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Sons of Fenris (Warhammer 40,000: Space Wolf) | 
| Author: Lee Lightner
Publisher: Black Library
Category: Book
List Price: £6.99
Buy New: £4.89
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Avg. Customer Rating:  6 reviews
Sales Rank: 100061
Media: Mass Market Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 416
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.4
Dimensions (in): 6.7 x 4.2 x 1.3
ISBN: 1844163881
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9781844163885
ASIN: 1844163881
Publication Date: January 2, 2007
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
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| Customer Reviews: Read 1 more reviews...
 Lord have Mercy! June 27, 2008
Ok, if you've read the Ragnar series up to now, you're going to have to read this one just for completeness.. but for the love of God, dont expect too much, because you're not getting it. I can only echo some of the other comments made about this book, the authors have done a sucky job, lots of repetition, no real flow and just poorly written. The Black Library need a good kick in the ba.. er pants for letting this through.. grrrr
 Change March 14, 2008
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
It's not the same as the previous books. There, i said it. A new author has the serise and it's changed. this fact is not neccisaraly a bad thing. If you like the seise and can live with a change in the writing style then this book is just as good as the previous installments. My one complaint is the final third of the book seems rushed, most likly to the strange limit the black library seems to have imposed on the books.
 Sons of Rubbish December 21, 2007
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Reading this novel makes me wonder about the people who run 'The Black Library'. I mean, do they actually proof read their output before sending them off to be printed and bound? If they don't, it would explain this steaming pile. If they do, then whomever they have in charge of proof reading should be sacked with immediate effect.
The first four novels of the Space Wolf series were decent reads, with good dialogue, a nice number of well-written action set-pieces, and more interestingly offered an insight into the war-torn universe of the 41st Millennium, which I (as someone with neither the time nor the money to invest in the hobby) found fascinating.
But most importantly, the prose was well written, constructed, and paced. And it flowed.
Fast forward to Sons of Fenris. New writers inevitably bring different things to the table, and there were bound to be changes in direction. But a decent writer (or writers) should be able to take a given series and a given set of characters and construct the next adventure so that they are all recognisable. The gestalt that is Lee Lightener failed miserably in this regard. The characters are wholly alien to what has gone before, and have lost everything that made them interesting.
The truly unfortunate part is that the rest of the novel fails as spectacularly. Plot holes you could drive a land raider through litter the story, with the writers seemingly confused as to just how far in the future the story is set. The dialogue is leaden and uninteresting, new characters are given a short shrift until they are needed to die. The prose itself is leaden, hard to follow and poorly written, and the actual plot itself, whilst holding promise, misses so many opportunities to do something interesting that it was painful, whilst simultaneously having the most obvious 'twist' you can think of.
There is absolutely nothing to recommend this novel to anyone who isn't in desperate need of something to help light a fire.
Avoid.
What a let down... June 21, 2007
15 out of 15 found this review helpful
I was a great fan of the first 4 books in the series so when I came across this book on amazon, I knew I had to get it. I read the fluff at the the back and thought it sounded like a good tale.
I finished the book a few weeks ago and this is the first chance I've had to write up the review, so I hope not too many people have purchased it in the meantime as it really isn't worth the money or effort to order it (and considering that ordering via amazon is so easy, i think that says a lot)!
I hadn't noticed before I ordered the book that this new addition to the series of Space Wolf novels had been written by a different author to the one who wrote the first four books, so it will be no surprise to know that I was also unaware that this book was not written by one, but two authors!
But this did help explain why the book seemed to be so disjointed. I got the feeling that in the writing of this book we had possibly one person who had read the previous books and had taken down a few notes about the space wolves and characters but then lost those notes and tried to write this new books based on what they could remember and then we had another author who hadn't read any of the previous books and who thought they could just wing it.
The characters don't behave or express themselves in the same way that they did in the previous books, so that you are left confused as to who exactly is talking and what their motives are.
As we had two authors, I feel it is a crime that they did not proof read each other material and been a bit more clinical about removing parts which did not work or flow well. It's an even bigger crime that BlackLibrary/Games Workshop let this drivel be published. They should have caught the inconsistencies/errors/poor written style and even edited it to be a better book. Is it a case of getting a certain numbers of book published and damn the quality?
A book is like a journey. In some books you are walking to your destination, others you are driven high octane style to your end point. In some books the start, middle or end points are highly interesting and in others it is the landscape you pass through that is more memorable that these points. The means of reaching your destination in this book is more pedestrian than rocket fuelled. Your start, middle and end points could have been good, but the landscape you passed through to get there made it an impossibility to enjoy this book.
Take my advice, this is one journey you don't want to take.
Sci-Fi Written For The Lowest Common Denominator February 11, 2007
27 out of 27 found this review helpful
The Black Library is well-known for being hit-or-miss with its publications. As a rule of thumb, if it's written by Dan Abnett (Eisenhorn, Ravenor, Gaunt's Ghosts et al), you're onto a winner.
The earlier Space Wolf novels, however, were never particularly good. Bill King took the backstory of a popular character and stretched it to breaking point, without even redeeming himself by producing well-written books - so when I heard that a new author had written the latest instalment, a little hope for Ragnar's future returned.
Oh, how disappointed I was.
For starters, it seems that around a quarter of this book is needless exposition, explaining some of the most basic aspects of the backstory to people that will no doubt be familiar with it. The irony is that the author (or authors, as it turns out) don't seem to share that same familiarity with the background material. A few examples: A Dreadnought with three arms: Dark Angels in black robes: a complete lack of knowledge concerning the operation and armaments of Space Marine fleets, and the structure of Planetary Defence Forces and massive discontinuity with regard to the abilities of his characters. I can't really give away the biggest blunder without spoiling the plot, but should you ever read the book I'm sure you'll pick it out.
Add to this the horribly corny dialogue, laughable character development and mercilessly recycled plot lines, and you're left with not so much a novel as 404 pages of drivel. A waste of the paper it's printed on. Put this down, and go read the Horus Heresy series, or - as mentioned - anything by Dan Abnett.
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