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My first 40k novel was "Nightbringer". An ultramarines novel with Cpt Uriel Ventris(sp). It was a great starter book, pretty old now, but I have gone back and read that a few times.

Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

Best books so far:
Helsreach: For IG and BT fans. Great atmosphere, great plot and the storytelling is swift enough.
Blood Angels Omnibus: Good plot and nice characters. Sometimes the storytelling drags on and on, but what the hey.
Gaunts Ghost series: Sometimes the plot is very dull, but then again it has epic moments and grimdark as well.
Everything from Graham McNeil.

Worst books so far:
Fall of Damnos: Hollow characters and pretty dumb plot.
Dawn of War series: These books are actually so bad and absurd that their writer, C.S Goto became a meme
Dead Men Walking: The book itself was ok, but since its characters have no depth at all, the plot is a bit weird and the book is depressing even for 40k standards, I would not recommend this.

I recommend Reflection Cracked, its a 100 page story in "The primarchs" a recently relesased Horus heresy book

J99Pwrangler wrote:My first 40k novel was "Nightbringer". An ultramarines novel with Cpt Uriel Ventris(sp). It was a great starter book, pretty old now, but I have gone back and read that a few times.

Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

Nightbringer is the first story of the omnibus ive just finished. I'm on to the second omnibus now so there have been another 5 since that one.

Currently reading Battle of the Fang and I am enjoying it so far.

Kind of an interesting image being painted of the Thousand Sons. I actually am finding myself feeling bad for them...

imark789 wrote:Any good books with Necrons playing a large part? As one of the main antagonists or anything?

"Hammer & Anvil" from James Swallow. I think it's the first novel that featured the revamped Newcrons, but even though I still prefer the original version, Swallow managed to make it an enjoyable read. Of course, whether it's a good book or not always depends on the reader.

J99Pwrangler wrote:Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

I know one more, "Battle of the Archaeosaurs", a short story by Barrington J. Bayley. I've read it in the Dark Imperium anthology, but it was reprinted in Let the Galaxy Burn as well.

Lynata wrote:

J99Pwrangler wrote:Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

I know one more, "Battle of the Archaeosaurs", a short story by Barrington J. Bayley. I've read it in the Dark Imperium anthology, but it was reprinted in Let the Galaxy Burn as well.

Mechanicum is a great Titan book, you don't need to have much knowledge of the Heresy either. It was the first 40k book I read.

Yeah, Mechanicum is pretty much all about Titans.

Gaunt Ghost , its a very good story line
but my to is Eisehon and Ravenor trilogies.it shows who the life is in the Imperioum.
i cant wait for the Eisehorn vs Ravenor book......

The Ciaphas Cain books are damn awesome, can't wait for the new one ("Greater Good", coming next year, lets see Cain mess up some Tau by sheer force of luck and ofc Jurgen).
The Night Lord's novels are amazing as well, and give something new to Chaos, not just the usual "Blood for the blood god" which is awesome but get boring after some time.
Farseer is a pretty cool book too, quite so if you like rogue trader meets xenos, gets in to deep gak and conspiracy + ancient demons and such.
Kill Team is pure gold... if you are looking for some filthy xenos face human maniacal murderers and get fethed + inquisition, conspiracy, and human-xeno relations.

STAY AWAY!!!
The Dawn of War, DeathWatch and Eldar Prophecy by C.S. Goto, as mentioned above his perception and portrayal of the 40k verse is legendary bad.
Fire Warrior is just ridiculous. One tau dude menages to kill thousands of humans, space marines, take down a titan, a bunch of CSM, a great demon who is devoted to all four gods of Chaos and is all like -insert bad quote which is suppose to induce character depth-.

The first book I read was Cadian Blood. knew nothing about chaos, imperial guard or space marines, but It was an interesting start to 40k. Plus had some zombies

Loved Rynn's world more than Helsreach. For some reason the Crimson fists where more memorable than those Black Templars.

