Category Archives: Black Library

QUICK REVIEW: His Will – Guy Haley

Labelled as ‘a Dark Imperium prequel story’, Guy Haley’s short story His Will features Frater Mathieu aboard the captured Macragge’s Honour, tying this character – and the Dark Imperium series as a whole – in nicely with the earlier Gathering Storm-era narrative around the return of Roboute Guilliman. With the Ultramarines’ flagship under the control of the Red Corsairs, Mathieu and his flock – including young, nervous Brother Clydeus – share their faith in secret, despite the dangers. When they risk the ire of the traitors to help a crewmember in need, Clydeus finds himself exposed to truths that challenge his faith like never before, but somehow bring hope as well.

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QUICK REVIEW: Live Wire – Robert Rath

With his third 40k Officio Assassinorum short story, Live Wire, Robert Rath returns to Callidus Assassin Sycorax (previously introduced in Divine Sanction) for a second instalment of stealthy, polymorphine-induced infiltration. At the frozen pole of Sanga Kappa, one of the twenty planets of the Meloc Worlds, the heretek Programmator Quavarian works to perfect a potentially deadly meme-virus. When engine-master Jezette Vaal is captured and brought to Quavarian’s base to be infected by the virus and ‘reformatted’ to serve the glory of Chaos, an unexpected chance to serve the Omnissiah one last time provides the cover that Sycorax needs to finally track down and deal with the heretek before he can do any more damage.

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Best of Black Library 2020 – Age of Sigmar

As 2020 comes to a close and 2021 beckons, I’m looking back at the Black Library stories I’ve read over the last twelve months or so and picking out some of my highlights for the year. I’ve already written articles like this for 40k and the Horus Heresy, but now it’s time to look at Age of Sigmar. Have a look at those earlier articles if you haven’t already, then read on for a few thoughts on each of the three Age of Sigmar stories I’ve enjoyed reading the most in 2020. Once again, I’ve set myself two criteria – stories that were published in 2020, and (obviously) that I have read during 2020.

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The Reverie – Peter Fehervari

Peter Fehervari’s fourth Black Library novel, and his first under the Warhammer Horror label, The Reverie is his most assured book yet, an understated masterclass in balancing complexity and readability. Three travellers make their way to shining Malpertuis, homeworld of the glorious Angels Resplendent, in search of answers, inspiration, judgement or clarity. Amongst the tiered galleries of the capital, Kanvolis, they begin to understand the truth of the world – that behind the veneer of enlightenment and artistic sophistication, an insidious darkness lurks within Malpertuis and the Chapter of Space Marines who call it home. Each of the three has a part to play as the boundaries between past, present and future blur and a shadow leaks from a wound at the heart of the world.

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QUICK REVIEW: A Coin for the Carrion Thieves – John French

Taking place after the events of Ahriman: Unchanged, John French’s Warhammer 40,000 short story A Coin for the Carrion Thieves sees Thousand Sons sorcerer Ctesias called upon to put his particular set of skills to use in service of Ahzek Ahriman. Their forces drastically reduced in number and resources, the ragged remnants of Ahriman’s followers find sanctuary in the Eye of Terror, to hide from their enemies and to regroup and resupply. In the currency of Eyespace, what Ahriman needs most carries a high cost, so he turns to Ctesias’s daemonology to pay the price demanded by the scavenger-traders known as the Carrion Thieves.

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Best of Black Library 2020 – Horus Heresy

It’s almost the end of 2020, so I’m taking a look back at the Black Library stories I’ve read this year and choosing a few highlights for each of the main settings – and this time it’s the turn of the Horus Heresy. Take a look at my 40k roundup if you haven’t already, but for this article I’ve picked out the three Heresy stories I’ve enjoyed reading the most during 2020. As I mentioned in the 40k article, these are just my own choices based on what I’ve read this year – I’ve limited myself to Heresy stories (both the main range and the Siege of Terra) that I’ve read in 2020, and which were published this year too.

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QUICK REVIEW: The Shaper of Scars – Marc Collins

Introducing the character of Katja Helvintr, daughter of Fenris, queen of her Rogue Trader dynasty and jarl of the Wyrmslayer Queen, Marc Collins’ 40k short story The Shaper of Scars is an intriguing tale of a battle being fought on both the physical and spiritual planes, and a culture clash between the rituals of Fenris and the strictures of the Imperium. As she lies on death’s door in the cold apothecarion of her ship, Katja relives the moments leading up to her grievous wounding, while medicae thralls tend to her ravaged body and an old gothi sees to her still-strong soul.

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RAPID FIRE: Chris Wraight Talks The Helwinter Gate

Welcome to this instalment of my Rapid Fire series of quick author interviews, in which I’m talking to Black Library author Chris Wraight about his new Warhammer 40,000 novel The Helwinter Gate. This long-awaited conclusion to the Járnhamar trilogy is out tomorrow in swanky ‘Mega Edition’ format, complete with all sorts of additional bits and pieces and an eye-watering price tag to patch – while the standard editions should (assuming past release schedules apply) come along in about six months time. Whether you’re grabbing a Mega Edition or not, however, this sounds like another great book from Chris – so read on to find out more about it!

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QUICK REVIEW: Battle of the Archaeosaurs – Barrington J. Bayley

Originally published back in 2000 in the pages of Inferno! Magazine issue 18, Barrington J. Bayley’s Warhammer 40,000 short story Battle of the Archaeosaurs pits the pride of the Adeptus Titanicus against the might of vast saurian war-beasts. It’s Titans vs. dinosaurs, in other words. With two prior forces having bafflingly failed to take control of a backwater world and its Stone Age-level population, Imperial commanders dispatch a battle-hardened Imperial Guard regiment accompanied by a pair of Warlord Titans to finally get the job done. The Princeps’ confidence of a quick resolution, however, is dented when they see the sheer scale of what they’re up against.

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Best of Black Library 2020 – 40k

It’s almost the end of 2020, so I thought it might be fun to take a look back at the Black Library stories that I’ve read this year and pick out a few personal highlights – in this article I’m looking specifically at Warhammer 40,000 stories, but I’ll do the same thing at some point for some of the other settings as well. These are just my own choices, based on what I’ve personally enjoyed reading the most, and I’ve based my selections on stories that were released in 2020 and that I read during this year (so for example I’ve had to miss off a few short stories that I read in anthologies in 2019 but which subsequently got standalone e-short releases in 2020).

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