Fall of Damnos review

[Occam]

Howdy all!
I recently got a chance to read the book "The Fall of Damnos" a bit early and thought I'd give my review of the book here.

As always, feel free to debate. And if you don't like it just remember....

Not the face. NOT THE FACE!

[Occam]

Book Review: The Fall of Damnos
By,
Occam

The Fall of Damnos is the newest Space Marines Battle novel published by Black Library and written by Nick Kyme. The book details the events surrounding Damnos, an event mentioned in both the big rule book [BRB] and Codex: Space Marines. This is one of the few books to use the Necrons as antagonists. I ordered mine in advance since I liked Steve Lyons’ Dead Men Walking and as the date neared, I was excited to hear that the book is rumored to reveal more about the upcoming Necron codex release. I was especially excited to read on various blogs that we would finally have the points of view of the Necrons.
The verdict: This book sucks. Don’t buy it; use your local library, bum it off a friend or use a website like paperbackswap.com if you absolutely have to have it. Or save your time and just read my review. Spoilers ahead.

So what’s wrong with this book? The simpler question would be what’s right with this book. The story structure is garbage, with too many under-developed plot lines and prolific plot holes and no sense of time as to when things take place. The occasional flashback chapter doesn’t draw the reader in but instead confuses the reader and leaves one with the impression that Kyme became bored with writing the Necron story so he decided to jump over to a random short story. The sentence structure is choppy, often causing me to re-read whole sections or chapters to figure out what just happened.

Worst of all, the characters are at best cardboard cutouts, one-dimensional and lacking depth. The parts of the book that were for the Necrons or the average citizen/trooper of Damnos were gutted to make more room for Space Marines, but the Space Marine’s sections were gutted to make more room for the action.

Again, the horrible writing can’t be stressed enough: it permeates every facet of this book. Comma splices and poor word choice abound and these are the least of his problems in between unfinished thoughts and sentence fragments. The dialog is either wooden or outright ridiculous, my favorite laughter-inducing quote being on page 318, when after a round of brutal ordinance, one character says “They must have used a weapon on us.” Really? I thought they were using rainbows!

Kyme can not seem to make up his mind about the books terminology or point of view, which appears to be “3rd Person Ignorant.” Kyme constantly dithers about how much humans or even the reader knows about the enemy. Kyme continuously switches between everyone knowing every game term for the army, as if lifted from the codex and nobody knowing anything. It is outright confusing when a squad of marines is called “Immortals” and Kyme either describes a similar Necron or eventually gives up all pretense and uses the term to describe both. And this is just with the Necrons—similar instances populate the book. Also confusing and annoying is when the book is bisected with a force organization chart of the Space Marines. Why is it in the middle? Why not at the end? The book already reads like a long battle report, so why not place it at the end with unit costs or a small pamphlet about how to stage a similar battle for the table-top game?

The complaints of the characters will be brief as they all suffer from the same problems mentioned earlier: either woefully underdeveloped or arrogant, especially in the case of the Space Marines. Though if this is from Kyme’s attitude or from an actual character trait fostered by their environment is unclear. The book suffers, greatly, from the fact that it is a long love-letter from Kyme to the Ultramarines and this becomes readily apparent when in order to make the protagonists look good, the author has to make their enemies worse. Speaking of which, if the enemies have to be made weaker and dumber for the protagonists to look good, then both have been done a disservice by the writer.

The pages involving the Necrons start of well enough, but quickly lose steam. I don’t like the depiction of almost being computers in nature. They also seem to be transformed into a horde army built of tissue paper instead of living metal. Like everyone else in the book, they seem to do things for the convenience of the plot. There is something about “wanting to return to fleshtime,” but it doesn’t quite jive with the Necron’s character: If they can manipulate time and space, create living material from inert matter, then why can’t they just fashion brand new bodies and transfer their minds that way? It doesn’t make sense, nor is it ever addressed.

Although Nick Kyme seems to go out of his way to break the “Show, don’t tell” rule, there are a few good moments in the book that I believe are worthy of mention. One marine being saved by a group of common miners-turned-soldiers was a nice touch. There are about four pages [of 414] where the Ultramarine Praxor and the venerable Dreadnought Agrippen have an exchange about the nature of honor and Praxor’s contempt towards the people of Damnos for not doing enough to help themselves. A named Necron named “Sahtah” has the only marginal flashback of interest. While the varying Necron lords contempt and racist/class deriding attitude towards the Flayed Ones and Destroyers is neat, but seems odd and slightly out of character, though I’m not sure why.

