Tag Archives: Warhammer 40k

QUICK REVIEW: Becoming – Andy Clark

Two weeks into Black Library’s 2016 Advent Calendar, day fourteen brings us an Imperial Knights story in the shape of Becoming by Andy Clark. Setting things up for the upcoming novel Kingsblade, we’re introduced to the knightly houses of Adrastrapol and their rituals, as veteran Knight pilot Sire Markos tells the story of his first battle to two young squires on the eve of their coming of age ritual. Thrust straight into battle without time to prepare, the young Markos had to learn quickly in order to survive, and in doing so forged himself a legend. It wasn’t all glory though…
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QUICK REVIEW: The Embrace of Pain – Ian St. Martin

The 2016 Black Library Advent Calendar hits day twelve with the fourth of six audio dramas, The Embrace of Pain by Ian St. Martin. A short prequel to the novel Lucius: The Faultless Blade it finds Lucius’ vessel The Diadem assaulted by a vast, plague-ridden daemonic entity deep within the Eye of Terror. With its geller field breached and corruption spreading through its corridors, Lucius faces off against the guiding intelligence of the attack, a daemon of Nurgle who was once a warrior of the Death Guard. Though supremely confident in his martial skills, has he underestimated the danger this time?
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QUICK REVIEW: Prodigal – Josh Reynolds

The tenth story in Black Library’s 2016 Advent Calendar is Prodigal by Josh Reynolds, a Fabius Bile story which sees the apothecary musing on the nature of his work and what his legacy will be. When his pensive mood is shattered by a daemonic attack launched directly into his laboratorium, he’s surprised to find that not all of the daemons are trying to kill him, or at least not yet. Faced with the return of one of his earliest (and perhaps greatest) creations bearing riddle-like warnings, an unexpectedly paternal side of Fabius is revealed.
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QUICK REVIEW: Wraithbound – JC Stearns

The eldar arrive on day eight of Black Library’s 2016 Advent Calendar in Wraithbound by JC Stearns, in which a combined force of craftworld and corsair eldar make a daring webway assault onto an Imperial world that’s been overrun by orks. Among the first wave is Crimson Hunter pilot Seoci, firmly on the path of the hunter but not yet lost to it. Donning his war mask as he goes into battle, he pushes aside thoughts of his previous path until his past comes back to haunt him when his craftworld’s wraith constructs take to the field.
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QUICK REVIEW: The Howling Ship – Josh Reynolds

Included in the Limited Edition hardback of Fabius Bile: Primogenitor, Josh Reynolds’ The Howling Ship sees Fabius launch a daring attack on the Black Ship Savonarola as it returns to Terra carrying amongst its cargo of psykers a particularly nasty specimen known as The Howling Man. As the crew work to fight off the void assault, Inquisitor Borja races to where The Howling Man is being held, determined to use any means necessary to prevent the psyker being taken. Faced by the Butcher of Terra however, all of his certainties are challenged and his willpower tested to the limit.
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Fabius Bile: Primogenitor – Josh Reynolds

From the prolific pen of Josh Reynolds comes Fabius Bile: Primogenitor, the first in a new series from Black Library featuring the Chief Apothecary of the Emperor’s Children. Exiled from his Legion, loathed and feared in equal measure, his goal is nothing less than to ensure the future of humanity…in his image. Hidden away on the dead Crone World of Urum, surrounded by the horrifying results of his endless experiments, Fabius diligently works away while his body rots around him. It takes the most tempting of targets for him to leave his work behind and rouse himself to war once more.
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QUICK REVIEW: The Calculus of Battle – David Guymer

For day five of Black Library’s 2016 Advent Calendar it’s the turn of the Iron Hands, in a 40k audio drama by David Guymer – The Calculus of Battle. Viewing an Imperial world besieged by tyranids through the Iron Hands’ cold logic, Warleader Kardan Stronos weighs up the conflicting costs and benefits of intervening – does the potential cost in materiel usage and possible loss of Iron Hands life outweigh the benefits of evacuating even a tiny proportion of the planet’s 7 billion inhabitants? Constantly shifting with every action he takes, the battle calculus drives his decisions and determines whether the world lives or dies.
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QUICK REVIEW: Argent – Chris Wraight

Originally released as part of the event-only Black Library Live! 2016 chapbook alongside A Memory of Tharsis by Josh Reynolds, Chris Wraight’s Argent is an Inquisition short story that links in with his excellent novel Vaults of Terra: The Carrion Throne. In it, Interrogator Luce Spinoza tells a tale of joining the Imperial Fists in an assault on a traitor-held hive, during which her perception of the Angels of Death is profoundly affected. Fighting alongside the Fists as part of a wider mission to cleanse the hive, she faces both the horror of corruption and the ferocity of the Space Marines’ ardent faith.
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QUICK REVIEW: A Memory of Tharsis – Josh Reynolds

Currently only published in the Black Library Live! 2016 chapbook (alongside Argent by Chris Wraight), Josh Reynolds’ short story A Memory of Tharsis sees Fabius Bile paying a visit to Lady Spohr, Magos-Queen of the forge world Quir, to make a trade. He needs her services to repair his ancient medicae equipment in order for him to continue his grand work, but if he’s to succeed he knows he will have to offer her something new and unique. If he fails to provide something suitable he might not survive the visit, but he has something up his (rather disturbing) sleeve.
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QUICK REVIEW: The Maiden of the Dream – John French

Day two of Black Library’s 2016 Advent Calendar brings us The Maiden of the Dream by John French, the second ‘story of the Horusian Wars’ after The Purity of Ignorance. The titular Maiden is Mylasa, a powerful psyker who, as one of Inquisitor Covenant’s acolytes, uses her gifts to interrogate prisoners of the Inquisition and purge their memories. Can she be trusted, however? Beneath the accumulated memories ripped from the minds of others, is her soul still pure? Keep reading…