Dan Abnett

This is probably the most Warhammer novel ever. I loved it. It was big, bombastic, grimdark, the author went back through the novel and added in lots of big obscure words in clusters, and we're only in part one of three. Hopelessness, fighting, demons, aerosolised blood, snippets of horror presented like flickering screens, oh my days this is everything the horus heresy promised. Thanks Dan!

Genuine Contender For Best 40K Novel

To get it out of the way: Warhammer 40K is Space Nazi Yahtzee, the Inquisition are the apotheosis of cops, the Imperium are not the good guys, and ACAB.

This is simply a great hardboiled scifi action crime extravaganza that would be brilliant with or without the 40k flavour, but it uses all the concepts and trappings of 40K spectacularly to really make the Dark Millennium feel real and, equally, uses the powers and elements to great effect and makes all the show more grimdark science fantasy ridiculousness vivid to point of seeming plausible.

Truly the best kind of popcorn reading.

Toby Longworth has long been my favourite Black Library narrator and is superb.

My only criticism would be a rather weak and wishy washy, 'Ravenor is a good cop in a filthy galaxy' thing it does at one point. These awful things exist in an awful universe and it's one thing to show a human side of the pawns of space fascists, it's another to try and justify it.

Genuinely, loved this and will definetly continue the trilogy and check out the Eisenhorn books eventually.

ACAB. show less

Access a version of the below that includes illustrations on my blog.

In this volume, the zombie infestation spreads to two more universes, those of Star Trek and Ghostbusters. Turns out that I don't give a crap about Ghostbusters (saw the first movie when I was a kid, enjoyed it, haven't really thought about it since and don't care to, and Kyle Hotz's artwork made the characters difficult to distinguish), but Star Trek-does-zombies is just perfectly nailed by the Tiptons, Casey Maloney, and show more Gary Erskine. Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and two security guards end up stranded on a Federation colony that's been infested by zombies, and have to stay alive long enough to make it to their shuttle and/or send off a distress signal. It's a perfect little slice of the zombie genre infused into the Star Trek universe, down to the predictable but utterly satisfying moment where McCoy scans a guy, says "He's dead, Jim," and then he lurches back to life. (And guess which of the five Starfleet characters end up as zombies?)

Add in computers with reel-to-reel tape decks, and a comedy robot, and you basically have everything I could want out of this kind of tale. You even get Captain Kirk fighting zombie with a wrench and Doctor McCoy with a zombie-cure-serum gun. And I don't really understand what's up with the sexy vampire lady who appears in all four realities-- but when her form adapts to the Star Trek universe, it's of course in the form of a woman in a TOS miniskirt.

I had thought that the finale issue would involve all the different series coming together in some way, no matter how small, to provide a final solution. Like, I didn't expect Captain Kirk, Optimus Prime, Bill Murray, and whoever the hell leads G.I.Joe to meet, but I did think all four side stories would somehow contribute to the end of the story. Well, they don't; all there is is a single shot of the four universes through a portal. Instead it's a bunch of tedious supernatural nonsense to wrap it all up, and I don't care. But at least this misbegotten mess gave me a good Star Trek zombie tale.

The Transformers by IDW: « Previous in sequence | Next in sequence » show less

A very tight, well-written little episode, and a nice change from the massive plotlines that form so much of the series. This is a one-off short story, and I liked seeing Eisenhorn dealing with a more localised issue. Although there's little room for of his companions in such a brief story, we see how the Inquisition go about handling smaller cases: patience, hard work, deduction and confronting terrible things, however minor they might appear on the surface. There are some nice touches in show more the side characters, and in the way the real threat is depicted. It's also less gruelling than the others (Missing in Action and Playing Patience) which is a pleasant change. show less