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At this point I've read Horus Rising, False Gods, Galaxy in Flames, Flight of the Eisenstein, Legion, A Thousand Sons, Prospero Burns, and The First Heretic.

I'm currently trying to hack my way through Fulgrim, but good lord it is so friggin' boring I want to shoot myself in the face. It's like they are trying to make this Primarch as contemptible as possible. The only reason I persist is because a fellow dakkanaut vehemently argued that this book proves that Astartes still have very much active sex drives and aren't a bunch of chem-neutered geldings. I'll get through it eventually, so I can reignite that argument from an informed position, but for now I need a break with something that doesn't suck... or at least sucks a little less.

Dismissing the compilation books, it seems what's left to me is the Battle for the Abyss, Mechanicum, the quasi-duology of Descent of Angels and Fallen Angels, and Nemesis.

Right now I'm leaning towards Mechanicum because I always liked the techno adepts, or the duology since I've never much cared for the Dark Angels and would like to change that opinion if possible. I'm very much open to suggestions, however. So which of these books is the best/least horrible to cleanse my reading palate from the foulness that is Fulgrim?

Omegus wrote:At this point I've read Horus Rising, False Gods, Galaxy in Flames, Flight of the Eisenstein, Legion, A Thousand Sons, Prospero Burns, and The First Heretic.

I'm currently trying to hack my way through Fulgrim, but good lord it is so friggin' boring I want to shoot myself in the face. It's like they are trying to make this Primarch as contemptible as possible. The only reason I persist is because a fellow dakkanaut vehemently argued that this book proves that Astartes still have very much active sex drives and aren't a bunch of chem-neutered geldings.

Well that's not true so you're going to be dissapointed

Dismissing the compilation books,

Don't, they are some of the better ones.

You dislike Fulgrim ? How ? I admit the start is a little boring but once you get through it, it gets very enjoyable.

I have enjoyed most of the series (And I have read them all) the only three I have a problem eith are : Battle for the abyss, Decent of angels and Falllen angels.

The best so far have been : Legion, Mechanicum, Fulgirm, A thousand sons, The first heretic and Age of Darkness is quite good aswell.

KamikazeCanuck wrote:Well that's not true so you're going to be dissapointed

So not disappointed, but rather vindicated! I did think his argument sounded very fishy, so it's good to get confirmation that he was full of crap.

Don't, they are some of the better ones.

I was saving them for last.

moonshine wrote:You dislike Fulgrim ? How ? I admit the start is a little boring but once you get through it, it gets very enjoyable.

Well, I've gone through the first 100 pages or so, and I just can't get into it.

I have enjoyed most of the series (And I have read them all) the only three I have a problem eith are : Battle for the abyss, Decent of angels and Falllen angels.

I've heard horror stories about the Battle for the Abyss. It's disappointing that the Dark Angels books are equally horrendous.

The best so far have been : Legion, Mechanicum, Fulgirm, A thousand sons, The first heretic and Age of Darkness is quite good aswell.

Mechanicum it is!

Mechanicum is the best so far in my opion right now I am working on decent of angels.

The battle for the Abyss is pretty shoddy stuff.

Mechanicum is okay.

You shouldn't dismiss Tales Of Heresy, compilation or no. It's quite good and gives more of a panoramic view of the conflict. I don't recall being bored through any of the stories.

Nemesis is also worth a look. Because assassins are cool.

I agree that the books make the primarchs into as ugly and nasty a group as possible. But that, to me, isn't boring. They are, at heart, emotionally disturbed children in command of weapons that can kill worlds. What could be boring about that?

Yeah you really have to plow through Fulgrim for a bit (about page 200 is where it gets going) but once you are through that it becomes very enjoyabe and you will probably agree that is one of the best.

I would recommend The First Heretic, by far my favourite.

moonshine wrote:Yeah you really have to plow through Fulgrim for a bit (about page 200 is where it gets going) but once you are through that it becomes very enjoyabe and you will probably agree that is one of the best.

That's half the damn book!

Droofus wrote:You shouldn't dismiss Tales Of Heresy, compilation or no.

As I said, saving that for last.

Valkyrie wrote:I would recommend The First Heretic, by far my favourite.

Was one of the first I read. It was a good one, indeed.

Out of all of them so far, Legion is just begging for a sequel.

Agreed, Legion is amazing. Oh and to add to the dissapoinment list I will add: prospero burns. (most disapointing title ever)

I liked the book quite a bit, although the title is definitely misleading. Dan Abnett's worst is still the Black Library's best.

Check out Battle of the Fang for "Wolves curbstomping Thousand Sons" action, that may cool your ire.

Mechanicum is the worst book in the series. The narrative is appalling. It's just a summary of a bunch of stuff that happens during the heresy on Mars, there's no plot. A one page bullet list would have provided the same drama. All of the characters have between 0 and 1 motive, mostly the former.

I don't plan on reading battle for the fang, I dislike space wolves. The major problem I had with Prospero burns is how dissapointing it is, the cover art and title made me excpect a good description of the battle for prospero and the actual battle betwean Magnus and Russ but alas it did not deliver on it at all.

