You're going to keep getting 40K prequel novels, and you're going to like it
If you’re a fan of the Warhammer 40,000 setting — and maybe even if you’re not —then you know that the fanbase has a ravenous hunger for everything Space Marines. These transhumanist warriors get the bulk of Games Workshop’s love, enjoying special attention in everything from cool new tabletop models to face time in one of the setting’s many spin-off video games.
At the core of everything to do with the 40K hobby is the humble wargame, played out across local game stores and kitchen tables around the world. In order to explain why all of these space factions are fighting each other, Games Workshop has dutifully prepared lore for each army. The lore has been adapted into games, an Amazon production in-progress, and most successfully the Black Library, which serves as Games Workshop’s publishing arm
Games Workshop just concluded the Horus Heresy prequel series of books, a sprawling web of over sixty novels that share the thrilling details on a massive Space Marine civil war between the Emperor’s immortal sons, the Primarchs, each with their own legion of Space Marines. The war is set 10,000 years before the current setting of 40K. The Horus Heresy setting is so popular that it even inspired its version of the tabletop wargame, allowing players to battle back and forth in clashes between the Emperor’s eighteen Primarchs and their respective legions. The historical epic concluded with The End and the Death, a massive three-part saga that concluded the story of the Siege of Terra.
Don’t worry, though: there’s still plenty of Space Marine stories left to tell. In July, Games Workshop announced a new series that takes place directly after the Siege of Terra. Ashes of the Imperium by Chris Wraight is the first book in The Scouring series, set in a historical period when the loyalist legions forced their traitorous brothers back into the Eye of Terror. If that’s not enough, there’s also a re-telling of the Dropsite Massacre, which was already depicted in the Horus Heresy books. The Dropsite Massacre, by John French, provides another angle to a big, brutal Space Marine Betrayal.
While some people might think that this is just another example of Space Marines being the special boys of the setting, it makes sense that Games Workshop would choose to extend the Horus Heresy. First of all, we know there are some interesting historical events that have yet to be covered in any meaningful way. We know that Rogal Dorn pursues his rival Primarch, Perturabo, into a trap known as the Iron Cage. The traitor Legions splinter and collapse in the wake of their loss on Terra, and their infighting will lead to the rise of Abbadon and the Black Legion. Several of the surviving Primarchs on the Loyalist side go missing during this era in history, and we’ll likely learn more about the circumstances behind their disappearances.
Secondly, the series is set in the past, and that means the authors can make big, decisive swings. The current setting of Warhammer 40K is, by its very nature, stuck at a minute before midnight. Things need to stay relatively stable, so that Games Workshop can keep selling models. The Scouring is thousands of years in the past, so there’s plenty of room to tell big stories, set up characters, and murder them off whenever the narrative calls for it. In the modern-day story, characters like the newly returned loyalist Primarchs Guilliman and the Lion feel protected by potent plot armor. While in the past, characters like Dorn and Jaghatai Khan, are basically guaranteed to die or go missing.
Finally, it lets Games Workshop go truly hog wild on Space Marine stories. In the modern era, we’ve seen Black Library authors experiment with other factions from the far future. The High Kahl’s Oath is the first novel centered around the Leagues of Votann. While the Necrons have gotten some great books in The Infinite and the Divine and The Twice Dead King duology, and the T’au Empire is explored in the very good novel Elemental Council.
But Games Workshop hasn’t yet managed to replicate its runaway success with the Horus Heresy. It’s extremely difficult to run a multi-author, multi-book epic series, but fans responded in droves to the origin of the series’ Long War between various factions of Space Marines.
The War of the Beast anthology is a twelve-book series that ran in the mid-2010s, and while it has a few interesting scenes, it’s not worth recommending as a whole. The Dawn of Fire series began in 2020 with Avenging Son, and concluded after nine books with The Silent King. There are some good books in the Dawn of Fire collection — Sea of Souls, for instance, is a fascinating look at the Imperial Navy struggling against the extraplanar threat of the Warp — but without any real throughlines or connecting themes.
Games Workshop simply hasn’t found a way to replicate the magic of the Horus Heresy, and so, we’re going back to that familiar well to tell more stories about big armored boys fighting each other against a backdrop of political upheaval. In some ways, it’s a relief. The more we focus on the Horus Heresy, a setting which is Oops! All Space Marines!, I hope that it gives more xenos and Chaos-focused publications a chance to thrive in the modern setting of Warhammer 40K.
