Black Library in 2022

The Black Library online preview has just taken place, squeaking in at the end of 2021 to show off some of the books due for publication in 2022, so now seems like a good time to look ahead and think about what 2022 might be like from a BL perspective. For the first part of this article I’m going to talk specifically about the BL preview and give some of my observations on how it went (TL;DR overall I enjoyed it, even if I’m not keen on how it was structured), and what I think about the newly-announced books. After that I’ll recap the other BL books that have already been confirmed for 2022, and then go on to talk in a fair bit of detail about how I see the year ahead going on the BL front…or at least how I’m hoping it will go.

The Black Library online preview

Given that there’s a full article over on the Warhammer Community site I don’t think I need to give you a list of everything that was announced, but nevertheless there’s plenty to talk about with almost all of the new titles. I’ve broken up my thoughts into a few specific areas so let’s take a look at those, starting with some general thoughts on the preview as a whole.

Overall observations

As a whole I really quite enjoyed the preview – 10 brand new books that came as complete surprises, with a few other bits and pieces thrown in as well (including Neil Roberts’ lovely artwork for the next Siege of Terra book). Not bad. I’m personally not really bothered about Special/Limited Edition reprints like Ravenor Rogue (although it does look pretty), but I’m actually annoyingly tempted by the illustrated edition of Xenos as that looks kinda cool. I think if I knew BL were definitely going to produce the other two novels in the trilogy in the same format then that might convince me…as it is, I’m going to have to wait and see. It’s a cool idea though, and much more interesting than just another straight-up reprint.

What I didn’t like about the preview was the way it opened with the new Horus Heresy minis. Don’t get me wrong, they’re nice minis and I’m absolutely fine with them being included in this sort of preview as they’re at least linked to Black Library stories. I just don’t like the message that it sends, putting minis at the top of the bill – I’m sure I’ve said this before, but Games Workshop as a whole always seems a bit dismissive of fans who enjoy the books first and foremost, or indeed only enjoy the books. There were plenty of big, high-profile books in this preview that would have made a great opening reveal, especially given that the minis ended up being discussed twice! Obviously a big part of BL’s role is to provide another route into the wider hobby, but I just wish there was a bit more actual celebration of BL in its own right.

I don’t want to be overly negative though – as I said, the new minis are nice, and the rest of the preview was great. I particularly enjoyed the two sections of Kyme Time (I’ve already seen calls for this to be a regular Warhammer+ show!) with Wade and Nick chatting about the various new books coming soon. Indeed, without meaning to be disparaging of the other Warhammer TV hosts I can’t help thinking that future Black Library online previews should be run entirely by Wade and Nick – they make a good team, and Nick’s knowledge of the subject matter is always impressive.

Age of Sigmar

Speaking of positives, it was great to see a few new Age of Sigmar books finally announced! By my count there were only seven new AoS books released in 2021, and eight (plus a couple of audio dramas) in 2020, compared to 12 (plus three audio dramas – one of which was a four-disc boxed set) in 2019, so numbers have definitely been dropping recently. Hopefully the three revealed here won’t be the only AoS releases for 2022, but I think they make a good start! I’m fairly sure David Guymer’s Kragnos novel would have originally been slated for release in 2021, but better late than never! In general I prefer books which don’t tie in too closely with the ongoing narrative of the game, but this does sound quite interesting.

I’m always happy to see new Gotrek stories on the schedule, as they’re inevitably a lot of fun! Soulslayer is the third Gotrek novel from Darius Hinks, which is interesting as I sort of thought BL were gearing up to making this a multi-author series (what with Robbie MacNiven’s 2018 novella and Gary Kloster’s 2021 short story), but don’t get me wrong – I’m very happy for Darius to continue writing them! I’m also very happy to see a new Richard Strachan novel on the list – Blood of the Everchosen and The End of Enlightenment are two of my absolute favourite BL books from the last couple of years, so I really can’t wait to see what he’s come up with this time. I worry that not enough people recognise how good Strachan is – seriously, if you like BL books then make sure you check him out!

40k and Horus Heresy

I imagine it will come as no surprise to regular readers to know that I was particularly pleased with the announcement of a new Peter Fehervari short story in the Successors anthology! Any Fehervari story is good news! To be fair though it sounds like a fun anthology as a whole, so I think that will be one to look out for if you’re a short story fan…although I’m surprised it’s coming out in hardback first. Anthologies just seem like a natural fit for the paperback format in my mind. Speaking of paperbacks though, it’s good to see the next Dawn of Fire novel announced pretty quickly after the release of book three. Once again, I imagine The Wolf Time was originally scheduled to be released earlier in 2021 than when it actually ended up coming out. As for Throne of Light, I’m always happy to see a new Guy Haley book, and I expect this to be typically great.

