Horus Heresy: Ruinstorm by David Annandale (Book Review)

Ruinstorm could be considered many things. It's an attempt to tie up the Imperium Secundus plot for good, a major push toward Terra, and complete the final acts in the Heresy for several major characters. Atop of this, it was treated as if it were a second stab at both Battle for the Abyss and Fear to Tread, two of the lesser regarded novels of the series in the eyes of many. It also ties into Damnation of Pythos, the characters from Angel Exterminatus, and a stab is made to resolve several dangling plot threads. There was a lot riding on this one, many eggs in one proverbial basket. So, with that in mind, this was a story which had to juggle many elements all at once, while still also remaining its own creation.

From that you're probably predicting that the story buckles under its own weight, and fails entirely. Well, no. Not exactly. While some would be quick to write it off due to Annandale's involvement (and you know who you are) and it is notably overstuffed, it's far from bad. In fact, in many regards, it succeeds where several prior tales failed.

So, let's get down to the core details then.

Synopsis

The trio of demigods leading the Imperium Secundus have come to realise the error of their ways. Terra still stands, and with this news Guilliman has made his decision to risk everything in order to support their father. Amassing a gigantic armada of their remaining vessels, they seek to brave the Ruinstorm which has seemingly cut them off from the rest of the galaxy. Yet, nothing is ever simple when it comes to the forces of Chaos. Even as the traitors find themselves beset on all sides by mortal and daemonic foes alike seeking to bar their passage, other plans are at work. Something hungers to claim the primarchs and turn them to the Ruinous Powers' service, and the renegade Konrad Curze still has a part to play in this saga...

The Good

If you were ever to stop and look at David Annandale's interests, you'll notice three major reccuring factors. He's a fan of most classic horror genres, from the Hammer era through to the slasher films of the 80s. He loves big, bold events and explosive pieces with weight to them. Plus, he has a love of the kaiju genre, with the likes of Godzilla and co. Why does this matter? Because he tends to be at this best when two or more of these elements cross over, allowing him to sink his teeth into something familiar, and pull off stunts most authors would struggle with. It's akin to how Ben Counter's tales can verge upon being outright camp at points, but still have enough earnest intent and substance to pull through.

Ruinstorm, in particular, fits Annandale's skills exceptionally well because of these factors. It's a titanic Chaos storm which has been raging for months about the galaxy, warping all about it. This leaves room for horror stories of haunted ships, dead worlds discarded by their Dark Gods, places so twisted that they push the boundaries of what can be believed. While this isn't apparent at first, the opening stages of the book lull you into a false sense of security, offering up some of the more mundane and tangible threats you would expect of Chaos. Just when you think that this might be sticking purely to the tabletop models, the narrative starts throwing threats the Legions' way which are pure Chaos. Less the discount Lovecraft you might expect and more sort of undefined monstrosity Bronze Age Comics were noted for. It's insane and exaggerated, but they are presented so well and on such a scale that it is difficult not to become hooked as a result.

The story also moves at a brisk pace and delves back and forth between certain locations. It visits multiple planets, faces varying threats and even bumps into some surprising foes no one fully expected to appear. As soon as it seems to finish up with one problem, another almost immediately emerges. This creates a sense of relentless havoc and pressing danger which perfectly fits a journey on this scale, and emphasises the true power of Chaos. When a God or something capable of twisting reality itself to its will decides to make you its plaything, you're hardly going to overcome it without suffering some serious scars as a result. Even if you are among the best soldiers the galaxy has ever known, you're still going to be cannon fodder before some of their best servants. By adding in these elements and juggling between more substantial offerings, it avoids at least a few of the more disliked elements found in Battle for the Abyss. Furthermore, it grants more substantial moments for character building.

