Indomitus is the first book that I have read in the Warhammer universe. James and I were going to start the Beyond the Veil Crusade campaign and this seemed like the perfect introduction. His Necrons vs my Ultramarines were going to battle it out in the Pariah Nexus with the new Indomitus models that were released. My favorite book genre is sc-fi, however I haven't dove that deep into military science fiction. I knew this would be a shallow step into a newer category for me.
I'm going to not bury the lead on this one and just come out and say it. This book was not good. I know in the miniatures wargaming world that fluff means lore and narrative, but this was fluff on the fluff. Gav Thorpe managed to elongate the four pages on the Pariah Nexus that were in the 9th edition Core Book, and the few pages of Edge of Darkness (included in the Indomitus Boxset) into 384 pages. The editor for this novel must have simply hit control + f and made sure it hit all the Indomitus marketing keywords, and simply left it at that.
Writing novels is not an easy task. Often times when I read a book that doesn't connect with me, I usually don't slag the author. Some books just aren't for me. Not to mention, who am I to judge. I am a notoriously poor writing, who can barely piece a coherent blog post together.
With that being said, I can confidently state that this book is shallow. With this being the novel that heralds in the 9th edition of Warhammer 40,000 into the world, I expected this book to not only introduce the new units, but really flesh out that fluff and cement their place in this world. An example is the new Space Marines Eradicator units. The only mention of them of them was to state that a group of Eradicators joined the strike force. What do they look like? where did they come from? What is their place in a Space Marines fighting force? Rinse and repeat for all the new Space Marines units. This book was chalked full of flat characters with little to no development.
There was one twinkle of a bright spot for this book though, and that was the Necrons. Their inter-dynastic political stuggles. The Necrons troubled present situation and wrestling with what it means to wake up into an unfamiliar world while inhabiting unfamiliar bodies. Thorpe at least gave a glimpse of what a good Necrons novel could be. If I can get my hands on the new The Infinite & The Divine novel that just came out, it will jump towards the top of my reading list.
This book wasn't enough to sell me on the military sci-fi genre, but it gave me enough to keep on going.