David Annendale sucks

I'm loving the Beast Arises series, but this fourth book is giving me a headache. Just like Damnation of Pythos, Annendale has centered the story around delusional characters doomed to failure, and I just can't bring myself to care.

I don't want to not find out what happens, as I intend to read other books in the series, so would anybody like to save me the trouble of sifting through this turd for nuggets of corn and just spoiler the important details?

Did you know Annendale gets two more books in this series? Christ help us

If you're not into doomed delusional characters destined for failure, 40k might not be for you.

Actually half the fun is that most characters AREN'T delusional. Faith really does fight warpmagick, red one do go fasta, Eldar are all doomed
It's a sick and twisted world, and most people know it

Haven't read much of this guy though, so no idea what his delusions are

If you're not into bitter, coffee might not be for you

But David Annendale makes coffee so bitter it's basically human shit

Well specific to this book it's a huge effort against an Ork attack on Terra that every character with two brain cells says is doomed to failure. over and over. doomed to failure doomed to failure doomed to failure.

How do you make yourself keep reading a book that actively advertises how much it's going to suck

This is is easily the best book of the series

>Naval combat emphasis
>Descriptions of daily life on Terra
>High Lords & Inquistion political scheming
>Barely any Space Marines

BL is fucked, their older generation of writers (Dan Abnett, Graham Mcneil, ADB, Gav Thorpe) are moving onto bigger things while their newer generation of replacements (David Annedale, Guy Hadley, etc.) are mediocre to terrible.

Chris Wraight is the only one with potential

It's for the best because their older gen is getting weak and senile in their age, Abnett started burning out his talent long ago

>tfw you secretly liked Unremembered Empire

Thorpe is getting better imo. His Eldar series was meh, but the Dark Eldar series was pretty good and as another post has pointed out Emperor Expects was easily the best of Beast Arises so far

holy shit, what's life on terra like?

Terrable

ayyyy

Agree, it made the Grand Admiral the the second most likable of the High Lords.

It goes into these Arbites on guard duty at a cathedral. Basically these pilgrims line up by the millions to see a look at a piece of Guilliman's armor. There are so many people that they wait in line for years, and kids grow up and parents grow old while waiting in line. They get supplies along the way from street vendors that line the crowds. If you leave your line at any point you have to start over, so people either shit in the streets or can buy a privacy curtain and pot,

When they finally reach Guilliman's armor on display, they can only look at it for 3 seconds before being forced to move on

It's some Rogue Trader-era shenanigans in its intentionally over-the-top grimdark

its like something out of a Futurama joke, or even Rocko's Modern Life

Thorpe didn't do Path of the Dark Eldar, but I agree with you otherwise.

Damnation of Pythos was the worst book i have read. He had an entire novel to add something to a continuing plot and it ends up being nothing.... a book about nothing.

>He had an entire novel to add something to a continuing plot

That would be your fault for thinking the Horus Heresy books are still one single ongoing series. It's crushingly obvious that isn't the case any more. GW wants to expand the Heresy out to its own setting, where they can tell side-stories unrelated to the core narrative arch, filling in the blanks and adding new things to the fluff for that period of time. Maybe that's a good thing, maybe it's a shame to lose the mystique the Heresy originally held, but that's the situation. Pythos might not have added anything to the core HH plotline, but as a stand-alone novel set in the time period, it was a competent and enjoyable, if not particuarly stand-out and memorable, read.

That's what I thought, esp Futurama lol.

But why would the echlesiarry or administratum be ok with that? I don't get it.

It's totally ok to wait in line for years, where people have years to think about how horrid the system is and possibly turn to chaos in the hundreds.

Wasting time and food on standing in line, for FUCKING 15+ years!!! while you could pick up a lasgun and die in the emperors name!

Except they don't think about that. They think about the fact that they are literally on the most holy planet in the entire galaxy and they are living an insanely privileged life for having done so. That's why they're waiting to begin with. They're not wasting any food that wasn't their own and the difference between their output and the boost in faith their pilgrimage brings makes it perfectly in line with both the Ecclesiarchy and the Administratum.

>Thinking production and efficiency won't take a back seat to religious beliefs

Some of the were IG veterans or war of faith survivors that earn their right to pilgrimage. Their is also mention of a noble with the equivalent of a 40k RV

>delusional characters doomed to failure

In 40k? Get outta town.

Guy Haley is twice as good as Thorpe ever was. Thorpe writing anything other than short stories was a disaster.

>but the Dark Eldar series

Because Thorpe had nothing to do with it.

His short stories are decent though. Same with Kyme. But I don't want either one of them touching a 40k novel. John French and Rob Sanders are both really enjoyable as well.

you WHAT m8?

Guy Haley and Chris Wraight are the best writers BL has ever had (not a very high mark tbqh).

If anyone epithomizes new-BL, it's ADB.