The story does repeatedly emphasise a massive scale and weight to the beings involved. However, before it becomes truly unmanageable, the story is always scaled back. There's always some excuse to narrow down the focus naturally or concentrate upon one or two figures, while cutting back and forth between the larger military effort and an individual duel or act. This especially benefits the Lion early on due to his personal secrecy and Sanguinius for the bulk of the story. Both of who have enough insight, impact and commentary to prevent some of the immense nature of what is going on from completely overwhelming the narrative. Guilliman himself also has a few decent moments, and the story does a good job of presenting flaws within the characters without letting them overwhelm all else. Rather than the laser pointer focus upon Angron's failings which made many fans regard the World Eaters as "the joke legion" (and no, I'm not going to let that drop anytime soon) it brings them up, but offsets them against obvious moments of competence. Even when a character is performing an act which is seemingly stupid, the drama or even subject of fate itself is used to almost excuse it. There's a certain internal logic to the overall setting which carries them through. That might sound odd, but it's the same sort of one which allows people to accept elite special forces to exist alongside knights errant and space elves.

When the narrative does make call-backs to previous books, they are extremely deftly handled. This creates a sense of tangible continuity with prior events, and while many are obvious there is a number which prove to be subtle. At least subtle enough to be lost in the moment of the action itself. Take this one scene for example, where the Ultramarines opt to get some revenge on the Word Bearers via a captured vessel:

"In the midst of the Word Bearers formation, the Annunciation turned against the flow of the retreat. It accelerated as if it sought to escape from the cluster of ships. It had ceased to respond to hails shortly before the arrival of the Ultramarines fleet. The Cavascor­ pulled away from it, and the Annunciation drove straight for the Orfeo’s Lament. The light cruiser was still turning when the larger ship closed in on it. It abandoned its manoeuvre and tried to accelerate on a tangent. The Annunciation struck it just forwards of the stern. It broke the Lament in half. It barrelled through the hull in a storm of explosions. Statuary from both ships, colossal embodiments of metaphor and the lessons of the dark, flew off from the collision in a swarm of tumbling fragments. The Orfeo’s Lament howled its last, and the plasma cry swept over the Annunciation. The strike cruiser’s bow was a ruin after the collision, twisted and fused. Tremors swept the hull, damage feeding damage until the ship was a bomb awaiting the signal for detonation. The signal came from the Cavascor, when Hierax remotely triggered melta charges he and his Destroyers had left behind. The raging holocaust grasped at the retreating squadron, scraping the void shields, striking at the vessels with a foretaste of the XIII Legion’s anger.”

Explosive, awesome and utterly over the top, isn't it. Well, in admiring that, you might have missed one thing: This is karmic retribution. It's the Ultramarines performing the exact same action as the opening strike against Calth, the one used to kill hundreds of thousands in the opening attack and destroy much of their fleet. The way it is presented and added in does grant some value to re-reading the work, and that might even be true of later stories as well.

Finally, and most pressingly, Sanguinius is probably one of the story's strongest points. While James Swallow is the best-known Blood Angels author - and I will personally defend all but one book from his series as being entertainingly crafted - people have noted that he tends to focus upon a few key elements above all others. In particular, their Curse went from a notable pillar of their character to overwhelming all else, hardly helped by an atrocious codex which enhanced this mistake tenfold. So, when it came to writing about the Heresy, rather than getting insight into the legion as it was, the same focus yet again was purely on the Black Rage and Red Thirst. Annandale does acknowledge it here, but he isn't beholden to it. Instead, his commentary upon Sangiuinus reflects more of the upstanding qualities of the character and a surprising level of both pessimism and optimism. Much of it ties into choice, fate and the actions made in the time characters have, along with a few definite links to the future. It's a more engaging take on him than what we have previously seen outside of Pharos, and it's enough to make me personally hope Annandale gets another shot at writing him before this is all over.

Yet, while there is a lot of good there's also a great deal of bad, unfortunately. Often, this tends to go hand in hand with its best qualities.

