Review: Titanicus

So Dan Abnett's Titanicus now that it has come out in soft back.

So believe it or not, this book deals with a Titan war. A forge world in the Sabbott Worlds area (The same region of the Imperium that Gaunt's Ghosts takes place) has been attack by a chaos Titan legion. The Titians of Legio Invictus are rerouted against orders to defend the forge world.

I am an admitted Abnett fan boy (I think he is the best Black Library author bar none!), but I was not very happy with this book. I think that Abnett was reaching to far when he wrote this book. There are literally twelve plot lines going on in the book. And there are a few of those plot lines that have absolutely nothing to do with the overall story line.

There are so many characters, and so many jumps within each chapter it is hard to remember, was this the tank commander guy, or the commander of the Warlord titan? I am used to authors having multiple plot lines going on and just as you get into one, it jumps to the next one, but this book takes this idea to the extreme. I found it difficult to follow.

Review: Cadian Blood

One thing I tend to forget when considering the Imerial Guard is that when we think of the countless billions that die everyday in the wars of the Imerium; regiments tossed into the meat grinder to take a nameless hill, the barely trained conscript given a lasgun from the fellow in front of him that just took a bolt round to the face, these are the "normal" Guardsmen of the Imerium, and for some reason, I always lumped the Cadians in there with these poor schlocks.

For some reason I had assumed that the Cadians were the lowest common denominator. I mean it isn't like they were Catachans, those guys grew up on a jungle death world! The trap a fell into is that although Cadia isn't technically a death world, the Cadians treat it as if it is.

It says in the fluff that Cadians learn to strip a lasgun before they learn to walk. They are inducted into the guard at age 14. The thing I forget about the Cadians is that they are all badasses! These guys are like the Green Berets, Navy SEALs and the SAS all rolled into one.