Mechanicum was alright. Galaxy in flames was poor, the rembrancers were very boring and so was the titan crew. Ban counter simply cannot write to the standards of the other black library authors (battle for the abbys springs to mind) luckily as you may have noticed the weaker authors do not write much Horus heresy stuff do we can avoid anything from Ben counter for a while.

Gav Thrope is writing Deliverance Lost, so we can only wait and see if he does somthing Dan Abnett quality or will he fail like Ben Counter ?

DarknessEternal wrote:Mechanicum is the worst book in the series. The narrative is appalling. It's just a summary of a bunch of stuff that happens during the heresy on Mars, there's no plot. A one page bullet list would have provided the same drama. All of the characters have between 0 and 1 motive, mostly the former.

As all the books are a basicly a summary of what happens during the heresy the location should not matter. There is a plot (Tho someone a simple as you may not apperciate it). Its easy to go around slinging mud when you don't take the time to enjoy the book and actualy read it. Just because someone is not getting eviserated or blow away every other page does not make the book bad. It is written from diffrent perspectives so that you can understand how deep the heresy on mars was and how it effected each of those people. The some of the characters were well defined while others were not I will atest to that. The overall story weaving was done quite well. It was a good look into how the mechanicus was created. How it had a chance of becoming something much more grand and advanced, but instead falling short due to greed and power mongering and the corruption of chaos. As far as the bullet list thing is concerned there is not one book that can't be explained that way, but only someone who does not apperciate good fiction tends to only pay attention the action packed parts and dismiss the more common laid back explanitory parts that bring the book together as boring and bad writing.

I liked the battle for the abyss loads of action loads of adventure every page is pretty much a fight scene or the first 3 books yeah there good.Currently reading the first heretic any suggestions after that?

I honestly liked Fulgrim from start to finish, I found it very interesting throughout and the pacing was better done than A Thousands which while good , had a really slow start.

Don't read Prospero Burns, doesn't really give any view on the Wolves side of things until well over halfway into the book and even then its not as exciting as a Thousand Sons was or gives anything new to the information we already had really except for the trial and thats very brief

Horus Rising and False Gods are pretty good as well
Have yet to read First Heretic or a Galaxy in Flames but I'm looking into them next

Malivon wrote:

DarknessEternal wrote:Mechanicum is the worst book in the series. The narrative is appalling. It's just a summary of a bunch of stuff that happens during the heresy on Mars, there's no plot. A one page bullet list would have provided the same drama. All of the characters have between 0 and 1 motive, mostly the former.

As all the books are a basicly a summary of what happens during the heresy the location should not matter. There is a plot (Tho someone a simple as you may not apperciate it). Its easy to go around slinging mud when you don't take the time to enjoy the book and actualy read it. Just because someone is not getting eviserated or blow away every other page does not make the book bad. It is written from diffrent perspectives so that you can understand how deep the heresy on mars was and how it effected each of those people. The some of the characters were well defined while others were not I will atest to that. The overall story weaving was done quite well. It was a good look into how the mechanicus was created. How it had a chance of becoming something much more grand and advanced, but instead falling short due to greed and power mongering and the corruption of chaos. As far as the bullet list thing is concerned there is not one book that can't be explained that way, but only someone who does not apperciate good fiction tends to only pay attention the action packed parts and dismiss the more common laid back explanitory parts that bring the book together as boring and bad writing.

When some one insults a book, you don't go an insult the person.
Opinions are just that, and everyone has one.

If he didn't enjoy the story, trying to insult him certainly won't prove anything to him.

I for one found Mechanicum rather boring and I absolutely loved Fulgrim.

DarknessEternal wrote:Mechanicum is the worst book in the series. The narrative is appalling. It's just a summary of a bunch of stuff that happens during the heresy on Mars, there's no plot. A one page bullet list would have provided the same drama. All of the characters have between 0 and 1 motive, mostly the former.

Obvious Troll, is obvious.
You managed to con one person into a reaction, please, no one else take this seriously.

Agreed!

The only 'bad' book is BATTLE FOR THE ABYSS - and really it was just because it literally added nothing to the story to date, in terms of what we already knew or what the current series is telling us...

Alpharius wrote:Agreed!

The only 'bad' book is BATTLE FOR THE ABYSS - and really it was just because it literally added nothing to the story to date, in terms of what we already knew or what the current series is telling us...

So THATS why all the hate for Abyss. I was about to post, I read it and thought it was pretty good, but yes, it technically didn't add anything so I guess that's a fair point.

I read threw Fulgrim in two days, I found it VERY enjoyable but... that's not to say it would not be boring in other eyes. So I'll consider why it would lead someone to shot themselves in the face. It's not very combative sure there are the points, I would say three sections one near the beginning a second near the end and then a third that is at the end very heavy.

Now for what would bore you, the sub plot being one involving Serena D'Angelus, Ostian Delafour and Bequa Kynska, one a painter, sculptor lastly theatrical.