I got the hammer and bolter book, and so far all the stories I read are interesting. It has a mixed bag of Silver Skulls, Iron hands, Iron Warriors, Catachan fighters, inquisitor shenanigans, Alpha legion mind blowing, and the only written fluff I can find solely focusing on my Iron Knights chapter (<--- although I wish it was better written and more exciting). over all I rather liked it

Just finished battle of the fang. I really enjoyed it, the book did a good job of capturing the physical prowess of the space wolves. I like the references to the wolf brothers even though they are not detailed they are still intriguing.

-Helsreach is one of my favourites to re-read. It has a fairly simple plot (last stands and all that), but the characters are great, the depictions of Titans are amazing, and the author brought an excellent balance in the Black Templar's mindsets (great mix of grimdark and noble knights that few others have achieved). Also Andrej the Stormtrooper.

-The Blood Angels stories by James Swallow. Not bad, I used to love the first two, but now that I'm older, I find that parts of it are a bit... poorly written (not sure how to describe, it just feels like the work of somebody younger, inexperienced even. You get a sense of enthusiasm and eagerness, but it also loses something). The next 2 (Red Thirst and Black Tide) are very fun though.

-The Eldar "Path" books (starts with Path of the Warrior, only one I've read) are wonderful. As a newcomer to the Eldar, it was great learning about them through such a good depictions. It's a trilogy.

-Imperial Guard omnibus, not bad, but I enjoyed the novella Fifteen Hours the most out of it, and it's the one I remember the clearest. It depicts the harsher aspects of being a Guardsmen fantastically, very grimdark.

-Gaunt's Ghosts. Only read First-and-Only (and Ghostmaker) so far (as part of the first Omnibus, the Founding), but from that, I can say it's like reading Band of Brothers in the 41st millennium. A good thing. By making their numbers so limited, and making them specialist recon and light infantry (as opposed to a massed infantry wave), Abnett made it possible to get to know particular band of characters in an army that's normally numbers in the thousands. So far, it ranks with Helsreach as "most enjoyable BL books I've reads so far".

Anthony Reynold's Word Bearer books were great! his last book Dark Creed was hereticaly insane, definitely one of my favorites.

Dead Men Walking by Steve Lyons - The Death Korps of Krieg vs. Pre-Ward Necrons, what could be better? the ending was also the saddest thing ever.

I liked the Eldar path books, I just recently finished the Path of the Renegade and I think it did a pretty good job in giving the Dark Eldar some perspective. I humbly await the Path of The Outcast and Incubus.

Elector wrote: ...Also Andrej the Stormtrooper.

Andrej is hilarious! I have to say he really did help make that book even better.

What with all the speeches and grimdark Grimaldus, everybody forgets the legionnaire who's always right.

TheMostWize wrote:

Elector wrote: ...Also Andrej the Stormtrooper.

Andrej is hilarious! I have to say he really did help make that book even better.

If ADB did a book that had Andrej as the protagonist, I would buy the book in a heartbeat.

Quick question.

Are the ultramarine and iron warriors book linked? Do they overlap? Ive read the ultramarine omnibus and Honsou of the Iron warriors make an appearance with the main charecture being Honsou. That battle isn't repeated in the iron warriors book is it?

I don't want to read it twice.

Wardragoon wrote:

TheMostWize wrote:

Elector wrote: ...Also Andrej the Stormtrooper.

Andrej is hilarious! I have to say he really did help make that book even better.

If ADB did a book that had Andrej as the protagonist, I would buy the book in a heartbeat.

Absolutely! Andrej for President!

It is I feel one of the strengths of ADBs work - he makes chacraters you want to know more about, how they got to where they are and for those that survived their future:

Andrej would be a good character for a collection of short stories or his exploits and adventures - be especially interesting for him to encounter Cain

just as interesting I feel would be the story of Princeps Majoris Zarha Mancion, the Crone of Invigilata

or how Commander Barasath gained the right to bear the cross of the Black Templars on their aircraft.

J99Pwrangler wrote:Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

Mechanicum's primary concern as a novel is with establishing the Mechanicum's mythos (the Void Dragon, the labyrinth and all that), but there's still a good bit of old-fashioned giant mecha combat (which is a pleasing tip of the hat to how the Horus Heresy first appeared back in 1988). Other than that, titans seldom appear in any prominent role in BL's fiction, presumably because GW don't have any mainstream titan miniatures for the books to promote.

