Distant Echoes of Old Night Review

This is from Index Nocturnus, whose review and podcast site can be found here.


"The reason the Death Guard never get a Heresy showing is they are basically boring dog-soldiers, who walk up to you very slowly and kill you, regardless of where you are or who you are.

But that is the charm of the Death Guard, and why they are my favourite Marine Chapter. They don’t flap about on jump packs like Night Lords or try to sing you to death like Emperor’s Children, they Just. Kill. You. By whatever means possible. Sanders has summed this up beautifully in this short story, which involves a Death Guard Chaplain and a squad of slightly unhinged Death Guard with cool toys trying to dig out fortified Imperial Fists from their crashed starship (designation unknown). Just like the gas on Isstvan, which is frowned upon by pretty much every other Marine Chapter, they use rad grenades and burning phosphor to kill the opposition. Flat. Stony. Dead. They don’t worry about whether blood is spilt for Khorne, or whether there are magic artefacts to harvest for Tzeentch, or if you are scared enough like Curze’s nancys; they use any and all means at their disposal, and it is this bludgeoning, humourless unstoppable force that makes them both credible and really fun to read about.

The hubris of the Death Guard is also demonstrated by Sanders, as they bomb the Fists with this blue clingy burning phosphex stuff (more of that on the tabletop please!) and then force themselves to go in after them and leave no one alive, as that was their original mission. The ship sinks and takes them all down with it, and the Chaplain has a last crisis of confidence about Mortarion being a big wuss, as he dies. Which is a shame, as it undermines the character’s sheer bloody-minded determination – over the brink of insanity – that the author had effectively built up prior. Of course the Death Guard are the bad guys and have to lose, but it may have been more effective and spine-chilling if they held to their beliefs right up to the end.

More Death Guard please, Mr Black Library, sir. There’s a full point of personal bias added into the final score – 4/5 "

Death Guard

OUT NOW

The Horus Heresy short story Distant Echoes of Old Night.

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While I've been away I've missed a lot of reviews. The blog tends to be the place where I collect these, like some nut-crazed squirrel preparing for Winter. I'm going to get right back on with this but in no particular order. Up today is an appraisal of my Horus Heresy short story Distant Echoes of Old Nightfrom HachiSnax Reviews. The story details the dire exploits of the Death Guard legion and in particular their controversial use of units known as 'Destroyers'. Here's what HachiSnax had to say.

“Distant Echoes Of Old Night is a Horus Heresy short by the very talented Rob Sanders, which centers around the XIV Legion, the Death Guard. In Echoes, Death Guard Brother-Chaplain Morgax Murnau is charged with guaranteeing that no survivors remain on the felled Imperial Fists ship Xanthus, which has been shot out of orbit and now lays sinking in the mire of the blighted planet of Algonquis. Well, to be exact, it is a portion of the ship, however, any amount of Imperial Fists in a fortified area makes for an extremely tough nut to crack.

Purge the ship of survivors. A seemingly impossible task. But Murnau has a trick up his sleeve. In fact, it is the dirtiest trick in all the Legiones Astartes. He is set to deploy a group of Destroyers to finish off the Fists. These Destroyers bring a horrifying array of weapons to bear, most of them high-radiation, or chemical in nature. And not just your run of the mill biochemical warfare, these are tools usually deemed too harsh for most Space Marines to use, and remember, the Spaces Marines are an elite fighting force bred to bring entire systems to compliance. The game is set: the universe's greatest defensive players versus the most nefarious plague marines around. Murnau's instructions: no survivors.

Although Echoes is technically a Horus Heresy story, it, like most recent entries, can be read independently. This is, indeed, more a Warhammer 30K work than a HH tale. Now, I am not up to date on all the Heresy books, so if there are any clever Easter eggs, story arc progression, or hints about certain events, please let me know in the comments section. So yes, if you are not up to date on your Heresy reading, you can still sit down and enjoy these 21 pages of Death Guard/Imperial Fist action.

And enjoy it I did. Sanders brings a flair for vivid imagery to the fore in Echoes. A good chunk of the earlier pages give us a stark picture of the plague that has been unleashed upon the former forest planet of Algonquis by the Death Guard. Where once lush green foliage and tall trees defined the landscapes, all is swamp and insects. "Syrupy waters" lap against Mark III armor, and the buzzing of filthy fauna pervades all. Later on, the descriptive prose gives us an "in-your-face" look at the effects of the Destroyers' devious toys.

It is a good thing that The Black Library finally put this short into general release. I've been wanting to read it since it was announced for the chapbook, and I am sure many others have been champing at the bit to get a crack at it. Here's hoping he gets a crack at a full-length Heresy novel soon.

Here's what it is:
A nasty little tale of dirty deeds done dirt cheap. Space Marine specialists ask the age-old question, if an unstoppable force meets an immovable object, who will win the day? Can anyone win?

Final Score:

90/100”

You can but the short story Distant Echoes of Old Night HERE.

You can read the original piece and more of HachiSnax's fantastic reviews HERE. You can, of course, read more reviews of my work by hitting the Reviews tab on the menu above.


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'We play at perpetuity but we were not built for forever. Warmth will leave our great bodies. Our hearts will beat to empty echoes. Blood will sit stagnant in our veins and our flesh shall rot. Accept this.'
Distant Echoes of Old Night