Of course Throne of Light will also get a Special Edition release, so that leads me nicely on to the subject of Special and Limited editions. Not including the latest Siege of Terra map and the as-yet-unnamed Siege novel, BL announced five brand new books in posh editions – remember that BL defines SEs as coming out simultaneously with the regular edition, and LEs as coming out (in theory) 3-6 months before the regular edition. Obviously the aesthetics of a book are always going to be a subjective matter, especially when the book in question costs upwards of £35, but I think it’s safe to say that all five look like they’re made to the usual (mostly) high standard that BL have set over the last couple of years.

What’s interesting with this particular set of books is which ones are LEs and which are SEs. As expected, John French’s Sigismund novel (just like Valdor and Luther before it in the Heresy Character Series) is listed as a Limited Edition – and just look at that cover art! For me personally, the whole thing sits together really well, with the artwork and the overall colour scheme. Lovely stuff. John’s new Ahriman novel (woohoo!) is also going to be a LE – or in fact a ‘Mega Edition’ by the look of it, with all those extra bits and pieces. Personally I think that’s a shame, as I never want any of the extra gubbins and £90 is just too much to pay, but to be fair this does look like a cool set so I can understand fans wanting to buy it.

I was surprised, however, to see Danie Ware’s The Triumph of Saint Katherine listed as an LE, as that looks more like the sort of book that’s been released as an SE in the past. Nevertheless, it’s great to see Danie back and with her first full novel for BL too! I was also surprised to see Mike Brook’s Huron Blackheart novel marked as an SE. Personally I think all of the posh editions should be SEs – i.e. released at the same time as the regular editions – but that’s by the by, and the previous book in the 40k Character Series (Nate Crowley’s amazing Ghazghkull novel) was definitely an LE. That came out in May 2021 and the regular edition is still not available! Still, given that they’ve shown both covers it does look like this will be an SE, just like Throne of Light.

The last 40k book to mention is Robert Rath’s Assassinorum: Kingmaker, which I think is one of my highlights of the preview. I remember reading Robert’s first Assassinorum short story and thinking that it absolutely had to represent the start of a new series, it was that good! If you haven’t already checked out the three short stories – Divine Sanction, Iron Sight and Live Wire I strongly recommend you pick them up, as they’re damn good. Iron Sight in particular, I would say. No swanky edition for Kingmaker, but the cover art does look great (and whoever made the joke in the comments comparing the Imperial Knight’s head on the cover to a Bretonnian…I salute you!).

Already confirmed for 2022

While the Black Library ‘Coming Soon’ page on the WarCom site continues to be a largely-neglected wasteland, BL has actually confirmed a few new novels as coming in 2022, all of which sound great. I might have missed something, as BL doesn’t make this easy, but here are the books I can find that are (hopefully) confirmed for 2022:

• The Bookkeeper’s Skull by Justin D. Hill – Warhammer Horror (40k)
• Day of Ascension by Adrian Tchaikovsky – Genestealer Cults vs Adeptus Mechanicus
• Gothghul Hollow by Anna Stephens – Warhammer Horror (Age of Sigmar)
• The Twice-dead King: Reign by Nate Crowley – the sequel to The Twice-dead King: Ruin, which came out in 2021

I’m looking forward to all of these – more Warhammer Horror is always a good thing, and it’s great to see an established SFF author of the calibre of Adrian Tchaikovsky making his novel debut for BL! Of all of them though, personally I’m most looking forward to Nate’s second necron novel. For all that BL makes us readers wait a ridiculously long time for some books, it’s great to see both Matthew Farrer’s Urdesh books and this pair from Nate released reasonably close together. Hopefully there will be more like this to come.

