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A review by protocol7
Rynn's World by Steve Parker
4.0
Mostly a good read, but not without its flaws. Its biggest strength is that it's very, very fast paced. You meet all of the principal characters in the first few pages, learn a bit about them, and then it's "go, go, go" from there. I found all of the main characters, with the exception of Captain Alvez, to be likeable. He was too much of a typical "we're better than these people simply because we're super soldier" trope for me to really care about him but Sergeant Huron Grimm, his second in command, was one of my favorites in the whole book and served as a perfect foil. He showed a humanity that was a stark contrast to Alvez's purposeful distance from the common citizens, so it all ended up working out in the end. That whole theme was mirrored in the relationship between Chapter Master Kantor and Captain Cortez, the other two main characters in this, and it plays out as well as they travel to the city and pick up a group of religious pilgrims on the way. Of course, their superhuman traits are on full display when they fight the Orks who are besieging the planet.
And the Orks are mainly where I had a problem with this book.
I guess I've been spoiled by the Dawn of War games, but I like my Orks to have some presence and personality. Here, they're little more than cannon fodder for the Space Marines except for two particular bosses, and merely act as faceless mooks in a way that sort of robbed the story of a tension that was needed. In most encounters, the Orks get stomped by the marines and don't really pose much threat beyond their numbers. This was especially a shame because it's strongly implied that the Ork warboss was cunning in a way Orks aren't supposed to be, and that was ripe for exploration.
My other major gripe was that the book glosses over a lot of things. For instance, there's a passage that implies Ork Kommandos (again, cunning Orks!) are operating in the theater, but nothing ever comes of it beyond that. Likewise, I would have liked to have seen something that showed the Gargants laying waste to their surroundings, but all we ever see are a few passages about the ground shaking, and then we move on. I liked this book, but it could have been much better if we got at least a few glimpses of the war from the perspectives of others who are directly involved in the fighting, just to give the whole thing a sense of scale. There's a scene involving a PDF pilot shooting down enemy bombers that's really great, and the book could have benefitted from more of that. Without it, the actual war felt more like background noise than a central part of the story.
Still, I'm glad I read this book. I give it a 3.5 overall.
And the Orks are mainly where I had a problem with this book.
I guess I've been spoiled by the Dawn of War games, but I like my Orks to have some presence and personality. Here, they're little more than cannon fodder for the Space Marines except for two particular bosses, and merely act as faceless mooks in a way that sort of robbed the story of a tension that was needed. In most encounters, the Orks get stomped by the marines and don't really pose much threat beyond their numbers. This was especially a shame because it's strongly implied that the Ork warboss was cunning in a way Orks aren't supposed to be, and that was ripe for exploration.
My other major gripe was that the book glosses over a lot of things. For instance, there's a passage that implies Ork Kommandos (again, cunning Orks!) are operating in the theater, but nothing ever comes of it beyond that. Likewise, I would have liked to have seen something that showed the Gargants laying waste to their surroundings, but all we ever see are a few passages about the ground shaking, and then we move on. I liked this book, but it could have been much better if we got at least a few glimpses of the war from the perspectives of others who are directly involved in the fighting, just to give the whole thing a sense of scale. There's a scene involving a PDF pilot shooting down enemy bombers that's really great, and the book could have benefitted from more of that. Without it, the actual war felt more like background noise than a central part of the story.
Still, I'm glad I read this book. I give it a 3.5 overall.