Customer Reviews

Chapter's Due (Ultramarines)

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

 

 

I'm gonna make this short. The ultramarines portrayed in this book come off as weak, dumb, and ineffective. How have they held ultramar as long as they have if they always do like in this book, underestimate and allow themselves to be outsmarted by the enemy. The Ultramarines didn't make a single tactically brilliant move in this entire book. In fact, we're lead to believe that an enemy force that's never even been to ultramar know their defenses better than the ultramarines do. Tigurius, the most powerful librarian in all the Imperium, comes off as weak and ineffective against the demon forces of M'kar. I mean, Tigurius should have been able to banish M'kar himself, he's so powerful in the
background information, but in this book, he can barely hold off minor demons. Mephistion of the blood angels in the novels comes off as far more powerful than his
peer, Tigurius, who was once able to scan the mind of an entire hive fleet and live to tell the tale. Too bad he's not effective at all in this book. And how was M'kar able to stand up to the Gauntlets of Ultramar, which have taken down Daemon Lords as well as Khaine avatars? M'kar was literally shrugging off blows from gauntlets that are Dark Technology Age wonders, with no explanation as to how he could do so. Calgar could beat M'kar before, but not now with Tigurius and Captain Agammon at his side? And after all the trouble he causes Hansou conveniently escapes again? With no reason as to how? The Ultramarines fleet is that weak as to be dominated like they were? I thought they were the most powerful Imperial Organization on the Eastern Fringe? Why were inquisition members in this book? They accomplished nothing. When it came down to it, why was Uriel Ventris and Cato Sicarius so not effective against Honsou and the pirate queen? Honsou was ten times the fighter Ventris was for no apparent reason all of a sudden. Even Vaanes the Raven Guard was ineffective as a hero. But he was effective as a villain. In fact, all the villains in the book cause terrible devastation while the heroes can't pull their heads out of their you know whats to figure out what's going on. And even when they do, they still make the same muck ups. Having a not so bright Uriel clone meant the Iron Warriors could override all the defense protocols of the Ultramarines? I could go on and on pointing out the flaws in this book, but I think I've said enough.

I have followed this series since the beginning. The I bought the Ultramarines Omnibus (a great deal) and was swept away by the adventures of Uriel Ventris. Before I picked up the omnibus I held the Ultramarines in low regard, as a space marine chapter they seemed pretty bland in comparison to the Black Templars or the Space Wolves. Uriel Ventris grudgingly earned my respect and I've been a fan of McNeill's ever since.

As amazing as the first three books in this series are, the two preceding Chapter's Due were lack luster. After following Uriel's exploits against a tyranid splinter fleet and a daemon world teeming with traitor marines his last two adventures were unfulfilling. The Killing Ground was aggravating and small scale, worst of all is McNeill's portrayal of the Grey Knights (my favorite space marine chapter). Courage and Honour was larger scale but lacked the atmosphere of earlier entries in the series. When I read the description for Chapter's Due I thought McNeill was finally returning to his roots and despite my unease I paid hard-cover price.

What most excited me about this book was the return of Warsmith Honsou of the Iron Warriors. Honsou makes for a wonderful villain, having risen to power in Storm of Iron and having faced off against Uriel in Dead Sky, Black Sun. There was also a short story called Skull Harvest in the Heroes of the Space Marines anthology that makes for a good precursor to this book.

This is not a bad book, McNeill is a great author of the Black Library and this is much better than most of the lesser author's works. This book is better than the previous two in this series but it no where near the level of the first three. What should have been an epic show down between Uriel and Honsou held no where near the emotional power I expected. This book is on a much larger scale than the others, *spoiler* by the end of the book there are three hundred and some less Ultramarines *end spoiler* and the whole Chapter gets involved including Marneus Calgar himself.

The plot follows three campaigns. One finds Marneus Calgar and the First Company in an endless siege against a never ending tide of daemons. This campaign is pretty boring and does little to further the plot but McNeill dosn't linger on it too long. Another campaign finds Captain Sicarius and Second Company fighting against pirates. This campaign is also pretty boring, standard Astartes warfare and a little more time is wasted on it. The real focus of the novel is Uriel's battle against Honsou in the caverns of his homeworld. The battle of the Four Valley Gorge is definitely a gripping fight and probably the most fun to be had in the book.

Where the book falters is the conflict between Honsou and Uriel. Honsou is no where near as interesting in this book, having been reduced to a daemon's errand boy. The ultimate showdown at the end is short lived, the Newborn (Uriel's evil clone) plays a much smaller role in the story than expected and *spoiler* Honsou escapes to fight another day *end spoiler*. No main characters die, and Learchus disappears for half the book only to return at the end with little explanation.

All in all this is by no means a bad book. The action is adequate even if the plot and character development are lacking. If you are a major WH40K fan like me go ahead and buy it for your collection, maybe wait for the next omnibus instead of forking over 25 bucks. If you are new to the 40K universe pick up the original Ultramarines omnibus, I usually induct newbs by having them read that. This is not McNeill's best work but I'm sure I'll buy the next one regardless.