Spoiler is about Art sub plot...

Spoiler:

Sure threw the story they have there own plot lines, Both Serena and Bequa actually degrade into an aspect of Slaanesh in an artistic form. Serena threw painting her bodily fluid painting, Bequa threw her last opera and the summoning of daemons. The interesting twist is Fulgrim trying to out do Ostian's sculpture. I think with this thinking Fulgrim is the one that actually takes the stand point of corruption from sculpting as an art form as a foreshadow. Ostian stays pure to the emperor threw the whole novel which is why Fulgrim view's his work as perfection. The novel itself could constitute a stand in corruption of literature. Thus the sub plot is a corruption of artistic styles and creations which could bore someone too death if they like combat and honor and all that jazz.

Far as 'Vehemently' is concerned I don't particularly agree with him and I enjoy Slaanesh fluff quite a bit. I would say he is 85% wrong there are some scene's maybe three but they could have been WAY WAY better...

Spolier is involving sexuality & almost end material...

Spoiler:

The only real aspects of sexuality with SM's is Fabius involving modifying the body structure to feel pleasure more so in combat which isn't even sex. Also maybe a section involving Serena and Lucius cause its fuzy in my mind but I want to say no. The only real sexual scene's that were there was the Laeren Cavern with the sword which involved alien's and no SM individuals from what I remember cause Fulgrim was just after the sword and the end of the Laeren race. There was a section involving Serena to complete her painting and sexually luring a... writer I think to his death so she could use his fluids in her art work. Far as sexuality with SM... I would say it was a far fetch and it could have been better.

Things I thought could have been better in the novel myself, even though I enjoyed it very much...

* Developing sub plot involving the corruption of the Opera with Bequa leading the score (Litterally).
* More provocative sexual innuendo's and / or situations towards the end of the novel involving sub plot characters to show a better representation of the corruption of literature.

-Sincerely Viri

Well, for what it's worth, it was the combative parts that made me want to shoot myself in the face. Combat description against snake people and how the EC want to perfectly do everything perfectly while perfectly shooting their perfect bolters at perfect targets perfectly is not why I read the Horus Heresy books.

The artistry stuff was just so telegraphed... the moment I read that Serena couldn't blend red properly I knew blood would be the final ingredient that she would want, etc. etc.

It's not so bad now that I've neared the middle of the book, as was pointed out above.

Hm, that's interesting Omegus though I could see how you feel about that. For me I was kind of waiting for the moment things would happen with the corruption so it was always a 'When's it going to happen to so and so feeling'. Which is fun for me cause I enjoy the fluff and all that but if you read it and your not big on fluff yeah that could be a definite not so fun thing. Far as the Perfectly doing perfection.... its very true and if your looking for the faults in the novel I would say...

Look at Fulgrim a bit closer and near the end you'll see one very faithful Emperors Children member go down tragically(If thats even a fault but if you think imperious wise it would be). There is also a scene were Lucius looses a duel. Fulgrim's sculpture I guess would be a down side.... That's all I can think of for non-perfection in the novel but your right it does flow pretty standard without hiccup or hiatus. Hope the rest of the read is more 'pleasing' for you(as it should be...). Honestly I found Daemon World more cryptic and enjoyable and it involves Slaanesh being beat up! That's okay though cause most the time that's a good thing.

I'm currently reading Crimson Tears which has a Slaaneshi dark eldar pirate in it and it is boring me to death as well so your not the only one in pain here haha. Though, I have yet to even start reading about the pirate himself or even see his entrance.

-Sincerely Viri

Fulgrim seems to illustrate the Emperor's failure to tell his sons exactly how dangerous the warp is. I thought it was good throughout, but it gets going about half way through.

Battle for the Abyss is poison.

Mechanicum was garbage. The "main" character was a total Mary Sue. "Main" gets to go in quotes because there's no protagonist since there's no plot for that group at all; they just wander around aimlessly.

It was poorly written drivel.

DarknessEternal wrote:Mechanicum was garbage. The "main" character was a total Mary Sue. "Main" gets to go in quotes because there's no protagonist since there's no plot for that group at all; they just wander around aimlessly.

It was poorly written drivel.

Heh, didn'y succeed the last time so you thought you'd try again?
Obvious Troll, is now extremely obvious.

I thought Mechanicum was a good book. Favourite 40K book by far.

DarknessEternal wrote:Mechanicum was garbage. The "main" character was a total Mary Sue. "Main" gets to go in quotes because there's no protagonist since there's no plot for that group at all; they just wander around aimlessly.

It was poorly written drivel.

You know when someone says something is bad, they're kinda supposed to back it up witha reasonable explanation
Here I'll show you how its done

"I think the main character is a Mary Sue because..."
"Mechanicum was garbage because...."
" It was poorly written drivel because...."

Now see the difference? You stated your opinion as if it was fact without backing it up
Is there any reason why you think these things, other than just because YOU didn't like it?

You fell in to the trap. He's trolling, don't react.