At another point, a character notes just how creepy the silence of the Necrons is at around page 74. This could have been turned into a strong motif for the book: Sound vs. silence. Others would have been light and darkness and life and death. Memory could have been a great nuance to the Necrons; perhaps the lords could have used memory to inflict punishment on each other. It is this that is actually the Damnos’ and Kymes greatest crime: the missed opportunities. How wonderful it would have been to see a comparison of the Dreadnoughts to the Necrons, the true motivation of the few sapient Necrons revealed or the Space Marines getting over their arrogance of “lesser humans.”

But in the end, the book cheats. It cheats with its premise, its characters and with its ending. The Necrons are portrayed as a nuisance rather than as a legitimate threat, for if they are that easily defeated, how could they have taken over a planet? The ending is a cheap cop-out: in both the rule book and the codex of Space Marines state that Imperial forces lose, but the ending is presented as a scene of hope when more marine forces and vehicles make planet-fall. If you want a real book that satisfies, moves and involves the Necrons as a potent threat with a consistent background and better story, pick up “Dead Men Walking” by Steve Lyons.

[wkz]

...
I don't know about the book, but here's some tips on REVIEWING:

a) Mine gods!! The wall of text!! You need more paragraphs!!
(PS: paragraph means pressing the "enter" button twice)


b) As much as people riff on BOLS reviews, it does certain things correctly. This is one of them: how in the world is someone going to know the gist of the book if the entire review is a spoiler on what happens in the book? You're going to end up with either (i) "I read the review, and I already know the major plot points... bah!!", or (ii) "I don't read the review... thus I get NOTHING from said review".

You have quite a lot of points inside the spoilerrific wall that are NOT spoilers... In fact most of the review is NOT spoilers. Just remove the spoilers (or hint at them) and put the points across without giving your review's readers grief??


c) The other "does certain things correctly" BOLS does: Be concise > be precise. Use as few words as possible to get the point across. Not everyone is the "I can stand Wall of Texts" person, and a lot of people are going to be turned off this review just by looking at it.


d) You're writing a review for the READERS, not the WRITERS. Leave the "writing lessons" portions of your review out of this.

Basically, what I meant is: you can mention "this story jumps around too much", or "the flashback chapters confuses people", because this will be points of interest for the readers... but you do NOT talk about "Man, the author missed the chance to make a sound vs silence theme", or "The book already reads like a long battle report, so why not...".

The book is ALREADY written. There's no way it can be changed. However, telling your target audience (readers) is now your job: curious people still wants to know how the book is like, so TELL THEM, and leave the other things out of this.


e) You're jumping all over the place with this review: You talk about overall (story structure, plot holes, etc), then confusion (flashbacks), then writing (sentence structure), then jump straight into characters (cardboard cutouts)... and BACK to writing again. And suddenly back to characters (dialog between characters), terminology, force org... etc...

What you should do (another thing BOLS reviews "does certain things correctly") is find a review point/focus/idea, and STICK to it. Only after you exhaust that focus do you move onto the next.

Example: If we're talking about characters, talk about all aspects of that before moving on: they're like cardboard cutouts, their dialog is stupid, their decisions are stupid, the author is trying too hard to beautify them, etc... THEN move on to story structure (which will involve the complaints about flashbacks being confusing, grammar and sentence structure, etc...). Only after that THEN you... etc...


f) You don't need to give definitive statements. By that I mean you can say XXX is bad (sentence structure is bad)... but you do not, should not, never do, cannot break the review rule of saying things such as "this book sucks" (or its opposite "this book is AWESOME") especially right at the start, without presenting your opinions first.

Present your opinion of what the book brings to the table (its story, its characters, its premise, its readability, etc...) and let your review's audience decide, but do not say things such as "if you want a REAL book"...

It is as if you're saying "This book sucks, because I say so". Instead, a good review should say: "I think XXX is bad, YYY is done badly, ZZZ is quite bad", THEN say "the above means this book is bad."

PS: also note: a review is "one person's opinion". NEVER pass of your review as fact, because it is not.


g) Lastly, the review as it applies to the book's story itself... I can't help you there, as I have not read the book you reviewed. Thus I can't gauge this review's objectivity, accurateness, bias, etc...

Can someone else help out, and do the honors??

[Deadlift]

Personally I enjoyed the book, ok it's not going to win the booker prize but then it's not supposed to, it's just throw away fiction like much of the black library releases. So as such it suited me just fine. I do agree however the backflash parts were unneeded and detracted rather than added to the story being told. The possible hints of units not currently seen in the codex and the description differences for current ones maybe hints of what to expect in the coming codex.
For me it was an enjoyable enough quick read, not thought provoking in anyway but just the usual space marine fare. For me it was exactly what I expected from a black library novel.

