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40K's written franchise ranges from childish heroics meant to appeal to growing young boys to deep stories that question the nature of conflict and the universe.
What are the deepest 40k stories you've come across?
My guess would be the first Soul drinkers novel.
In that book, the soul drinkers find an ancient book which has a picture of a chalice on it. After flicking through it, the soul drinkers decide to pack up and move out of the Imperium.
The book they find is hinted at as containing passages about tolerance and understanding. Am I the only one who thinks the book was either a novelisation of Indiana Jones and the last crusade OR the script of Monty Python and the holy grail?
There are some nice moments in the Horus Heresy series where we get to see the humanity behind the traitor primarchs which I quite like. Some of my favourite Warhammer quotes come from people like Angron or Curze telling their loyalist counterparts why they have no right to judge them/commontary on the loyalist chapters.
One of my favourite quotes from the series:
Spoiler:
"What would you know of struggle, Perfect Son? When have you fought against the mutilation of your mind? When have you had to do anything more than tally compliances and polish your armour?" [...] "The people of your world named you Great One. The people of mine called me Slave. Which one of us landed on a paradise of civilization to be raised by a foster father, Roboute? Which one of us was given armies to lead after training in the halls of the Macraggian high-riders? Which one of us inherited a strong, cultured kingdom? And which one of us had to rise up against a kingdom with nothing but a horde of starving slaves? Which one of us was a child enslaved on a world of monsters, with his brain cut up by carving knives? Listen to your blue-clad wretches yelling of courage and honour, courage and honour, courage and honour. Do you even know the meaning of those words? Courage is fighting the kingdom which enslaves you, no matter that their armies outnumber yours by ten-thousand to one. You know nothing of courage. Honour is resisting a tyrant when all others suckle and grow fat on the hypocrisy he feeds them. You know nothing of honour."
Angron, to Guilliman.
...And another:
Spoiler:
"Because the Wolves kill cleanly, and we do not. They also kill quickly, and we have never done that, either. They fight, they win, and they stalk back to their ships with their tails held high. If they were ever ordered to destroy another Legion, they would do it by hurling warrior against warrior, seeking to grind their enemies down with the admirable delusions of the 'noble savage'. If we were ever ordered to assault another Legion, we would virus bomb their recruitment worlds; slaughter their serfs and slaves; poison their gene-seed repositories and spend the next dozen decades watching them die slow, humiliating deaths. Night after night, raid after raid, we'd overwhelm stragglers from their fleets and bleach their skulls to hang from our armour, until none remained. But that isn't the quick execution the Emperor needs, is it? The Wolves go for the throat. We go for the eyes. Then the tongue. Then the hands. Then the feet. Then we skin the crippled remains, and offer it up as an example to any still bearing witness. The Wolves were warriors before they became soldiers. We were murderers first, last, and always!" —Jago Sevatarion
Ghorros wrote: The moral of the story: Don't park your Imperial Knight in a field of Gretchin carrying power tools.
Marmatag wrote: All the while, my opponent is furious, throwing his codex on the floor, trying to slash his wrists with safety scissors.
If you want a deep story you really should not be looking at the stuff that BL puts out. Go read some real literature (do try Tolstoy) instead if you want a deep story. Ultimately, every 40k work is written primarily to entertain teens and young adults. It is just for fun, not meant to be deep.
That said, I am very fond of Wrath of Iron. It is pretty good as far as 40k novels go.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/12/28 14:20:01
As said the primary idea is for the novels to be fun, but the HH series does play around a lot with the idea of loyalty and brotherhood over duty ect ect.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2016/12/28 14:33:07
Eisenhorn get's a shout out as the most deep novel BL puts out. Slowly giving in to corruption over 3 novels Eisenhorn has to become everything he hates in order to defend the Imperium, loosing basically everything. His decent into corruption a slow one and is a good character arc, and the overal setting is remarkably ''human'' most of the time, not battlefields overrun with supersoldiers, so it's easier to sympathise with him.
From my understanding Eisenhorn and/or Ravenor takes the cake for 'deepest' without much competition.
I mean, Blood Pact. When it comes to doing at least a small amount of effort to get some insight about identity, loss, dependence, then sure, I'd read Blood Pact.
Criid wears a costume, that's pretty obvious piece of emotional manipulation but it goes pretty far I think.
I'd have to say the Word Bearers Omnibus is a safe bet... Kinda. Though the story depends on the reader, I personally find it to be one, if not the best, depiction of 40K war and the terrors that chaos truly holds. At a whim a world could be washed away in literal rivers of bodies while forces seeing only black and white murder one another. So if you want a good depiction of 40K's reality, that's a good bet for you.
Out of my collection, I'm nominating Dead Men Walking. You get to see the Krieg acting just like the internet thinks they do, as well as watching ordinary people try and cope with it. There are other books/scenes I've had recommended (Eisenhorn is one), but I've yet to get them.
Spoiler:
In particular the process of Gunther being slowly brainwashed into a mini-Krieg was surprisingly emotional to me
If you allow yourself to be killed and ingested, your soul is forfeited.
