In a bit of a switch up, and a sign of the times we are in, Games Workshop held a Warhammer Preview Online for Black Library today. It was a great look at books to come, and interviews with some of Black Library's stand out authors. Let's take a look at what was showed off.
The Horus Heresy: Siege of Terra
In a follow up to Dan Abnett's Sturnine, John French has written Mortis.
In Mortis, book 5 of the Siege of Terra series, Horus unleashes the Titan Legions.
Here is the blurb:
The victories of Saturnine and the sacrifices of the Eternity Wall spaceport have faded into the hope of yesterday. Denied but not defeated, the traitors intensify their assault on the Imperial Palace. With the principal spaceports in Horus' hands, the Warmaster now drains the heavens of his reserves.
As the pressure of the assault increases, the power of Chaos waxes. The waking lives of the defenders are filled with despair, while their dreams pull them in search of a false paradise. As the fabric of the defenses fails and the will of those who stand on them cracks, Horus commands the Titans of the Legio Mortis to breach the walls. Against them stands the might of Mercury Wall and the strength of the Legio Ignatum.
Ancient rivals, the god-engines of both Legions meet in battle, while within the walls a few desperate individuals seek a way to turn back the tide of the warp's malign influence. Across Terra lost warriors and travelers make their way through wastelands and gardens of horror, towards home and an unknown future.
Dark Imperium
The Dark Imperium series by Guy Haley focuses on the Plague Wars in Ultramar. This series focusses on the rebirth of Primarch Roboute Guilliman. Introducing the third installment of this trilogy, Godblight.
From the back cover:
Dark Imperium Godblight, an Era Indomitus Novel
The paths of Roboute Guilliman and his fallen brother Mortarion bring them inexorably together on Iax. Once a jewel of the Imperium, the garden world is dying, as the plans of Mortarion to use it as a fulcrum to drag all the stellar realm of Ultramar into the warp come to deadly fruition.
While Guilliman attempts to prevent the destruction of his kingdom, Mortarion schemes to bring his brother low with the Godblight, a disease created in the Cauldron of Nurgle itself, made with the power to destroy a son of the Emperor.
Primarchs clash on the ravaged landscapes of Iax. The gods go to war, and the wider galaxy balances on a knife edge of destruction. As something powerful stirs in the sea of souls, only one thing is certain - whoever wins the last great clash of the Plague War, the repercussions of victory will echo down eternity...
In edition to Godblight, new editions of the previous Dark Imperium books, Dark Imperium and Plague War are being released. The new editions now account for the events in the Indomitus Crusade.
A Hero of Ultramar Reborn
For almost twenty years, Captain Uriel Ventris has graced the pages of Graham McNeil's Ultramarines novels.
Warhammer 40,0000 The Swords of Calth, a Uriel Ventris Novel. Blurb time!
Uriel Ventris, newly ascended to the ranks of the Primaris, leads warriors of the Fourth Company from the Indomitus Crusade of Roboute Guilliman to a world on the frontiers of Ultramar. Once a battleground against the orks, Sycorax is now under furious assault from an enemy of ancient times - the necrons.
The Ultramarines have faced these baleful xenos before, but Uriel senses the hand of a foe from his own past at work on Sycorax, a tally unfinished and a debt to the Imperium finally come due.
Trapped deep in a devastated city, Uriel leads the Swords of Calth into battle, and must adapt to his new incarnation as one of the Primaris - a challenge that will test his soul as much as it will test him as a warrior.
The Swords of Calth is slated for February release. I like Ultramarines, I like Necrons, so this book is a definite pickup for me. There have been so many books released with those two factions clashing, I can barely keep up!
The cheeky folks at Games Workshop even slipped in a model preview into a book preview. Check out the new Captain Uriel Ventris that will be released alongside the book.
Dan Abnett's Inquisition Novels
Dan Abnett's characters like Eisenhorn and Ravenor from the Inquisition novels are some of the most well regarded characters in the Warhammer 40,000 universe.
Eisenhorn, Ravenor and Bequin are back in the all new Penitent. Blurb time:
In the mysterious city of Queen Mab, the forces of light and darkness are locked in a murderous struggle for truth. The dedicated agents of the Holy Inquisition battle with their shadowy counterparts, the infamous Cognitae, to descover the encrypted identity of the enigmatic, all-powerful King in Yellow.
Caught at the heart of this struggle is the pariah Alizebeth Bequin. Will she stand with the Inquisition, or with the Cognitae that raised her? And if she chooses the Inquisition, will it be the wise but ruthless Ravenor, or his rival, the denounced heretic Eisenhorn?
Bequin must withstand an onslaught of angels and daemons, and even the monstrous warriors of the Traitor Legions, to unpick the greatest riddle of her life.
Here is Black Library's Chief Editor With Even More Books to Come
The Book of Martyrs
The Battle Sisters of the Adepta Soroitas get an all new novel. This book follows three sisters an their inevitable martyrdom in the name of the Emperor.
As a personal note, I love seeing more representation in Warhammer 40,000. My daughter was ecstatic to see female warriors that looked just as rad as her brother's Space Marines.
Here's a blurb!
To die in the name of the God-Emperor of Mankind is to live eternal, and none are more willing to bleed in His name than the Adepta Sororitas - the Sisters of Battle. The Book of Martyrs charts the deaths of these exemplars.
Sister Ishani of the Orders Hospitaller, serving alongside the death-obsessed Valorous Heart, tends to her Ecclesiarchy charges as something inhuman hunts the fields. Sister Anarchia of the Order of Our Martyred Lady, taken captive by the vile T'au Empire, seeks to teach her interrogators what it truly means to be one of the faithful. On a regressed Imperial world, Sister Superior Laurelyn of the Order of the Blood Rose reinforces the beleaguered defenders against a familiar foe turned anew by the Great Rift.