This book was great. The more of Graham McNeill's books in the Ultramarines the better they get. I am waiting for the next one.

The Ultramarines Omnibus was my first real encounter with the 40k universe, and it made enough of an impact that I've got acquired a couple dozen more books and put a couple hundred hours into Dawn of War 2. Naturally I've been interested in the continuation of the story that started it all for me.

"Chapter's Due" didn't disappoint me at all. Whenever I had to put it down I was consistently looking forward to the next chance I would have to read further. Unlike many other Space Marine stories I've read, this felt like a true epic. It follows the full Ultramarines chapter defending multiple systems. Like the Codex Astartes that the Ultramarines strive to follow to the letter, this is both the book's greatest strength and weakness at the same time.

The story feels a bit thin on a personal, character level because it's spread so far. You've got ten times the Ultramarines (plus a handful of Raven Guard) fighting a chaos warband large enough to invade many planets at the same time. Even so, "Chapter's Due" is only about 50 pages longer then the last Ultramarines book, somethings gotta give.

The trade off was worth it in my opinion. Graham McNeill still wraps up the Newborn plotline nicely, and Vaanes satisfactorily. I didn't mind Honsou being shunted to the side for this book, it's fairly obvious he's going to be back to fight Ventris on a more intimate scale in the future.

Finally, I just have to touch on a major complaint some other reviews seem to have. The believability of various characters "power levels" seems to be split just like any other group of 40k book reviews I've ever read. Everything you read about in other reviews does have an explanation in the book. You might not agree with it for whatever reason, but it is there.

By the time I got to this book I kind of new what to expect, and got exactly that. The ending was probably the biggest let down. Builds up throughout and then you get more of the same.

Was also frustrated having not read the skull harvest short story that I assume gives some more back ground to Honsou's force.

Definitely not one of the better WH40K books, but once you read the omnibus you have to read it just to get some closure...I guess.

I was disappointed by this book. When I first found out that Honsou was coming to attack Ultramar, I expected an Iron Warriors vs Ultramarines showdown. It's nothing of that sort. A bit of the plot: Iron Warriors Warsmith and Uriel Ventris nemesis Honsou attacks the realm of Ultramar with a huge force and the aid of the daemon lord M'kar. Now, this is not a terrible book. As is his custom, Graham Mcneill offers up a ton of action and several large scale battles, it will keep you entertained if you read it with no prior expectations.

My first problem was that I expected a heavy Iron Warriors presence here. In fact, they are rarely seen and almost never seem to take the field of battle. Honsou seems to have fallen on hard times, his army is composed of a hodge podge of pirates, mercenaries, renegade Astartes and even a daemon lord and his hosts. That was dissapointing.

The second and even bigger problem is the lack of suspense. It just never felt like any of the main Ultramarine characters or planets were in any danger despite how often they were placed in major trouble. Part of the issue is how overambitious the plot seems to be. "SPOILER ALERT" Does anyone who knows anything about warhammer 40k think that Calth, Maccragge or Marneus Calgar are going down? Of course not, they are just "too big to fail" to borrow a phrase. Half way through the book, that belief becomes contagious when you realize that even the attacks that involve lesser names aren't going to succeed, either. This lack of suspense really hurts the second half of the book. It's like watching a saturday morning cartoon when you know regardless of what the bad guys do, that the good guys are going to win and win without any losses. I hope that in the future, Mcneill injects a bit more suspense in his books, picking targets that he can actually write off, as well as making Honsou more interesting and more of a protagonist. If he is as well written as he was in Storm of Iron or even Dead Sky Black Sun, he deserves his own trilogy. And please, don't leave the Iron Warriors on the sidelines again.

The Uriel-Ventris-series started out with a VERY interesting idea: making the "smurfs" (a.k.a. the Ultramarines) look interesting in comparison with other, more remarkable chapters. And for a couple of books, it almost seemed to work.

But then, Mr. McNeill did something VERY stupid: he tried to entwine two independent story arcs, containing two awesome characters and setting them up as opponents. Which of course meant, that somebody had to die...or at least loose. Come to think of it, dying would have been preferable...

I don't know whether I missed out on a short story here, but the novel simply makes no sense at all. The last thing I remember is Honsou returning from the Maelstrom at the head of a host of renegades and traitors, which he "won" (*yech*) from the Tyrant of Badab.

And now he enters the stage, in league with a demonic entity, doing the bidding of this...creature. Why? It is mentioned throughout the novel that Honsou does "NOT bow his head to anybody or anything!!" Yet that's exactly what he's doing. And this is REALLY sad, since Honsou was SUCH an interesting figure in "Storm of Iron" or "Dead Sky, Black Sun". Now he's like a children's saturday-afternoon-TV-cartoon villain...(You know, "I do this for no discernible reasons...Muhahahahaha!"). He used to be ruthless, cunning, plotting and absolutely lethal...and now he's just...boring and unimaginative.