Mudrat wrote: Out of my collection, I'm nominating Dead Men Walking. You get to see the Krieg acting just like the internet thinks they do, as well as watching ordinary people try and cope with it. There are other books/scenes I've had recommended (Eisenhorn is one), but I've yet to get them.
Spoiler:
In particular the process of Gunther being slowly brainwashed into a mini-Krieg was surprisingly emotional to me
As said the primary idea is for the novels to be fun, but the HH series does play around a lot with the idea of loyalty and brotherhood over duty ect ect.
Oh please. The Last Church is anything but deep. It is an extremely amateurish attempt at a philosophical and theological discussion. If you want to see it done right, read Augustinus and Tomas of Aquino, which McNeill definitely should have done before writing that book, as they directly refute every argument made by the Emperor in the Last Church. And they wrote that stuff like a 1000 years ago...
Seriously, McNeill's unfamiliarity with actual theology makes the Emperor look like a complete fool, not to mention the priest in the story. Seriously, any local village priest would have come up with better arguments than Uriah.
Still, I suppose it can be an enjoyable read if you do not have any knowledge of theology. I know I definitely enjoyed it when I was younger.
As said the primary idea is for the novels to be fun, but the HH series does play around a lot with the idea of loyalty and brotherhood over duty ect ect.
Oh please. The Last Church is anything but deep. It is an extremely amateurish attempt at a philosophical and theological discussion. If you want to see it done right, read Augustinus and Tomas of Aquino, which McNeill definitely should have done before writing that book, as they directly refute every argument made by the Emperor in the Last Church. And they wrote that stuff like a 1000 years ago...
Seriously, McNeill's unfamiliarity with actual theology makes the Emperor look like a complete fool, not to mention the priest in the story. Seriously, any local village priest would have come up with better arguments than Uriah.
Still, I suppose it can be an enjoyable read if you do not have any knowledge of theology. I know I definitely enjoyed it when I was younger.
Thats your opinion, you would be amazed that other people may disagree with you. And actual teology is just as random and silly as any 40k book if you ask me.
I nominate Blood Pact and somewhat reluctant the Eishorn books as well. The Last Church is a good read as well
Iron_Captain wrote: If you want a deep story you really should not be looking at the stuff that BL puts out. Go read some real literature (do try Tolstoy) instead if you want a deep story. Ultimately, every 40k work is written primarily to entertain teens and young adults. It is just for fun, not meant to be deep.
That said, I am very fond of Wrath of Iron. It is pretty good as far as 40k novels go.
This, though I'm not a fan of Tolstoy. I disagree too much with his anti-individualistic narrative. War & Peace was a seriously tedious read.
Honestly, read Paradise Lost. It's almost the same as 40k, but it doesn't take place in space. 40k is pulp literature. It's meant to entertain, not stimulate the brain. I often find myself disliking bolter porn though, so if you want more plot and character development, I'd suggest the Night Lords Omnibus, or Aurelian and First Heretic, all by ADB.
I'm going to presume "Deepest" is not a veiled insult, but a quest for something that delves into characters and setting, instead of bolter porn. The Calpurnia books and Path of the Eldar get tedious in their descriptions of people, places, and motives. But...
Anything by Ian Watson. At the dawn of time, GW contracted a real, established Science Fiction author to write the first novels about their nascent 40K Universe. They gave him license to explore what was in the Rogue Trader rpg/rulebook. He wrote stuff that is still canon, and lot's of stuff that has fallen by the wayside. But, he wrote real novels, not just bolter porn. He went in strange, compelling directions. His style is NOT for everyone. And, that is NOT an indictment of anyone. Space Marine is still my favorite 40K novel (and, I'm not being snobby or exclusive, I have a bookcase full of Abnett and other 40K books which I have enjoyed over the years).
The later Abnett seems to be deeper. At least his Horus Heresy stuff. In any case, looking for "Deeper" 40K novels is like looking for organic cotton candy. The novels are not meant to be Hemingway, they are action-adventure books aimed at males 15 to 75. I enjoy them for what they are, and don't judge them for what they are not.
I really enjoyed Later Abnett's exploration of faith in the pseudo-Christian Fiction sections of books like Titanicus and Double Eagle. Not deep, but food for thought nonetheless.
The fundamental issue with trying to connect intellectual/emotional depth with 40k is that the novels tend to be too stuck on describing situations that could occur in the game and don't spend much time exploring outside the game.
The Heresy-era books tend to spend more time asking 'why' and exploring religion, war, government, and transhumanism than the more main-sequence books; there's a short story in one of the anthologies entitled 'The Last Church' that may be what you're looking for.
Dan Abnett's name on the cover may be another indicator; his works range in tone, but he tends to pay more attention to the underlying 'why' of what's happening and delve more into the characters/setting as a result as opposed to the usual twelve-year-old-drawing-a-metal-album-cover tone that comes across from most 40k lore.
Or The God Delusion, which is where Graham McNeill lifted the argument from.
"Deep"? What do you mean by that? Something where character development or exploration of a theme is more important than a BANG BANG plot? I agree with Iron_Captain, ChazSexington and Gobbla. Confining myself to science fiction, then Asimov's original Foundation trilogy and Herbert's Dune are two of the 40k setting's sources, and worth a read on their own merits. Alastair Reynolds and Stephen Baxter (especially his Exultant) have many similar themes - the horror of space travel, the effects on individual humans, societies and the species as a whole of a perpetual struggle for survival - despite beiong in completely different settings.
