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Hey everyone,
So I have been doing some looking around at some book stores at the 40k books and have recently gotten into the Tau army so I found 1 book called FireWarrior.

I was wondering if this book was more based about the Tau or the Imperial Guard?

I want a book more about the Tau and only the Tau, is there a book something that is like that?
Thanks

Fire Warrior I believe is the novelization of the video game from like a decade ago. Pretty sure it's primarily Tau-centric.

As above firewarrior is the novelisation of the video game.

There is also the novella Shadowsun: Last of Kiru's Line which is Tau vs Imperials and pontificates a little on Tau society. Perhaps that is more what you are after?

There is no perfect Tau novel written from Tau perspective, BL only dared such a thing for Eldar.

1.) Fire Warrior is a now old novelization of an ego-shooter. If you keep that in mind, it is surprisingly good with a few tidbits about private life. Main story is about an exceptional emotional Tau, that a daemon tries to corrupt.
2.) Shadowsun is indeed almost exclusively written from tau perspective. It is an okay novel if you like Tau, but not worth the high special edition price if not. As there are only two such novels, I can still recommend reading it.
3.) There is an ebook called patient Hunter, a few pages on a Riptide pilot, with some tau perspective. It is the first example of railgun-porn, mainly saying: "Here is IG tank X, here is its crew ... BAM ... here is the next IG tank X ....", so basically wasted time and money.
4.) This one is a bit complicated: "Fire Caste". This is an "Apocalypse Now" setting on a backwater jungle planet. IG vs. Tau vs. unknown influences. Novel is really good and innovative, but mostly written from IG perspective, even if you learn something when there are fights against tau, Kroot, and Vespids. However, there are two downloads exclusively from tau perspective. One a short background of the female tau commander, which is an okay read. Second a short story (about 11 printed pages) about a Tau expedition to a secret Inquisition complex. Best piece written from Tau perspective (young female Water Caste member) so far. Hilarious ideas, fun, inventive, thrilling, and potentially explaining a lot what is actually going on on that planet. So I can only recommend the package novel plus 2 downloads.
5.) Old novel "For the Emperor" also written from IG perspective. Topic an Imperial planet about to be taken over by Tau. You learn quite a bit about Tau and Kroot, but of course more about IG. Was best Tau novel until Fire Caste. The sequel "For the Greater Good" surprisingly has almost no Tau content, just sold at the time of the tau release. The latter a waste of time and money.
6.) There are a few other novels with tau participation, but for tau fans they are not worth reading, basically how Tau die in bolter fire. Especially bad are "Savage Scars" and "Courage and Honour".

Try Kill Team, a Last Chancers novel by Gav Thorpe. The book is about a plan to assassinate a Tau Commander. Lots of Tau involvement. Not a bad read either.

A yes, forgot that one in my list.
Strick IG perspective, actually the perspective of a total psychopath.
I hate to be forced to that perspective, but it also has a few nice tidbits about Tau and Kroot, a.o. Tau space travel.
Still, no book like the Gav Thorpe Eldar series, where you see Tau everyday life through the eyes of Tau.

Fortunately I think BL is finally branching out and releasing novels from non-Imperial perspective. Over the last few years we've seen a flurry of books from Eldar, Dark Eldar, and Chaos perspectives. A proper Tau perspective series is only a matter of time, and really the most difficult is going to be the inevitable Necron one given Newcrons are fairly free-thinking.

Unfortunately given the current state of BL it will be limited edition hardpack novella bs.

Damn the Tau's i want a Novel series from the Ork perspective j/k.

But seriously i would like to see a novel series from the Ork perspective.

An ork like captain bluddflagg from dow 2 retribution would be interesting enough for at least one novel.

I recently read shadowsun. it's not bad at all. The first 15 pgs were kinda WTF, but after that it's a good read and full Tau only warfare and society stuff.

I also recommend against The Greater Good. It's a decent read if you are a fan of Ciaphas Cain, but there's pretty much 5% Tau content. The image on the front, a short sequence in the beginning with some suits, and a meeting room. LOL.

Wow I didn't realize there were so many book available for the tau.

