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I got a little burned out on the Horus Heresy (I even wrote my own report on it from the point of view of the Tau).

I was looking over the AoS books, and I've never read any of them. Are there any good ones for someone who only has cursory knowledge of the realms (most of it comes from reading angry forum posts and WD articles).

So just like in Old World; one way to get a good handle on the setting is to team up with Gotrek. The first two Audio novels and then the following series of books that are being expanded are great. The two audio dramas basically set him up in the world; whilst the novels that follow will basically pluck one or two factions and regions and focus on them and his adventure and introduction to those factions and then move on.

The writing in them all is nice and solid and moves at a good pace.



After that you've got the Realmwars books which baiscally chronicle the very start of the setting. They are ok but they are made to go with campaigns alongside the stormcast and are VERY Stormcast heavy. They can also honestly feel a tiny bit silly at times with how elite GW made Stormcast in them.

Personally I started with Pestilens (its in the Saga collection 1 compendium). Which was a great Skaven VS Seraphon+Stormcast story.



After that the Novella are great shorter novels that let you get a peek at a lot of different factions; plus there's the Inferno series which are shorter, but again nice stories that let you peek into various different factions and groups.

Second the Gotrek books being a great way in.

Any of the character focus books are good for getting a view on them. Yndrasta, Ushoran, Lioness of the Parch and so on. The original Blacktalon novel was great, but unfortunately retconned. But probably has one of the most disturbing depictions of a Nurgle fortress ever written.

Oh and a Dynasty of Monsters was a fantastic little vampire read.

Dynasty of Monsters is great but its one of those books that makes me wish GW would hire just one REALLY awesome worldbuilding author to write a proper guide on just how the heck the mortal realms works.


I still can't work out how you can farm in a landscape that changes from fields to mountains in literal seconds.

People live in and around the center where it's for all intents and purposes, normal. This has been established for a while now.

 Eldarain wrote:
Second the Gotrek books being a great way in.

I've been trying to catch up on them, as I've only got the first 4 omnibuses. Annoyingly, volume 5 is out of print and people want silly prices for physical copies.

Crispy78 wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
Second the Gotrek books being a great way in.

I've been trying to catch up on them, as I've only got the first 4 omnibuses. Annoyingly, volume 5 is out of print and people want silly prices for physical copies.

I've noticed the same problem.

I didn't realize that Gotrek had made the jump to AoS.

He would probably hate the pansy AoS dwarves.

 Inquisitor Gideon wrote:
People live in and around the center where it's for all intents and purposes, normal. This has been established for a while now.

I mean aside from the fact that in Dynasty of Monsters the story is based on a settlement in such a region with farms and all. The City is even built on a massive towering plinths that raise it above the standard deviations for the region (and I believe some magic is involved to stop the land under it just becoming a mountain).

Well there's your answer right there, counter magic.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:

Crispy78 wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
Second the Gotrek books being a great way in.

I've been trying to catch up on them, as I've only got the first 4 omnibuses. Annoyingly, volume 5 is out of print and people want silly prices for physical copies.

I've noticed the same problem.

I didn't realize that Gotrek had made the jump to AoS.

He would probably hate the pansy AoS dwarves.

The first one definitely puts him in the role of skeptical WHFB veteran to good effect. Lots of complaining and comparing to the dwarfs, elves etc from his world.

Nagash: Undying King and Soulwars are both good IMO.

The various collections of short stories from the edition changes are usually pretty good and give you a nice, varied read of the realms.

Thanks. I need something fantasy-esque...

I read Bad Loon Rising last year.

Not the pinnacle of literature (or even fantasy lit), but entertaining enough for a short read.

City of Secrets was heralded as the first novel to get "street level" in the AoS setting and it was pretty good. It's had 2 sequels and a set of miniatures released to depict the characters of Callis and Toll, as well as some of their occasional companions.

Gloomspite was a good one, bit of slow-burn horror leading up to the enemy finally revealing itself in full and then things go into full body horror and survival mode as a city is overrun by Gloomspite Gitz. It came out shortly before Black Library released their "horror" subgenre, but would totally fit into that genre. And as far as deaths were concerned, no one was safe which is something that I like.

Warcry Catacombs: Blood of the Everchosen was something that surprised me, kind of humanizing the warbands that featured in OG Warcry. I thought it would just be brainless tie-in to the game, but it was pretty cool and had a neat concept that probably will never be brought up again, unfortunately.

All of the now defunct "novella" series books set in AoS I rate pretty high as far as pulp-fantasy fiction goes.

I keep meaning to pick up the Warcry books as they're cheap on ebay. I'll have to grab that then.