vaguely plausible reason for why Ufthak’s pet squig has always been called Princess).
ToW: What do you hope 40k fans will get out of this by the time they’ve finished it?
MB: A bloody good laugh! But also a fast-paced action novel. Rites of Passage was a more ‘domestic 40k’ novel, and reasonably upbeat in tone despite the fact some awful events occurred in it. Road to Redemption was much darker and grittier, with soul-searching and bad decisions in the face of impossible choices. Brutal Kunnin’ is just full-throttle from the start, as the orks land on a world and proceed to ork extremely and violently at everyone and everything, including on occasion each other. I hope it captures the nature of 40k the game, perhaps, rather than the grimdark background lore: incredible amounts of gunfire, explosions, death and dismemberment, but in the end it feels like you’ve had a good time…
***
Thanks as ever to Mike for taking the time to answer these questions! I’m sure I’m not the only person very excited to read this novel – it sounds so much fun! Expect a review just as soon as I get hold of a copy…
See also: my quick review of Mike’s short story Where Dere’s da Warp Dere’s a Way.
Brutal Kunnin’ is available to pre-order as of the 12th September.
Click here if you fancy taking a look at some other Rapid Fire interviews. If you have any questions, comments or other thoughts please do let me know in the comments below, or find me on Twitter.