I wish that some of them or even one was from the Tau perspective though because I am interested in the Tau background and want to know more the Codex only says a limited amount :p

One of the Ciaphas Cain books feature Tau as the primary opponents (well...stuff changes near the end but that's spoilers). I wouldn't call it "Tau centric" but it gives a pretty good unbiased perspective, in my opinion it's worth reading if only because Cain is hilarious.

The title was "For The Emperor" (of course right).

Just started reading For The Emperor. So far it's pretty decent, it's the last Tau novel I have to read, hopefully it's the best one, because none of them have been stellar imo. Courage and Honour was a non-stop action-packed funhouse, but still not McNeill's best. Currently it's my favorite Tau novel (told from the perspective of Astartes though).

 Krellnus wrote:
As above firewarrior is the novelisation of the video game.

There is also the novella Shadowsun: Last of Kiru's Line which is Tau vs Imperials and pontificates a little on Tau society. Perhaps that is more what you are after?

Spoilers: It is only 82 pages for a 20$ book and it is about whether she should be a mother.
It was written by someone with no idea how tau society works.

 PrehistoricUFO wrote:
Courage and Honour was a non-stop action-packed funhouse, but still not McNeill's best.

A Tau army of Orbital shuttles, anti-grav tanks and jet pack battle suits ..... fights over a bridge to cross a river ???
Apart from that you learn next to nothing about Tau and Kroot.
And even if it is official fluff, I can't get over this:
"Do you know how to drive that Tetra?"
"No, let's eat the drivers brain and be done."

Just to toss this one out there, but Imperial Armor 3 Taros campaign 2nd ed , is a great read about a Tau /Imperial campaign..well written and logical, also it has all the most current rules for every Tau unit forgeworld makes.

And they did not Ret-con Longstrike's killing of a Warhound..its still a AX-1-0 Tigershark that does it ..yay Forgeworld, fighting against retconning!

 Soo'Vah'Cha wrote:
Just to toss this one out there, but Imperial Armor 3 Taros campaign 2nd ed , is a great read about a Tau /Imperial campaign..well written and logical, also it has all the most current rules for every Tau unit forgeworld makes.

And they did not Ret-con Longstrike's killing of a Warhound..its still a AX-1-0 Tigershark that does it ..yay Forgeworld, fighting against retconning!

Really, ALL UNITS!!!!!
I know what im using any B-day money im getting

Does the old codex contain more backstory on the tau as well? Because I can get one for dirt cheap just for the fluff haha

IIRC only the first Tau Codex had a few stories not included in the second and third. The current third includes everything of the second and a few more things. If you only want to buy one, the current is the obvious choice for background as well.

chiefbigredman wrote:
Wow I didn't realize there were so many book available for the tau.

I wish that some of them or even one was from the Tau perspective though because I am interested in the Tau background and want to know more the Codex only says a limited amount :p

Honestly dude, you're gonna be hella disappointed. I play Tau and upon getting more into the hobby elements I wanted to learn more about their stories / culture / racial quirks and was extremely disappointed.

Basically every other race in the 40k universe is infinitely more interesting, poses an actual galactic threat and has some grand agenda. Most other races also have a crap tonne of exposition about each unit and their role in the culture, but Tau have no peeks into the daily culture or the thinking patterns behind their people.

I find it ironic that GW wants people to "forge a narrative" and come up with a cool story to give battles more depth, and then produces absolutely when it comes to fluff.

I have basically taken it upon myself to start writing short fiction expounding on things I think the Tau society should include / look-like.

You know, sometimes less is better....the current fluff and background serves to flesh out and define enough of the Tau and their culture to make them interesting , and to allow people interested in them to do some of their own background tweaks ( such as write their own Fan fiction ), anytime GW starts to muck around with a race and give it over to another new writers interp, it always runs the risk of getting worse.

I was happy that the new codex did not re-write the Tau and all its existing flavor over into some thing new, that I could quite possibly hate , the old fluff drew me to them, and the models are fun to work with..I care little that within the scope of the book fluff that the Tau are a small fish amongst whales, I still kick those whale's tails on the battlefield.

And many Tau players have tried their hands at Tau culture fan fics, its part of the fun..if some silly clod at GW started trying to nail down every little nuance of the Empire likely it would turn out horrible, I like my nice uncharted areas for my own imagination.