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I know this has already been asked before but, what order should they be read in from start to fin?(of course Horus Rising and Galaxy in Flames being 1st in 2nd).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horus_Heresy_%28novels%29

There you go.

In time order (I can only put in what I have read, maybe somepone else can fill in the rest):

Way back: Descent of Angels*

Before the Heresy: Legion*, The Dark King Audiobook*

Heresy Beginning: Horus Rising, False Gods, Mechanicum*

Isstvan III: Galaxy in Flames, Flight of The Eisenstein, Fulgrim (partly)

Isstvan V: Fulgrim (partly), Ravens Flight Audiobook*

Battle for Terra: The Lightning Tower Audiobook*

If you follow that basicly you will be ok. There are a few you can miss out all together (meaning if you don't read them you wont have missed anything major) which I have marked with a *

Read them in the order they were released. Otherwise, you might ruin the suspense of a mystery from earlier released novels.

Did that make any sense?

CajunMan wrote:Read them in the order they were released. Otherwise, you might ruin the suspense of a mystery from earlier released novels.

Did that make any sense?

Reading legion/Mechanicum/Descent of Angles first or at any time is not going to ruin anything.

I think reading Mechanicum first would ruin earlier novels because you learn a lot about the Emperor in that novel. Whereas, in the Horus trilogy, the Emperor was a distant figure, almost a legend. As the books are released you learn a little bit more about the Emperor and the Great Crusade, as well as actually witnessing him speak.

I've just started reading them.

The way I'm reading them, is Horus Rising, False Gods, Galaxy in Flames and Flight of the Eisenstein first. They all seem to make up the core start of the series. Then I'm just picking the books I want to read from the rest. If they're multi part books, I'll read those in order too.

Read Fulgrim after FotE. The Dark Angel books are kinda on there own, as is Legion. I would read Mechanicum after Fulgrim. After that its Tales of Heresy. After that Nemesis then A Thousand Sons and Prospero Burns. Then The First Heretic(which is AMAZING!).

The problem is, for me, there's books I simply don't want to read. Fulgrim (I don't have any interest whatsoever in him or the Emperors Children) and the Dark Angels books are right up there.

The First Heretic is a strange one. I like the Word Bearers, but Erebus was such an unlikeable douchebag that it made me want to skip First Heretic. It's possible to make likeable bad guys - pretty much every other bad guy in the first 4 books are great. They dropped the ball with Erebus.

Well, you can go without reading the Dark Angels books. Fulgrim is actually really good, and is the first to show the Dropsite Massacre on Istvaan 5. And Saul Tarvitz is friggin awesome! On The First Heretic, Erebus is rarely in the novel, so that should clear that up for you! And he's supposed to be an unlikeable douche. That's who he is!


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Oh and skip Battle For the Abyss. Stay away from it.

Thanks all Well I was thinking I could read it in released order but was not sure if reading the dark angel books back to back after flugrim would mess up anything for me, also wanted to see if there was a diff way I could start reading to be accurate with the time line( as in which book was written farthest back in the 40k universe and then go from there)

CajunMan wrote:Well, you can go without reading the Dark Angels books. Fulgrim is actually really good, and is the first to show the Dropsite Massacre on Istvaan 5. And Saul Tarvitz is friggin awesome! On The First Heretic, Erebus is rarely in the novel, so that should clear that up for you! And he's supposed to be an unlikeable douche. That's who he is!

You're the second person to recommend Fulgrim to me. I might grab that one when I'm done with Legion (no way I'm putting that one off any longer). After Legion, I'll probably grab Fulgrim and A Thousand Sons.