The Bad

What will certainly rob many people the wrong way to star with is Annandale's prose. While personally, I have grown to like it, his short and choppy sentences can be grating outside of some of the faster-paced action scenes. Equally, as charming as it is in adding a level of detail writers often ignore, there's no denying that his stories can delve into purple prose at times. This often works well when it comes to Chaos itself, or even the more pseudo-ancient qualities of the Imperial forces, but in others it can be unnecessary. It creates a sense of the work being overengineered, and it's easy to see a new reader finding it off-putting. Even the best of authors have this happen at times, after all, just look at Prospero Burns.

Another definite issue with the core narrative is how certain elements tend to loop themselves or even add in utterly superfluous elements to them. This is especially evident with Konrad Curze partway through the story, as his conversations with the Lion seem to exist largely to fill time and drive a wedge between the Lion and Sangiunius. Even his eventual fate, while poetically told and with a few nice touches, nevertheless still suffers from a few logical holes which holds it back. This is true of many scenes intended to drive a few major players onward, as they work thematically and have a fantastic atmosphere, but occasionally certain necessary ones will push that suspension of disbelief a bit too far.

In fact, the book tends to be at its worst primarily when details tend to get a bit out of Annandale's own hands. The sheer scale of what he presents and many of the fantastical elements can push things to the very brink of people questioning them or taking them out of the story. Yet, there are a few key moments when he underplays equally massive events or skims over them, making them seem irritatingly small in the grand scheme of things. This is true of supposedly one of the greatest single naval actions of Imperial history. When there is atmosphere, detail, and weight to the events they work extremely well. When it's too overstuffed, rushed or even lacking in a few key elements, the immensity works against it until its simply destructive "noise" overwhelming the narrative.

It has to also be said that a number of notable characters simply lacked any serious impact upon the tale. The Iron Hands in particular retain a number of key scenes to help give them some meaning - and even one of the few scenes to actually get their "flesh is weak" mentality right in recent years - but they tend to be lost in the story. With so much going on, it's easy to quickly lose track of them, and a few notable deaths seem too much like C-list fodder as a result. This might have been fine if it ended there, but others suffer as well. Several major Blood Angels players, particularly Amit, feel as if they are so far into the background that they might as well not be there. While this could be understandable due to the strong focus upon the relationship between the primarchs - a major plus of the book - it's neverthelss quite disappointing to see.

Even if you can get used to the above points, what works against the story the most is how it lacks a definitive ending and beginning. If you attempt to go right from the very end of Angels of Caliban to this, there's a distinct jump from one to the next. While the story might serve to tie up the Imperium Secundus plot, very little is actually done within the Imperium Secundus itself. When you start reading, the attempts to escape are already underway, and the book simply skims over the dismantling or nitty gritty of their mass exodus from Guilliman's personal empire. More than a few other readers have questioned if there was supposed to be another four chapters at the start, or even a full novella, to get around this. Without them, the tale suffers from a notably awkward start to series familiars.

Then we have the conclusion, which is definitely rushed. It's not bad,and the epilogue itself is certainly very satisfying for all involved. It justifies why the other primarchs cannot make it to Terra in time, does away with Curze and even offers a new spin on Sanguinius' fate. With that said though, so much of the previous chapters emphasised action that it seems more like a concession over an essential story element. If it had included more of what was seen in the epilogue then this would be a far better tale, but without it the character-driven edge is unfortunately just that bit too blunt for it to stand among the greats.

The Verdict

This is certainly going to be a very divisive book among fans. There's no denying its strengths, but the shortcomings certainly make it very flawed indeed. It seems as if for every major step forward the story makes, it falls short in another area. Not so spectacularly it is unreadable by any means, but simply to the point where it can be seen as quite disappointing. Even with that said however, Ruinstorm is still a tale worth reading for Horus Heresy fans. It offers up plenty of good moments and, even with its own problems, corrects a few old issues or proves certain story concepts right. Some great moments will definitely stick in your head - especially one particularly mind-bending daemonic fortress - but the overall tale won't hit as hard as other works. Overall, most will likely read this once, feel satisfied, and then move onto the next book.

Verdict: 5.2 out of 10