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Hey, I know there's alot of 40k fluff out there and I was wondering which books are fun to read as well as have alot of info on the 40k universe. So far I've really enjoyed Dan Abnett's Legion (Horus Heresay) and am halfway through Duty Calls by Sandy Mitchell- which is highly amusing. However (as in every series), there are some novels which are pretty painful to read - I'd also like to know which ones to avoid.

The Ciaphas Cain books are pretty solid all around. The omnibus is fantastic.

The Space Wolves omnibus is great - I really enjoyed the first three Ragnar Blackmane books. After that, I didn't enjoy it.

Storm of Iron by Graham McNeil is pretty good too. It's cool to see a book from the Chaos side of things.

EDIT: wow, a double post. That's never happened before.

EDIT2: uhh... and now the first post disappeared. Okay, let's try this again!

Eisenhorn trilogy and Ravenor trilogy are the best. They can both be bought as compiled books now.
First 4 Horus Heresy books are pretty good. After that it's kinda hit and miss.
Gaunt's Ghosts is okay.
Ciaphas Cain I haven't read but supposedly is alright.

The Horus heresy.
Read it.
All of it.
From the beginning.

Well I'll definately check into the Space Wolves, and apparently the Horus Heresy is sketchy - some people really love it, some dont. So who's right?

Storm of Iron FTW

Jack Yeovil is a pen name for Kim Newman (Anno Dracula series). he did 3 or 4 books for Warhammer Fantasy and 4 for the long-defunct car wars game Dark Future.

All are excellent.

Anything by Jack/Kim is worth picking up.

Cadian Blood is a good-ish one. Eisenhorn, Ghosts as someone said.

Fifteen Hours isn't too bad either.

Eisenhorn is my favorite although you can't go far wrong with any of Abnett's books.

Brother SRM wrote:The Ciaphas Cain books are pretty solid all around. The omnibus is fantastic.

QFT

I really enjoyed the souldrinkers books, Its a nice change to have a third faction to read about.

I agree with all of the above, and you should read Storm of Iron from Graham McNeil, as it provides a great backround on the Iron Warriors legion and some of the other Chaos stuff.

My first BL book that I read was the Brotherhood of Snakes which i enjoyed alot. The Horus Heresy books are great too.

Edit: I said the name of the SM Chapter in the book, not the actual book itself. = P

The Eisenhorn trilogy is Dan Abnett's masterpiece! I'm reading it again right now for the 3rd time.

Anything by Dan Abnett is good (although I didn't much like that Alpha Legion HH novel). Brotherhood of the Snake is a really good look at what Space Marines are like. Of course, the whole Gaunt's Ghosts series is very very good. Ravenor has some good twisted parts but gets fuzzy at times.

Other than Abnett, Storm of Iron is a classic.

Warmaster Phthisis wrote:The Eisenhorn trilogy is Dan Abnett's masterpiece! I'm reading it again right now for the 3rd time.

+1 I also recommend Eisenhorn. Im also going to pick up the Space Wolves and Ciaphus Cain omnibuses cause Ive heard good things about them.

Some of the HH books are either a hit, miss or glancing blow.

Abnett is the King of the grimdark, that much is certain. I could literally not put down his "Gaunt's Ghosts" series, as well as his Eisenhorn Omnibus. Really, if you are going to read the Horus Heresy, read only the first three or 4 books. They start to get all over the place after that, and I am STILL waiting for them to start to tie together again.

Gaunts ghosts are all class! and as a bonus blood pact the next in the series is out next month!! cant wait! the cain novels are all good and inject some humour into the books which is a little different from he norm, as most posts have said put your faith in Dan Abnatt or Sandy Mitchell and you cant go far wrong!

binky wrote:Well I'll definately check into the Space Wolves, and apparently the Horus Heresy is epic. lol. But does it flow cohesively because isn't every book written by a different author?

Yeah, the Horus Heresy series is VERY good, the only duff books are 'Battle for the Abyss' (stay away from it like you would the BNP) and Descent of Angels and Flight of the Eisenstein I dont like either. However yes, the books flow really nicely from one-another and often have nice links in them too! I'd advise reading the entire series from the begginning, maybe missing out the duff one(s) I mentioned... and yeah, I loved Legion too!

The Blood Angels omnibus is also very good, I loved it!

(My brother has the Ultramarines omnibus and Malus Darkblade books and he says theyre very good)

and as some said, the Storm of Iron book is also a very good read, seriously, you barely know which side's going to come out on top during the read...

