Love this book after some of the slower novels that have been published recently, such a fear to tread and the weird such as Vulkan lives (bit fragmented for my liking). It was nice to read one of Dans novels. Although not his best work it's still up there for me. He is by far the best 40k novelist I have read and although some reviews I read didn't praise the work I found it brilliant in both technique and story. I loved it and is one of my faves some may disagree but I doubt you will be disappointed if you love the genre. Loved it and yet disappointed (spoilers)First - I've only read two thirds of the Horus Heresy novels and I absolute love the saga. I do wish it would move on though a bit. The Unremembered Empire does move the story slightly and I learned some new things. The first half of the book I really enjoyed and it kept me interested. I enjoyed seeing the Ultramarines Primarch approach the potential restarting of the Empire and all that entailed. I also really liked getting to meet all of the characters with their strengths and flaws.What I didn't like mostly revolved around the Primarchs: 1. Guilliman is almost killed by 10 Alpha Legion Astartes. Granted they do initially surprise him and he is mostly unarmed. Appartently he's trapped and can't jump out the window????? I just can't imagine a Primarch having an issue with an Astartes squad. 2. When Curze is confronted by 10 space wolves in the same room they can barely touch him. (A space wolf gets flung out the window - reason for above comment) 3. Curze is unbeatable. Two legions plus another 1,000 rag tag astartes are not able to bring him down or even really touch him. 4. Not even Guilliman and the Lion together can do more than scratch his face. 5. Vulkan can't even best him and for some reason he is appartently able to land blows with a mace and hammer when others can't land anything with projectile weapons. Heck, Vulkan can't even best a 'perpetual human'. I lost track of how many times he (Vulkan) was killed... I imagined Vulkan would kick some butt but apparently he's similar to the Hulk but super frail. (My favorite 40k book is Battle at the Fang and if you read that - I think you get to really see the power of a Primarch. Can we get some loyal primarchs that can do anything in this book? Curze seems like a god...)The second half of the book felt like the author was trying to find a way to fit what had already been written into place and it just seemed a bit forced. I'm not blaming the author with this.Overall though - this book kept my attention.
I love the way that abnett continues to subvert my expectations in a way that is always pleasing.
—raichel
Much better than one of the biased ADB books but still read once no need to read ot again...
—Iamaninja326
Too many converging plots makes this a slogging read. It felt like a clipshow.
—Chloe
Amazing. makes me love an ultramar smurf
—sivaram
Abnett utterly smashes it.
—cupidprincess