Also, the two other sub-plots are even more boring than the story about Uriel Ventris and Honsou. On the one hand, a squad of line-troopers is sent to find the leader of a cult in Honsou's host, because killing her is somehow incredibly important and will somehow ensure victory...The problem is, I personally didn't give a f*** about any and all of them, because this just felt like a simple filler, which had no connection whatsoever with the other two stories.
The second part deals with Calgar and Tiguirius, holding out in a shrine against hordes of demons. And again, why would ANYbody care? Apart from the fact that apparently Mr. McNeill has forgotten how demons work in the 40k universe (they cannot come to this plane without being summonded and need a lot of warp-energy to stay here for a prologued time), he seems to have forgotten how to make characters interesting as well. Sure, they are named characters from the tabletop-game, but apart from that, WHY should I care what happens to them? You know right from the start that neither of them will die, so why even bother?

And if all that were not enough, there are so many small mistakes throughout the novel, it is really sad. Allow me to give some examples:

- Discussing the enemy, a "smurf" sagely announces, that the proposed strategy will "make the enemy wary...and a wary enemy is a defeated enemy". This statement HAS to be one of the dumbest thing I've ever heared, especially from a unflexible bunch of hardheads like the Ultramarines...oh, and it makes no sense. Being careful is a weakness now? As opposed to rushing headlong into the fray, as the Ultramarines are wont to do?

- After the first planet has been assailed by Honsou's host, Tiguirius is rebuked by a fellow Ultramarine for "not seeing this attack coming"...and half a page later, the VERY SAME character asks Calgar, whether it is safe to base their whole strategy on the predictions of the Librarian. It's just sad...

- The "fight" between the Newborn and Ventris is announced and hyped through the entire book. But in the end it is over in just half a page...

- Honsou has the Ventris and his squad at his command, yet chooses not to kill them, becaaaaaause...then they would be dead, I guess. There is NO WAY Honsou would give away such an opportunity. But Ventris couldn't die here, so the very character of Honsou was sacrificed for the sake of the story...

I really could go on here, but to be frank, I'm sick of thinking how BAD this novel turned out to be. I didn't have high expectations to begin with, but to be so HORRIBLY disappointed...

I guess if you've been dying these last couple of years to find out how the "titanic confronattion" between the Ultramarine captain and the Iron Warrior warsmith ends, you'll read this book no matter what I write here. But don't say I didn't warn you...

Captain Uriel Ventris returns to Macragge after defeating the Tau on the planet of Pavoinis. As usual, the next battle comes quickly. Such is the life of an Ultramarine. The Iron Warriors, lead by Warsmith Honsou, is targeting the realm of Ultramar. Honsou is out to destroy all Ventris cares for, including his homeworld of Calth. To this end, Honsou has freed the Daemon Lord M'kar, a diabolical hybrid of Dreadnought and warp-spawn.

Captain Ventris must also deal with the Newborn. The Newborn was once a human boy, but thanks to the Ruinous Powers, the being is now a patchwork melange of stolen skin sewn together from corpses, and its hatred of Ventris is matched only by Honsou. Ventris is horrified to learn that he and the Newborn have much more in common than he could ever have dreamed possible.

**** FOUR STARS! Graham McNeill adds a few interesting secondary characters to flesh out the plot this time around. Captain Aethon Shaan of the Raven Guard is in the action with Uriel because one of his Chapter, Battle Captain Vaanes, is on Honsou's team. (Side note: Uriel met Vaanes during his exile. Early in this novel, Uriel gives a brief overview about the time of his Death Oath.) There are a few other secondary characters with vital roles, but Uriel's Death Oath is at the core of this story's events.

The story jumps between various groups of characters. This gives the readers insight into the main characters' actions and goals. At times it even helps to develop (or deepen) more than one background story of key players. However, in my opinion, not enough time is given to the daemon lord or the Corsair Queen, who commands the Bloodborn host. On the flip side, this author has been known to tell just a bit about some secondary people and/or beings in one story and then bring them back in later stories as main players. Graham McNeill has one wicked imagination! ****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch of Huntress Reviews.

This book is the culmination of both the Ultramarine series and the Iron Warriors series which spanned various books and short stories.

As a small background for new readers:
The initial Iron Warriors series begins with the Storm of Iron book, followed by the Ultramarine's Dead Sky, Black Sun, and including some short stories. Overall story arc of this book is the insane lust for revenge of the Iron Warriors who were 'invaded' (lack of a better word) and brought to near ruin by the Ultramarines.
The Ultramarines themselves have to weather the insane invasion of their territory and try to counter an enemy that not only seems to be able to anticipate the Ultramarines but also seems to know them intimately.

An interesting read with further in depth character development (creepy Iron Warrior mind is creepy and reckless).

And enjoyable read. What will be next for Uriel?

A good continuation of the Ultramarines saga, Graham McNiell brings back action and carnage on a huge scale, in a fight for the Ultramarine's homeworlds. Where it didn't seem to be as well written as his first three books, description and emotion wise, and some parts were rushed, overall it was a great and enjoyable story full of good characters and constant action. Looking forward to the next installment!