But yeah, the Black Library make some VERY good books, particularly Dan Abnett and Graham McNeill IMHO, however BEWARE if your like me they'll make you want to collect the additional armies that you read about!

Hope that helped... x

You should read the Ravenor Omnibus. It is by far the best thing published by the black library. By far. Don't read the Souldrinkers omnibus, it is extremely lame with awful cardboard characters. Don't read the dawn of war series, its pretty bad. The space wolf omnibus isn't anything special, it's decent if you are into marines i guess. Eisenhorn was great as was the Gaunt's Ghost series. The imperial guard books tend to be better than space marine stories as space marines are pretty uninteresting people. Angels of Darkness is a huge exception as that is the only space marine book i could really recommend. It is excellent.

Again a bump for GG, Horn, and the HH. Cain will make you snort out loud at least a few times when reading it. There is a bit of humor splashed in there but not enough to draw away from the story.

As Jsu above said, I find the IG books to be far more entertaining than the marine books.

Planetkill was ok, but one of its stories was so great they made a sequel, gunheads. Another great book.

Double Eagle was awesome, as was 15 hours, though both where kind of short.

And while I know this is a 40k forum, the blackhearts book (as far as I know its only one) was incredibly entertaining if you want a break from 40k.

Wow, there's alot of good suggestions - now I got to head to Chapter's soon.

It's okay combatmedic, although 40k is awesome it's nice to read other stuff too. In fact, I haven't read a good fantasy book in awhile. In fact, if anyone cares to pusue that we could chat books in general (on a seperate thread) - but isn't getting off topic slightly frowned upon?

binky wrote: but isn't getting off topic slightly frowned upon?

You havnt been to News & Rumors yet have you? :p

Im just starting to get into the fantasy books now that I started a Empire army. The only other fantasy book Iv read besides blackhearts was I believe the Tales of the Old World or something. It had a number of different stories in it, and was very enjoyable, though there was series within the book that I did skip. Just couldn't get into it.

Eisenhorn
Titanicus
Gaunt's Ghost's
Crossfire.

That's my lot.

The OC-D

combatmedic wrote:

binky wrote: but isn't getting off topic slightly frowned upon?

You havnt been to News & Rumors yet have you? :p

Im just starting to get into the fantasy books now that I started a Empire army. The only other fantasy book Iv read besides blackhearts was I believe the Tales of the Old World or something. It had a number of different stories in it, and was very enjoyable, though there was series within the book that I did skip. Just couldn't get into it.

Probably. But I have this bad habit of not paying attention sometimes...

Who's the author of Blackhearts and Tales of the Old World? Might make it easier to find some information on it. But yeah if you ever want to read anything there's a world of stuff out there, Guy Gavriel Kay who writes more romantic-medieval period stuff, Michael Chrichton who ruled science-fiction, and I enjoy some stuff by Chuck Palahniuk - most everybody has seen Fight Club. Now im completely off-topic, however you mentioned an empire army didja post any pics on your page? I really am interested in seeing different people's painting for some ideas.

I am reading Gunheads at the moment, and honestly, this will be the first book i have ever read completley. I highly recomend it.

Horus Rising and False Gods are great, as for the rest of the books, errr... Not so much.
Also Emperor's Mercy by Henry Zou is worth checking out.

Lord of the Night was nearly good enough to get me to play Chaos.

Dan Abnett is darn near a god, and anything he pens is usually decent if not awesome. If you're into comics at all, you should be reading his Guardians of the Galaxy that he writes with Andy Lanning. (Nova's really good, too. As are most of the 'War of Kings' tie-ins; which is a rarity in the world of comics cross-overs, but I digress.)

@Kid Kyoto - Thanks for the info about Jack Yeovil, I loved the Anno Dracula stuff. I look forward to tracking some more of his writing down.

Armandloft wrote:If you're into comics at all, you should be reading his Guardians of the Galaxy that he writes with Andy Lanning. (Nova's really good, too. As are most of the 'War of Kings' tie-ins; which is a rarity in the world of comics cross-overs, but I digress.)

That's cool I didn't know he did comics too, wow he's got his bases covered. Does the series come in an omnibus? That would just make my day.

Yes, they do. I think almost all the War of Kings stuff is available. There are some pre-WoK Guardians of the Galaxy and Nova.

I heartily recommend Emperor's Mercy by Henry Zou. It was just published this year and is a great read. It lacks any of the psycho-babble that crops up in the works of Abnett et. al. I give Emperor's Mercy two thumbs up.