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Horus Rising (Horus Heresy) | 
| Author: Dan Abnett
Publisher: Black Library
Category: Book
List Price: £6.99
Buy New: £4.54
You Save: £2.45 (35%)
New (29) Used (12) Collectible (1) from £1.25
Avg. Customer Rating:  23 reviews
Sales Rank: 3405
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 416
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 6.7 x 3.9 x 1.1
ISBN: 184416294X
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9781844162949
ASIN: 184416294X
Publication Date: April 20, 2006
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
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| Customer Reviews: Read 18 more reviews...
 Great Start January 5, 2009
I have enjoyed this book immensely and found it very hard to put down. The battle scenes were well done but so to was all the background information which provided detail without becoming bogged down. I have read other novels by Dan Abnett and like other reviewers feel that he has progressed as a writer with this novel his best to date. I highly recommend this novel.
Meat on some old bones September 19, 2008
I have done it all with warhammer 40,000. I started with the old epic game, moved on to 3rd edition of the table-top 40k, even worked part time in a GW shop when i was at college. The thing that captivated me, made me sell my soul, was the rich background 'lore'. At least i thought so until this book hit me and sucked me in so much deeper! The horus heresy has always been a great tale, but to read about the time leading up to it in such detail like this really blew me away. The book its self is very well written, i had read the Gaunts Ghosts books before, so i knew the author wouldn't dissappoint. This book deserves to be read more widely and shouldnt be written off as a sci-fi section geek read.
I have gone on and read all the books in the series, but with possibly the exception of 'Fulgrim', this one is the best.
top-notch sci-fi September 13, 2008
Dan Abnett really does a suberb job in kicking off this series. Very high quality writing and lush battlefield descriptions made this a pageturner for me. It's just genuine good sci-fi, plain and simple, you'll love it you're not afraid of some gore and a future in total despair.
Note, I'm not a Warhammer 40K player and didn't know much, if anything, about the Warhammer universe prior to reading this.
 Surprisingly good read September 8, 2008
Up to now, my only exposure to the Warhammer 40,000 series has been via science fiction bookstores and games shops where you can purchase the miniatures. I had dismissed novels like this as pulp fiction. I'm glad to say that I was wrong.
This book, the first in the Horus Heresy series, is set prior to the universe portrayed in the Warhammer 40k universe and the series promises fans the chance to learn the history behind the game. The book tells us how the Emperor of Man has retired from everyday life for a chance to persue his studies, and appoints Horus to act as Warmaster in his stead. The Imperium of Man is on a crusade throughout the universe, destroying cultures, alien and human alike, that refuse to accept their teachings. The Imperium have removed religion and superstition from their existence.
Horus acts in the Emperor's stead, assisted by his Astartes warriors, genetically enhanced superhumans. The Astaertes warrior Loken, one of the inner circle who advises Horus, fights a strange battle where a fellow soldier changes form. This begins to point the way towards the story for the remainder of the series.
The battles scenes are graphic, there is not doubting that, but the book is surprisingly rich in content. The leading Astartes warriors, especially Loken, are used to add human feelings and touches to the story and the scene is cleverly laid for the next in the series. All in all it's a surprising good read.
 Please read this review if you aren't a W40K addict December 19, 2007
5 out of 11 found this review helpful
The problem with reader reviews on Amazon is almost every book ends up being a 4 or 5 star must read because the fans write the reviews. This doesn't tell you how the book really compares to other works. Let's face it we all know that most books produced are not 5 star masterpeices of art. So let me try and add some balance.
The writing is good and it is at times thought provoking, there is more here than blood and thunder. However the biggest flaw is the story telling. I got sucked into this series apparently without end so I am hoping you may be forewarned unlike me.
This is a first of a trilogy which by the end sets up the Horus Heresy. 3 books to get to the start of the story. Now what happens is interesting but that over a 1,200 pages to start a tale, that's longer than war and peace! So there is a LOT of filler here. For example at times you read several pages from the book the character is reading, is that necessary? There is a side story on a world called murder which admittedly does introduce new characters but is backstory turned into 100 pages. Indeed most of this book is background.
The real annoyance is the painfully slow progress of the story over 3 books. Just when you think the story may actually get out of 1st gear books 4 and 5 actually go back in time to cover many of the same events from a different perspective. It's a story line that seems to be going nowhere and yet I was first drawn to the books because I know what will happen at the end and at that will be a great book but I maybe an old man before they actually get that far!
So ignore the fan boy stuff. If you want to try some games workshop fantasy there are one off books to try but this is an over ambitious and badly thought through project to see how many books they can stretch the old "rise and fall" story for as long as they possibly can. If the whole thing had been condensed into 1 trilogy then this could have been something special as it is it is for hardcore W40Kers only who obviously don't mind spending a fair amount of cash on mediocre books.
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