As well as brand new books, there are some regular editions due in 2022 which have previously been released as swanky Limited Editions. I’m not going to go through all the paperbacks also due out, but these three (all coming in regular hardback) seem worth pointing out:

• Astorath: Angel of Mercy by Guy Haley (at last – the LE came out in 2020! Now confirmed as part of the ‘22 BL Celebration)
• Ghazghkull Thraka: Prophet of the Waaagh! by Nate Crowley (also at last! This was my top BL book of 2021!)
• The Vincula Insurgency by Dan Abnett

Hopes for 2022

The last couple of years have been a bit strange for Black Library fans, with fewer books than usual, various formats or mediums seeming to disappear or at least slow down massively, and useful communication between BL and the fanbase almost entirely drying up. Of course some or all of those negatives will have been directly caused (or at least affected) by Covid and all the rest of the recent global chaos, and there have still been plenty of interesting books released despite everything. I wrote about my top 5 BL books of 2021 in this article, and with two new Siege of Terra novels, two new Dan Abnett books, two Dawn of Fire novels, great new Warhammer Crime and Warhammer Horror releases, several new books with xenos POV characters, and a fair few great new authors starting to produce really interesting short stories…we haven’t exactly been lacking for cool new stuff.

Obviously I’m eternally greedy for new stories so my personal preference in 2022 would be for not just ALL THE NEW STUFF – not just what we already know is coming as well but lots more too, not least the final Siege of Terra books – but also a return to things like weekly Digital Monday short stories, the (previously) annual Novella Series, and a full 24-day Advent Calendar series next December. All of that would make me very happy as a reader and consumer of BL fiction in a variety of different mediums, and I suspect a lot of other fans would enjoy that too. Of course it depends on lots of things, not least authorial and editorial availability…but given that publishing tends to have quite a long lifecycle I’m hoping that we’ll start to see the results of the post-lockdown (if that’s an appropriate thing to say given the current situation) return to some kind of normality. Fingers crossed, anyway.

I’ve already mentioned that I’m hoping for more Age of Sigmar fiction in 2022 (there can’t really be much less than there has been recently), so hopefully we’re seeing the start of an upwards trajectory on that front. I also mentioned that I enjoy consuming stories in different mediums though, and one thing I’ve been a bit worried about of late is the stark absence of any new audio dramas. Clearly it’s tough to organise audio recording sessions in lockdown, and I assume it’s even now still much easier to arrange audiobook sessions with just individual actors rather than the group sessions required for full-cast audio dramas. I’m very much hoping that BL hasn’t abandoned the idea of audio dramas (either as a result of Covid or the recent emphasis on Warhammer+ animations) as it’s a medium that I really enjoy, and I’m really hoping that we’ll see at least some new releases in this format in 2022. Once again, fingers crossed.

Chris Dows’ Titans’ Bane is probably still my favourite BL audio drama – it’s incredible!

I can’t mention different mediums without also talking about digital releases. There was a time when BL seemed to be at the forefront of digital publishing with Digital Mondays, amazing mixed-media Advent Calendar series (not to mention Necromunda/Horror/Summer of Reading etc. weeks), serialised novels, digital premieres…the list goes on. I absolutely appreciate that not everyone likes reading digitally but a lot of readers have fully embraced this format, and it’s a powerful route to market for publishers. In the current era of Covid, paper shortages and supply chain issues, it seems a no-brainer to rely on digital as a great way of still supplying fiction to a voracious readership, and other publishers have been rushing to catch up…while for some reason BL seems to have backed off.

I can understand reducing the output of digital short stories for things like Digital Mondays and the Advent Calendar if authors and editors are struggling for time and headspace; that makes total sense. What baffles me is that BL appears to be holding back books which are apparently ready to go because they can’t get physical copies into stores – why not publish them digitally first, and then launch the physical copies when they’re available? After all, it’s pretty common for BL to do it the other way around and release audiobooks a week or two after the paperback/hardback and ebook editions, AND they’ve done this before with ‘digital premieres’! Sure, some fans exclusively want physical copies, but just let them know that the PBs/HBs will be coming when they’re ready. To my mind a digital-first (where necessary) approach just makes total sense, to maintain a steady release schedule and keep large proportions of the readership happy with new stuff to buy!

Anyway, new releases notwithstanding there are also quite a few things that I would like to see from BL in 2022 that go beyond new books and into a broader sense of how the business engages with us as fans and readers. To be honest I could write an entire article about how things have been as a BL fan over the last couple of years, and full disclosure: I did genuinely consider doing this…but I decided I didn’t want to focus too much on the negatives. Instead, hopefully it comes across in this article that I’m looking for positives in things that I hope will happen next year. There’s plenty I could still talk about, but if I could ask for one thing (aside from great new books) from Black Library in 2022…it would be better communication.

