How often does one encounter a company so invested in its completely fictional setting that they spend significant amounts of money publishing historical tomes, background books really, detailing various conflicts and within their fictional universe? How much rarer is it that said company would spare no production cost to create coffee-table sized versions of these tomes with high quality gloss pages and high resolution photographs. How much rarer is it for a company to have a fan-base that is so fascinated by the diverse science-fiction futuristic universe they have created that these books sell with relative like hotcakes? Safe for perhaps the teeming multitudes of works published regarding the inhabitants of Tolkien's Middle Earth, I would venture the guess that Games Workshop's Warhammer 40k setting is the only one able to claim all of this fame.
From the perspective Adjutant General Alexis Grail, staff officer of Cadian High Command, the Thirteenth Black Crusade chronicles the darkest and most dire days of the Imperium of Mankind. The worlds and sub-sectors surrounding the Cadian Gate are invaded by the most feared foe of man, the dreaded forces of Chaos. This invasion of terrifyingly mutated battle fleets, dark servants of ancient malevolent gods, hordes of mutants, and throngs of corrupted faith spewing heretics is preceded by an explosion of cult activity across dozens of worlds. This conflict, which will erupt like a volcano into a war involving hundreds of millions of soldiers from across the Imperium will eventually rip across nearly three dozen worlds, is the setting for the Black Crusade.
While some of the photographs mentioned in the another review are obviously taken from terrestrial sources this book is filled with nuance and detail of the conflict and reads exactly like the memoirs of a high ranking general. I would have preferred more detail on the forces and personalities involved in the conflict and their histories but this could be the subject of an entire historical tome of its town. It is interestingly paced and can, with only a little imaginative effort on the part of the reader, allow you to for a moment to envision yourself in this nearly unimaginably horribly and brutal conflict.
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