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Looking at picking up Redemption and Annihilation, the two omnibuses. Anyone read them and care to weigh in?

Yeah, they were okay.
A bit silly in places but I prefer my sci fi to be less dry.
Better than HH novels imo.

Wasn't overly impressed personally.

There was a point somewhere around Book 4 I think where I just stopped caring. I enjoyed the crap out of the first three, but Book 4 lost my interest completely with the introduction of new characters. Doesn't typically bode well for a series, but I still consider them fine reads.

i enjoyed them, and they really, really inspire some interesting Space Marine modeling ideas, and have a killer paint scheme...

going with what SharkoutofWata said, i would just buy the first omnibus, and see what you think...
the first few books build the setting, so everything is still new and fresh...

cheers
jah

I'm an SD player and nut job for some 10 years now and get quite jumpy on the subject viz;

A. the *concepts* are really really good
B. the execution wavers from
1. 'ok'
2. 'quite excellent book' ,
3. 'Nice idea, but it's out of place for the established story
4. 'WHY!?'
5. 'Ok that's cool and goes in depth about stuff that's not talked about much, but actually badly written'
6. 'Yeah, that was a good ending'.

book 7, Daenyathos is a separate story and should be read *AT THE END* because it spoils a lot. I will say that SPACE GHOST MARINE CHAPLAINS was quite possibly the single most insane piece of writing in the GrimDark i've encountered and I loved every moment of it. Daenyathos is possibly the best book in the series, but it's quite short. It's entirely possible that another trilogy could have come out of it, and it would have been awesome.

You can see Ben Counter's writing style develop from lots of enthusiasm, not much pure skill, to no enthusiasm lots of skill, and then pick up again towards the end. As such it's a bumpy ride but well worth it as it gives some really nice unique details you can run with for modelling all kinds of armies, and one of the more substantial tragedies of 40k, slightly hampered by the delivery.

Thanks for the input guys. One thing to clarify, was it reissued? I see on Amazon this one from 2006

https://www.amazon.com/Soul-Drinkers-Omnibus-Warhammer-Novels/dp/1844164160/ref=pd_sim_14_6/185-9598647-7379142?ie=UTF8&dpID=51sOdDcLS4L&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR104%2C160_&psc=1&refRID=M0BZSM4QA9DRW55Q3QPT

And this one from 2013

https://www.amazon.com/Soul-Drinkers-Redemption-Ben-Counter/dp/1849704597

If so, were there any major changes?

I have the original omnibus and the individual novels after that so can't comment.

Though if I remember rightly the 2nd version uses a slightly larger page format for a slimmer book.

I've read them and they were quite enjoyable. The concept of the series was very intresting, and I have to say the Chapter Master in the series is one of my favorite characters in all the Black Library novels I've read.