It would be nice to see more than just the usual ‘here’s the new stuff to buy’ articles

Communication obviously takes a lot of different forms, and I’m not just talking about weekly emails or social media posts. I’m not going to claim to be a marketing expert, but I’d love to see BL actually…you know…do some marketing! I’d love to see a greater presence for Black Library on the Warhammer Community site, with more than just a single token article each week, and I’d love to see more content which focuses on the fiction as its own part of the hobby rather than relating it back to the miniatures and the games. In particular I’m desperate to see a return to WarCom content which actively promotes Black Library releases – regular author interviews talking about their upcoming books, insights into new authors, more detailed explorations of how BL stories bring factions, characters or themes to life (and not just lists of faction-specific titles, but observations on what those stories say about their subject matter), that sort of thing.

WarCom is a great platform for reaching an audience that’s desperate to find out more about what’s happening – and to be fair, GW as a whole is doing a decent job of this as a whole, it’s just not reaching BL fans – so let’s see more BL content that makes the most of it. Talk to us about what’s coming, but also tell us if there are delays (we won’t mind – it’s much better to know about this sort of thing!), make it really clear what’s happening with different editions and when they’re going to be available, and engage with the readership! There are dedicated, enthusiastic fans out there, so why not invite readers, bloggers, podcasters, youtubers etc. to get involved? It already happens with the minis and the games, but not as far as I can see with the books, which is crazy considering how valuable reviewers are to publishing as a whole!

These articles are great – how about something like this from BL fans?

Looking beyond articles and interviews, I’d like to see a fundamental change in the way BL interacts with customers. Right now I think there’s too much obfuscation – there was no communication about Digital Mondays stopping, about the Novella Series not happening this year, about why the Coming Soon page was so neglected or what was happening with the broader release schedule. Incredibly, there wasn’t (as far as I could see) a single WarCom post about the ‘Horror Week’ short stories that were published earlier this year – which meant nobody seemed to know they were available – and I haven’t seen a WarCom post about the Advent Calendar yet (and we’re nearly halfway through December). I don’t know if there have been internal issues with staffing or anything like that which might have affected this…but I do know that it hasn’t felt great as a fan. If anything it feels like GW is trying really hard as a whole, but kind of ignoring BL fans, like it doesn’t really know what to do with us.

I may be wrong, but I feel like most fans don’t actually need much to stay happy. Beyond new books to read, I think all it really takes is to keep us in the loop with what’s happening, to be really clear with what’s available/when/in which formats, and to demonstrate enthusiasm for the stories that are being released and the work that the authors and editors are putting in. We want to see that Games Workshop as a whole cares about Black Library (you know…by including BL in ‘Warhammer Day’ celebrations, perhaps), that it’s proud of the stories which bring these amazing worlds to life, that it values BL readers and recognises that we want to know what’s going on so we can plan what to buy, and share our enthusiasm within the community. I’m not saying that none of this is happening, just that it needs to happen more, and with greater clarity.

For my part I’ve definitely found myself reading less and less Black Library fiction recently, and while there are various reasons for that it’s definitely affected by a sense that as a reader and a reviewer/interviewer I’m kind of being taken for granted. If other publishers and other IPs make me feel welcome and wanted then obviously I’m going to be tempted to look elsewhere, because there’s no shortage of amazing fiction being published. I don’t love the worlds of Warhammer any less, and I still enjoy reading the Black Library stories that I do pick up. I’m looking forward – in theory at least – to lots of the books that are coming in 2022, and that I haven’t found time to read in 2021. But while it used to be the case that I simply HAD to read each new BL book, so that I could share my enthusiasm with others and keep up with all the stories…now I don’t feel quite so engaged, or so desperate to stay on top of things.

That can absolutely change. With a bit more communication from BL/GW I could definitely see myself regaining a lot of my enthusiasm, especially if the BL community as a whole – authors, BL staff, readers, reviewers etc. – can all start to share the buzz again. To get excited once more about the same books (please no more 6-month LE exclusivity windows), whatever our involvement with the wider hobby – whether we’re all-in collectors/painters/modellers/gamers or we just enjoy reading about these awesome worlds. Nothing’s stopping us from individually enjoying what we read, but with just a little effort Black Library could play a crucial part in actively encouraging and engaging with the community, and that can only be a good thing for all of us!

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Anyway, as usual this has turned into a rather more extended article than I’d originally planned. Whether you read through the whole thing or just skipped to the bits you were interested in, I hope it’s been useful or thought-provoking or just interesting in some way! I’d love to know what you thought about the BL online preview, what your opinions are on the current state of things for BL fans, and what you’re hoping to see in 2022. As always, let me know in the comments below or over on Twitter.

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