English Assassin wrote:

J99Pwrangler wrote:Doesn anyone know of more Titan fluff in 40k novels? I have read Titanicus, and Helsreach. They make mention in a "crusade/conquest of Amageddon" book about titans as well. Just wondering if there is more out there or not.

Mechanicum's primary concern as a novel is with establishing the Mechanicum's mythos (the Void Dragon, the labyrinth and all that), but there's still a good bit of old-fashioned giant mecha combat (which is a pleasing tip of the hat to how the Horus Heresy first appeared back in 1988). Other than that, titans seldom appear in any prominent role in BL's fiction, presumably because GW don't have any mainstream titan miniatures for the books to promote.

I was reading Mechanicum again last night and I find it to be one of Graham McNeills triumphs, the battles are believable and the way in which he describes the events happening on Mars is very well done. The whole Dragon scene is great too, why couldn't he achieve the same in Fulgrim or False Gods i'm not sure. Perhaps they were his practice stories.

There is an excellent Titan battle in Storm of Iron, another one of Grahams and perhaps my favorite story written by him and there are Titans galore in the illustrated story Titan: God Machine.

http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/priests-of-mars.html


Titans and Ad mech indeed.

.. part 1 of 2 though so etc etc...

reds8n wrote:http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/priests-of-mars.html


Titans and Ad mech indeed.

.. part 1 of 2 though so etc etc...

Spoiler:

We also see the return of someone I never thought we'd see again

That looks good, but it's a lot of wonga, so who is it, if you don''t mind spoilering it? Is it

Nope.

.... if you insist...

Downright bad - Fall of Damnos, Legion of Damned, Atlas Infernal, Imperial Glory, Battle for Fang, basically anything by Henry Zou and C.Z. Goto.

Must read - Titanicus, Cyaphas Cain series,Emperor's Gift, Prospero Burns/Thousand Sons, Rynn's World, Priests of Mars.

Not so widely mentioned books GOOD books - Double Eagle (pilots' POV), Gunheads (Cadian tankers), Death World(Catachans, with nod to H.Harrison), and (f you're not allergic to mostly description of space elves' way of life) "Path of Warrior"/"Path of Seer".

Good enough - Know No Fear, Angel of Fire, First heretic(+Aureliann), Cadian Blood, Rogue Trader series.

Strange (either love it or hate it) - ADB's Night Lords trilogy.

Harriticus wrote:The Night Lords Trilogy (Soul Hunter, Blood Reaver, Void Stalker) are probably the best BL has put out. They not only take place in the 40k setting, but actually have real novel-level characterization/plot/drama. They feel like real sci-fi novels as opposed to bolter porn with a 40k label, a problem most 40k books suffer from.

Very true !

Otherwise its just the classics like Gaunts Ghosts and Eisenhorn. I don't know about Ravenor, havn't read it.

I also enjoy most of the Imperial guard novels. 15 hours was a great book, the perfect way to introduce someone to the 40k universe !
Rebel winter was nice, Cadian blood was also nice. Can't name many more off my head, read them a while ago.

I am just VERY confused about the ending of... damn it the name escapes me.

Its the book on this very specific guard regiment, it ends with them all dying in a suicid assault on the old HQ, and one of the characters having a vision of sorts.
WHAT THE FETH was on with the end...

I'll throw my voice behind Rynn's World. It provides a rare glimpse into the inner working of a chapter's fortress monastery as well as what it takes to emotional traumatize Space Marines.

Not to mention the bloody carnage that the Crimson Fists reap against the orks!

The idea to put BL books in 40k Battleforces/Starter sets was brought up recently in another thread, what do you guys think about that?

As other people have mentioned, Eisenhorn and Ravenor.
I have read at least 10 other 40k books and nothing comes close. Not that I don't like other 40k books, I just bought a bunch more Graham McNeill and some new authors I haven't read, but Eisenhorn and Ravenor are in a league of their own, even compared to Dan Abnett's other books. Gaunt's Ghosts are a distant second.