Customer Reviews

Blood Money (Warhammer Novels)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Tired and sick of care bears heroes who always make the noblest of choices, say no to drugs and have no human flaws like greed, cruelty or disrespect to life. If you are then this is the book for you. If you like a popcorn action book with a hero that can kick [butt], well this is definitely the book for you.
The book contains a series of short episodes in the life of Brunner, a ruthless bounty hunter with more tricks up his sleeve than the notorious galactic hunter mentioned above. Brunner is ruthless, shows little or no compassion or empathy for life and has no notions of honor (except maybe for golden coins). Actually he would prefer shooting someone in the back to face to face combat. The stories are very entertaining, despite of being unoriginal and despite the fact that the end is predetermined. Brunner's only motivation is greed and he would stop at nothing to complete a job. The action scenes are great as you would expect from a Warhammer novel and the fact that Brunner uses guile, (throwing salt in adversaries eyes, sowing the ground with caltrops, hiding pistol under a jacket in a la raiders of the lost ark scene etc..), only adds to the intensity and the overall fun.
Why only three stars?
* I only give 5 and 4 stars to the best Books (6-Being LOTR 5- George R. R. Martin , Tad Williams).
* Brunner lacks any real depth which makes his character rather uninteresting and predictable . He never displays any sort of feelings. It is fine for a tough bounty hunter with a cool attitude, but it doesn't add up to a realistic character. Brunner is like a machine, always on some job of tracking down another target. Almost no background of Brunner is given to explain his choice of occupation. We never hear of how he spends his money or if there is a bigger goal the man is working towards. Actually his tough attitude becomes rather old after a few chapters (I didn't count the number of times Werner wrote "his icy blue eyes stared" but I'm sure there is an overuse of that sentence).
To sum it up: Entertaining cliffhanger of the Warhammer genre worth a few days of fun.

The title may sound like a negative, but that is not how I mean it. Brunner is single-minded in his focus. He wants money, and will do what it takes to get paid. He doesn't fight fair. He doesn't pretend to care. He goes in, kills his target, and leaves.

And that is perfectly fine. There is nothing wrong with a character who is so focused. In fact, it is a nice change from the "rogue with a heart of gold" stereotype. Even when you think Brunner is going to do something nice, events shift and he continues to act only in his own self-interest.

I gave the book 3 stars instead of 4 only because it did not completely hold my attention. It is well-written and I did finish it. But it is the kind of book that you can put down for a few days without feeling like you are missing something.

This book is a collection of short stories about the bounty hunter, Brunner. Mostly written in the style of penny dreadfuls, they are entertaining, but the lack of any character development for Brunner gets tiring. The secondary characters have more personality than Brunner.

Good action, enjoyable quick read, but nothing special.

All I have to say is that if you like warhammer books, then you will love this book. It has the raw gritty feeling to it. With the main character being one of the better bad dudes in the warhammer universe.