Back to the original question - I agree with Gobbla; Ian Watson pretty much defined 40k for me (and for the setting as a whole; he was writing as the background got fleshed out, so his novels defined the background of the Imperial Fists and the Callidus Assassins). It's not just what he wrote, but how. The word choices and imagery really gives you a sense of the decay and fall from grace of the Imperium, monolithic and powerful, but rotten within. As well as his four novels, he had a couple of short stories in the Deathwing anthology, alongside several other well-known sci-fi authors.
Matthew Farrer's Enforcer trilogy is good too, although it can be a bit of a slog. The Ciaphas Cain and Dark Heresy novels from Sandy Mitchell go into some detail about the non-military aspects of the Imperium. Not especially "deep", perhaps, but a bit more varied than simply counting the dead Orks.
Gobbla wrote: I'm going to presume "Deepest" is not a veiled insult, but a quest for something that delves into characters and setting, instead of bolter porn. The Calpurnia books and Path of the Eldar get tedious in their descriptions of people, places, and motives. But...
Anything by Ian Watson. At the dawn of time, GW contracted a real, established Science Fiction author to write the first novels about their nascent 40K Universe. They gave him license to explore what was in the Rogue Trader rpg/rulebook. He wrote stuff that is still canon, and lot's of stuff that has fallen by the wayside. But, he wrote real novels, not just bolter porn. He went in strange, compelling directions. His style is NOT for everyone. And, that is NOT an indictment of anyone. Space Marine is still my favorite 40K novel (and, I'm not being snobby or exclusive, I have a bookcase full of Abnett and other 40K books which I have enjoyed over the years).
The later Abnett seems to be deeper. At least his Horus Heresy stuff. In any case, looking for "Deeper" 40K novels is like looking for organic cotton candy. The novels are not meant to be Hemingway, they are action-adventure books aimed at males 15 to 75. I enjoy them for what they are, and don't judge them for what they are not.
Yes, of course, I'm definitively not using "Deepest" as an insult. 75? haha
Dan Abnett's name on the cover may be another indicator; his works range in tone, but he tends to pay more attention to the underlying 'why' of what's happening and delve more into the characters/setting as a result as opposed to the usual twelve-year-old-drawing-a-metal-album-cover tone that comes across from most 40k lore.
Dan Abnett is known to have written several crappy novels though?
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Gobbla wrote: In any case, looking for "Deeper" 40K novels is like looking for organic cotton candy. The novels are not meant to be Hemingway, they are action-adventure books aimed at males 15 to 75. I enjoy them for what they are, and don't judge them for what they are not.
40K is supposed to be grimdark, in a way that's deeper than Star Wars or Star Trek
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2017/01/05 11:06:18
Define "crappy". In a lot of discussions like this, accusations of poor quality seem to relate to the accuracy of the setting details rather then Han the quality of writing.
IIRC, Dan Abnett's first novels were written for Black Library. He'd written for several comics for decades before then, but perhaps there are elements of the novel-writing craft that took time to be perfected.
AndrewGPaul wrote: Define "crappy". In a lot of discussions like this, accusations of poor quality seem to relate to the accuracy of the setting details rather then Han the quality of writing.
IIRC, Dan Abnett's first novels were written for Black Library. He'd written for several comics for decades before then, but perhaps there are elements of the novel-writing craft that took time to be perfected.
I was just asking about what I heard about Dan Abnett.
To me personally, his novels have a rather gimmicky comic-action tone throughout. And possess the melodrama of those cheesy 80s action films.
Maximus Bitch wrote: 40K is supposed to be grimdark, in a way that's deeper than Star Wars or Star Trek
Interesting comparison. Even the individuals in 40K are Grimmer and Darker.
Abnett rarely misses, but he ain't perfect. His Warhammer book about a vampire lord transported in a zombie crewed ship was subpar. That said, I still own more books by him than any other author.
Maximus Bitch wrote: 40K is supposed to be grimdark, in a way that's deeper than Star Wars or Star Trek
This.
I'm going to use this to make a case for Commissar Cain. He's not a deep character and neither is his sidekick Jurgen. The reason for his popularity though is that he helps others cope with the grimdark of 40k. Usually through comedy and becomming a symbol of heroism. There's quite a bit being said about humans coping with horror through comedy in his novels. Something very few authors besides Sandy Mitchell explores, usually prefferin the seriousness or madness grimdark brings.
Also shoutout to Eisenhorn. Possibly the Inquisition wars as well, though I personally despise the latter.
His pattern of returning alive after being declared dead occurred often enough during Cain's career that the Munitorum made a special ruling that Ciaphas Cain is to never be considered dead, despite evidence to the contrary.
"Grimdark" isn't necessarily "deep". In fact, the very term, as a pejorative, was coined to describe the sort of shallow stuff that thinks it's being important or meaningful by having lots of death and no "good" guys but doesn't really do anything interesting.
