Fantastic Performance

the performance of the narrator is brilliant. each character has their own voice making it easy to follow along. the story doesn't feel especially relevant as part of the Horus heresy narrative, but it is a great self contained story giving insight into the Iron Hands legion

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A Lovecraftian Tale of Machine versus Flesh

One of my favorite of the Horus Heresy books so far in the series, this book follows a group of Loyalists battling for survival on a Jurassic jungle world. Dinosaurs, Demons and Demigods fight it out to the last drop of blood in this epic struggle for victory.

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A story that doesn't know how to handle stakes

This is the first major Iron Hands book to take place after Fulgrim. Instead of having only a few Iron Hands characters, we see the actions of an Iron Hands company that had escaped Isstvan V and how they proceed. The book gives good insight into the Iron Hands perception of themselves and other Legions after the massacre, and contrasts their hyper rational views with the extremely empathetic views of a Salamander character who has been rescued along with them.

That being said, that's about the best part of the book. The story sets up plenty of stakes, but doesn't like to pay them off. Certain characters seem to be forgotten, others get nonsensical plot armor, and character arcs fall incomplete. The Epilogue of the book even tries to justify the whole book as being irrelevant and forgotten, which felt like an extra slap in the face of creating stakes in the universe.

Johnathan Keeble is great as always, and I feel like has been used unfortunately to try and get listeners through what would otherwise be a mediocre to average experience.

If you're a fan of the Iron Hands then this book would be a must listen in order to learn more about them, otherwise the book will just leave you feeling deflated in the end.

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I didn't quite love this one.

I normally like 40K.. However this book was a struggle to get through until about the last quarter. It has a very strong and climactic ending but I found the middle section fairly difficult to get through. Overall not a bad book but one I wouldn't have a second reading through.

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Good voice actor, flat story

I would say through all of the HH books I have read. This book is like the Battle of Abyss. The characters are kind flat. But it did grant me a 40k feeling of the glimpse in warp and its power. Other than that, I love the voice acting in this piece, superb work.

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Exciting, hopeless

This books ending is striking, the payoff is controversial only for those who don’t understand the purpose of the book. The grim dark reality of 40k really shines through in this piece, very good.

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Painful

The story is written too simply, character profiles seem to be copy pasted from previous novels with no additional flavour.
This story lack any form of passion that 40k fans are searching for, it's another unessessary addition to the Horus Heresy that will leave you hungry for your money back.

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Mediocre Story, Lackluster Characters

Voice acting is superb as per usual in this series. However; up until this book, the Horus Heresy series has been if not exemplary, then quite good. There are a couple other books in the first 30 that are also borderline duds, but this by far is the lowest. Its not BAD, but unless you are a hardcore Iron Hands fan, there is nothing overly exciting about this novel, and without really spoiling it, the whole story ends up going basically nowhere.

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Not great

its a filler book that doesn't progress the horus heresy story, you dont need to read this one to complete the actual horus heresy storyline

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1 person found this helpful