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Tycho wrote:


yep. LOVED that Ultramarines script. Abnett really nailed it.

Well, if Abnett was writing for the 1d4Chan version of the Ultramarines, it would have been the greatest and most accurate depiction of the chapter possible. I just like the everyman marines, not the hate train or the god worship from the ragers and the Wardians.

I'm a big fan of the cartoonish villainy 40k villains get up to. It fits well with the cartoonish villainy the heroes get up to.

Tycho wrote:

yep. LOVED that Ultramarines script. Abnett really nailed it.

I really liked the part where a Daemon Prince was knocked out by a Space Marine's helmet. That was kewl.

McNeill? One really good Iron Warriors book. After that all of his work runs together into the same colorless tasteless gruel the authors always describe CSM slaves as eating.

What have you read of his?

I will give you ADB though. His Nightlords books were amazing, but, IMO the rest of his work is just average. Not bad, just not the transcendent works of literary brilliance they are often made out to be.

It varies book by book, and even act by act.

I was totally down with The Emperor's Gift until Act 3. Then the assfury took over.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

Tycho wrote:

yep. LOVED that Ultramarines script. Abnett really nailed it.

I really liked the part where a Daemon Prince was knocked out by a Space Marine's helmet. That was kewl.

McNeill? One really good Iron Warriors book. After that all of his work runs together into the same colorless tasteless gruel the authors always describe CSM slaves as eating.

What have you read of his?

I will give you ADB though. His Nightlords books were amazing, but, IMO the rest of his work is just average. Not bad, just not the transcendent works of literary brilliance they are often made out to be.

It varies book by book, and even act by act.

I was totally down with The Emperor's Gift until Act 3. Then the assfury took over.

Abnett isn't much better. His Eisenhorn novels were great but most of Gaunt's Ghosts, while relatively enjoyable by BL standards (Abnett actualy manages to build interesting worlds ) on the other hand are little more than standard military fiction, including many of the usual cliches.
Mc'Neil is barely competent, his Ultramarines novels lack both interesting protagonists and inteligent villains and are more often than not carried by a plot that is quite thin.
With a few exceptions most BL novels are not better or worse than the usual scifi pulp.

Well... no. It's not incorrect. In fact, it's utterly correct. You know, there are only something like six basic stories, which any other story will ultimately boil down to. The fact of the matter is that nothing truly is new, but the way people use these things makes them appear new.

 Void__Dragon wrote:
Then the assfury took over.

"assfury"?!?

Also, you Avatar and Signature combo - not good!

Erebus doesn't fit into the OP's pattern at all, and he's the real antagonist for the whole HH series...

McNeill? One really good Iron Warriors book. After that all of his work runs together into the same colorless tasteless gruel the authors always describe CSM slaves as eating.


What have you read of his?

Storm of Iron (which is the "good" Iron Warriors book I mentioned), Nightbringer, False Gods, Fulgrim, Mechanicum, A Thousand Sons, Chapter's Due, and several of the other Ultramarines books, but like I said, I can't really separate one from the other with a lot of those.

Admittedly though, now that I think about it, I did also enjoy Chapter's Due. But the rest of it? Just didn't work for me. Nightbringer especially fell WAY flat.

KingDeath wrote:

Abnett isn't much better. His Eisenhorn novels were great but most of Gaunt's Ghosts, while relatively enjoyable by BL standards (Abnett actualy manages to build interesting worlds ) on the other hand are little more than standard military fiction, including many of the usual cliches.
Mc'Neil is barely competent, his Ultramarines novels lack both interesting protagonists and inteligent villains and are more often than not carried by a plot that is quite thin.
With a few exceptions most BL novels are not better or worse than the usual scifi pulp.

McNeill is actually a tier above Abnett, who more often from what I have read falls into hackneyed action cliches. McNeill also at least has some notion of how one ends a story. I haven't read the Ultramarines series admittedly, but what I have read is generally above that of Abnett's work.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Tycho wrote:

Storm of Iron (which is the "good" Iron Warriors book I mentioned), Nightbringer, False Gods, Fulgrim, Mechanicum, A Thousand Sons, Chapter's Due, and several of the other Ultramarines books, but like I said, I can't really separate one from the other with a lot of those.

Admittedly though, now that I think about it, I did also enjoy Chapter's Due. But the rest of it? Just didn't work for me. Nightbringer especially fell WAY flat.

Didn't like A Thousand Sons huh?

People defend ADB too much. Yes, he managed to write Chaos Space Marines with personalities. But his books have horrid plotting and zero suspense. In the first Night Lords book, the Night Lords abandon a battle that we don't care about, and that's it. Oh, and a Dreadnought we don't know wakes up, only to do nothing and then die. There is zero suspense regarding First Claw.

Then in the second book, the Night Lords abandon a battle that we don't care about. The only interesting part is the Exalted's inner conflict. Again, ADB can write excellent novels inside character's heads, but not outside at all. There is zero suspense in the space battle. Its obvious from the get-go of the fight that First Claw will be fine, and that the Exalted will die.

Then, in the third book, we have three rambling prologues (first, we see Talos getting killed, then we see Talos talking to Ruven's ghost about knowing that he'll get killed, then we see Talos talking to First Claw about how he set course for Tsuguladasfjkhadsf because of the prophecy about him getting killed). We know for a fact that everyone is going to die, expect for maybe Septimus and Octavia. But Septimus and Octavia have a raging case of Stockholm's Syndrome towards Talos, combined with their insufferable constant little arguments, that really make it hard for me to give a gak about them like I did for the first two books. Then, everything follows Talos's prophecies. Everyone dies in First Claw, expect Frankenstein-ripoff. Lucoryphus survives, which is pretty baller. Lucoryphus is an OG. Also, that pointless storyarc from the first book is cut and paste into this. The dead dreadnought wakes up, does nothing, and dies again.

His books would be perfect if it didn't feel like his characters were just muddling around in a world of half formed cliches, deus-ex-machinas, and plain old filler.

Didn't like A Thousand Sons huh?

I wouldn't say I didn't like it, so much as I was ambivalent about it. He wrote a solid Magnus (which probably wasn't easy), and the end battle was very cool, but the rest of the book was just kind of "meh" for me. It was a neat trick to make Magnus such an arrogant you-know-what but then still manage to make the reader have sympathy for him at the end, but like I said, his stuff just doesn't have flavor for me for some reason.

 Baldsmug wrote:
I love me some bolterporn. I have small children so the only time i really get to read is, as they would say in black library books "during my daily ablutions". I like that i dont have to think too much and i dont miss a whole lot when i briefly skim a paragraph or two to get to the parts about the guys i wanna read about. Who cares what Honsou is crying about skip to the next section so i can see what my most favorite LGBT couple in the galaxy, Uriel and Pasanius are up to. I also really love the audio dramas. If i wanted literature i would read that but i want some pulp and action. Its a fun read and is easy on the thought processors.
.

Honsou is the only good thing to come out of those novels.

 Omegus wrote:

 Baldsmug wrote:
I love me some bolterporn. I have small children so the only time i really get to read is, as they would say in black library books "during my daily ablutions". I like that i dont have to think too much and i dont miss a whole lot when i briefly skim a paragraph or two to get to the parts about the guys i wanna read about. Who cares what Honsou is crying about skip to the next section so i can see what my most favorite LGBT couple in the galaxy, Uriel and Pasanius are up to. I also really love the audio dramas. If i wanted literature i would read that but i want some pulp and action. Its a fun read and is easy on the thought processors.
.

Honsou is the only good thing to come out of those novels.

Just a pity that he gets burdened with the idiot/villain ball so often.