And in the age of the Indomitus Crusade, with the galaxy split in two, only one thing is certain - there will be no shortage of martyrs to fill the pages of this ancient tome.
Alpharius: Head of the Hydra
The next installment of The Horus Heresy Primarchs series stars the father of the Alpha Legion.
Short blurb:
Legends abound of the glorious - or infamous - deeds of the Emperor's sons. Yet almost nothing is known of Alpharius, the most mysterious of them all, for the Lord of the Alpha Legion is unparalleled in the art of obfuscation. Such are his gifts of secrecy and deceit that even his rediscovery has remained an enigma - until now. But when the tale comes from the serpent's mouth, where does the deception end and the truth begin?
Dawn of Fire: The Gate of Bones
While Avenging Son followed the launch of the Indomitus Crusade, The Gate of Bones focusses on the planet of Gathalamor, a symbol to the faithful.
Yet another Adepta Sororitas focused novel that I'm excited to put on my to read list.
blurb:
As the Indomitus Crusade begins, fleets of mighty warships leave Terra on a vital quest to stabilize Imperium Sanctus in the wake of the Great Rift. The returned primarch, Roboute Guilliman, leads a huge force towards the shrine world of Gathalamor, where stable warp routes will allow the flotilla to spread across the beleaguered southern half of the Imperium.
But grave tidings reach the Imperial Regent's ears. Warnings from an ancient race, and eerie silence from the army tasked with holding Gathalamor until his arrival, lead Guilliman to send a reconnaissance mission to the world; at its head, Shield-Captain Achallor of the Adeptus Custodes.
Achallor discovers a world on the brink: a beaten Imperial force and sinister agents of Abaddon the despoiler who have unearthed an ancient evil; a weapon that when harnessed not only threatens the primarch, but perhaps the holy Throne of Terra itself...
Liber Xenologis
I'm a total sucker for books like this. It's an encyclopedia of Xenos written from the perspective of Janus Draik, the Rogue Trader and hero of Blackstone Fortress.
The blurb according to Draik:
The Imperium is beset by horrors.
Xenospecies too numerous to mention are bent on our destruction. Only by naming and studying these predators does humanity stand any chance of survival. And by circumstance, or perhaps by divine will, it has fallen to me, Captain Janus Draik, Rogue Trader and first son of House Draik, to codify the myriad threats aligned against us.
In the westernmost reaches of the galaxy I have braved the nightmarish pits of the Blackstone Fortress and the lawless dens of its orbital platform, Precipice. Through exploration of those treacherous environs, I have unearthed truths hidden from even the most learned Terran scholars. Here, in the galaxy's first truly comprehensive work of xenology, I have delineated the terrifying face of our foe.
Gitslayer
Here is one for the Dwarf lovers out there. This one features a long time character in Warhammer Fantasy settings, Gotrek Gurnisson.
From the back cover:
Hell-bent on ridding himself of the Fyreslayer rune buried in his chest, Gotrek Gurnisson, the greatest Slayer to ever live, travels deep into the strange, alchemical realm of Chamon. Using their mysterious aether-science, the Kharadron Overlords of Barak-Urbaz offer an end to Gotrek's quest. But, as the Bad Moon rises and murderous Gloomspite Gitz threaten to destroy the sky-port, Gotrek pits himself against the most ancient enemy of his people - the greenskins. While his aelven travelling companion, Maleneth Witchblade, struggles to keep him alive, Gotrek throws himself headlong into a bloody battle for survival that will take him into the dank, fungal heart of Skragrott's Asylum.
Ghazghkull Thraka: Prophet of the Waaagh!
My son's latest addition is a Ghazghkull Thraka to his growing collection of Orks. DA BIGGIST BOSS get's a deep dive beyond his Psychic Awakening.
To the blurb!
Of the billions of greenskins who swarm the galaxy, only the name of one strikes fear into the hearts of human and xenos alike: Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka. The Warlord of Warlords. The Beast of Armageddon. The Prophet of the Waaagh!
With his tusks and fists and power claw, he does the holy work of Gork and Mork, and soon all worlds will burn in his bootprints.
Mystery shrouds how such a beast came to exist, and rumours abound that the mighty warlord was once just like any other ork. But if that is the case, how did his ascendance come to be? Many have lost their minds trying to unravel the mystery. Lord Inquisitor Tytonida Falx has headed into the murky depths of heresy to find the answer, only this time, something is different. She possesses something the other did not. Custody of the one creature in the universe who claims to know the truth of it all. Ghazghkull's banner bearer: Makari the Grot.
The End of Enlightenment
The aelves of the Lumineth Realm-lords were introduced this year into Warhammer Age of Sigmar. What is a fantasy setting without some aelves?
Let's take look at the cover and blurb from the last book from today's preview.
Long have the Lumineth Realm-lords held themselves aloof from the troubles of the Mortal Realms. But now, as Nagash asserts his dominion over the living and the dead, the Lumineth must strike back.
For Carreth Y'gethin, a legendary warrior and powerful Stonemage, the war against Nagash is merely a distraction from the Lumineth's true purpose - to hone their spiritual equilibrium and prevent their realm falling back into the madness that once plague it. But when Carreth's sister is horrifically killed fighting the undead, he finds himself inexorably drawn back into the struggle.
As the Ossiarch Bonereapers invade Hysh, Carreth is charged by Teclis himself to defeat one of Nagash's most dangerous generals, who is destined to destroy the Light of Eltharion, the Lumineth's greatest champion. The Stonemage must conquer the warring emotions within and slay this champion of death, lest the light of Hysh fade from the Mortal Realms forever...
Well that covers it for today. The next big book event we have to look forward to from Games Workshop is going to be the Black Library Celebration in February.