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Anonymous Allen

  • 24
  • reviews
  • 6
  • helpful votes
  • 27
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Delightful

Overall
5 out of 5 stars
Performance
5 out of 5 stars
Story
5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 21-12-2024

Such a fun book, it’s like an escalating series of pranks and schemes set in the 40K universe. There’s a really interesting look the Necrons here, with lots of interaction with other species. Also this book is SERIOUSLY FUNNY.

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Decent ending

Overall
4 out of 5 stars
Performance
5 out of 5 stars
Story
3 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 13-12-2024

The author does a decent job closing out this enormous saga, but the book suffers from the scale of the Horus Heresy. This book should’ve just been Horus vs. Emperor. Instead there are lots of side characters doing their own thing and finishing their own stories and it all gets a bit annoying and irrelevant. I don’t care about Euphrate Keela.

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Fun but tainted by woke identity politics

Overall
3 out of 5 stars
Performance
3 out of 5 stars
Story
2 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 08-12-2024

This should’ve been a fun Orks vs. AM story. Instead it’s loaded full of woke cliches - there’s a girl-boss, the male human characters are stupid/evil and characters with gender neutral pronouns. The gender neutral pronouns also made the story confusing - I couldn't tell the one THEY vs THEY plural during key moments.

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Superb introduction

Overall
5 out of 5 stars
Performance
5 out of 5 stars
Story
5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 28-11-2024

Fantastic introduction. The characters are clear, the descriptions are clear and the author does a superb job of building the world. Don’t be put off the by the length of the Horus Heresy, this is a great work of fiction.

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Fun and likeable

Overall
5 out of 5 stars
Performance
4 out of 5 stars
Story
5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 23-11-2024

Likes:
-Mike Brooks managed to somehow turn a huge ork war boss into a likeable protagonist.
-The ork antics are hilarious.
-It’s hilarious hearing the sophisticated, scheming Dark Eldar being confused and dumbfounded by the Orks.

Dislikes:
-Some of the vocal performances were a bit off.

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Mostly awesome

Overall
4 out of 5 stars
Performance
4 out of 5 stars
Story
3 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 20-11-2024

The good:
The Ork characters are FUN, funny and entertaining. Seriously, the ork parts of this book are a BLAST and the most fun you will have in a 40K book.

The bad:
The human parts for the Imperium are a bit lame and woke. The male characters are mostly stupid and vain, whereas the female soldiers are all cool, tough, smart and in charge. It’s like the author was given diversity quotas for the human characters. Next time, just write a book about the orks.

Mike Brooks has a tendency to write very long, explanatory sentences, as though he constantly needs to explain every character’s interests and motivations at every opportunity. One of the most important rules of story-telling is show, don’t tell. You don’t need to remind readers on every page that the evil sunz like speed etc etc.

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Awesome 40K novel

Overall
5 out of 5 stars
Performance
4 out of 5 stars
Story
5 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 19-11-2024

The black templars are awesome, black templars vs orks is such a good combination for a 40K book.

This is definitely the best 40K novel I’ve come across.

The story is great, the characters are clear and the book is also really unexpectedly funny in places from the black templar POV.

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Promising but flawed

Overall
3 out of 5 stars
Performance
4 out of 5 stars
Story
3 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 12-10-2024

The good:
-There’s a good, decent protagonist in here; an honest working class man who keeps his word.
-There are some good observations about parenting and psychology.
-There’s a decent twist halfway through the book.

The bad:
-Abrupt ending.
-After the twist is revealed the story loses impact and seems to go nowhere in the second half.

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Some strong elements, plot issues

Overall
3 out of 5 stars
Performance
3 out of 5 stars
Story
3 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 07-10-2024

The concept of this book is strong and there are some really good AI-horror concepts in here, but they’re not handled quite as well as they should be. There is a bit of cliched eye rolling stuff in the first third, and then the final third goes around and around in circles a bit, becoming quite boring in the climax.

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It was OK

Overall
3 out of 5 stars
Performance
3 out of 5 stars
Story
3 out of 5 stars

Reviewed: 19-08-2024

It was alright.

The good:
-The characters all felt very real and well-developed, with flaws and insecurities.

The bad:
-The whole Hawthorn Institute plotline felt weird and unnecessary, as though the author just wanted to write in something sinister for the middle of the book.
-The big reveal at the end was OK but wasn’t that surprising, I guessed it.
-The constant reminders of the dual timelines and the years that passed since Billy went missing were unnecessary, verging on annoying. It feels like every few minutes Ethan says something like: “I’m 40 now, I was 10 when Billy went missing, which was 30 years ago”. “30 years ago”. “I’m not 10 anymore, 30 years ago I was 10 years old”. WE GET IT DUDE THERE’S A DUAL TIMELINE IN YOUR BOOK YOU DON’T NEED TO MENTION IT EVERY MINUTE.

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