I downloaded it from iBook.

[aurionshidhe]

Kyme may have accidentally written my favorite part but I hope he was intentional in his subtle comparison of the sapient SM dreadnought (Agrippen?) vs. the other SM dread that was losing his grasp on reality. This included in a book that also spends a lot of time differentiating the thinking Necron Lords from the Necron "hordes" was pretty cool in my mind.

The book wasn't great, but it was a quick and fun read.

[Occam]

Wow! Thanks for taking time out of your day to read my article.

[Occam]

To WKZ:
A review of a review? I feel an Inception joke would be appropriate, but can't think of one.

Thank you for taking time to read my review. The fact that you did makes my day.
I just copied and pasted it from the MS Word file. I thought it would "looK" exactly as it did in MS Word. I'll be sure to remember the hint on paragraphs on the BoLS forum.

I was writing the article much the same way as I would in one of my regular columns or reviews, with a summary of greivences and then more details as to why. It was odd--it felt like there was both an abudance and dearth of stuff to criticize, if that makes sense, so I tried to focus on the meta-points, or underlying causes.


I put the "verdict" at the front much like Siskel & Ebert did in their film reviews because that is what some people like. I honestly would not have used such strong language if the book did not warrant it, in my opinion. I do take umbridge with me passing this off as fact: I never explicitly said that. But you are entitled to your opinion as I am to mine.

Otherwise and I do mean this in earnest, thank you again for reading.

[wittdooley]

It looks fine, dude. I don't know how else he wants you to format it. You gotta understand that not everyone wants an actual review for their Black Library stuff. The ones that BoLS posts on the front page are crap. This was not.

BTW... I enjoyed Dead Men Walking a lot. Here's my review of it, if you care to read :)

Dead Men Walking Review (http://imperialathenaeum.blogspot.com/2011/03/40k-review-dead-men-walking-steve-lyons.html)

[DarkLink]

I didn't see anything in your review that I wouldn't expect from a well educated individual who would normally be reviewing a high quality book, which 40k stuff typically isn't. Talk of writing flaws like poor character development and plot holes is useful for comparing this book to a better one. It's precisely because this book was written with those flaws in it that makes is a poor book, it seems.

[Occam]

It looks fine, dude. I don't know how else he wants you to format it. You gotta understand that not everyone wants an actual review for their Black Library stuff. The ones that BoLS posts on the front page are crap. This was not.

BTW... I enjoyed Dead Men Walking a lot. Here's my review of it, if you care to read :)

Dead Men Walking Review (http://imperialathenaeum.blogspot.com/2011/03/40k-review-dead-men-walking-steve-lyons.html)

Thank you for yours and Darklink's kind words. Also, thank you for providing a link to your review. I liked it.

[Demonus]

But in the end, the book cheats.

This is exactly how I felt when I finished the book yesterday. For 380 pages, the Necrons are beating Space Marine ***, then the final 20 pages are garbage. As a Necron Player I was totally offended. :)




***** SPOILERS BELOW*****








I was thoroughly excited reading this book and already knowing that the Necrons won sinces its pretty much elluded to in the SM Army Codex. I know that the SM are GWs golden boys, but I was thinking "hey, for once we wont have that bs come from behind win in the last chapter that you always see..." well boy was I wrong.

In regards to character development. We have Jynn, the miner turned guerilla warfare expert that mourns the loss of her husband. Then we have the main guy miner character, forget his name but it starts with a K, who is obviously in love with Jynn, says as much and I never saw a resolution between them. I suppose Jynn died, as she was being carried by one of the marines and she looked dead, but it didnt seem like K ever found out about her death. Maybe I missed it?

The Necron Lords. We have one who causes the necrons to lose their artillery, and the battle, and lose one of their Lords, for no apparent reason whatsoever. It said that he was "loyal to the necrons, but a survivor first and foremost." He watched the small strike force sneak over perilous ice drifts to attack the Pylons. He obviously knew that there was only a handful of humans and 2ish Squads of troops, could have easily sent some Wraiths to push them to their deaths, but did nothing.

More than nothing actually as he gave out a bad rez orb (didnt know they existed) to **** over a Lord, but doesnt say why he did this at all. Did the Voidbringer sell him some bad weed when they were kids? Steal a girlfriend? This made no sense to me whatsoever.

Also in regards to the Voidbringer, he has a powerful psyker dying in his grip, and let's him go because a random marine, who should have never made it there in time, took a pot shot at him in close combat. Said psyker miraculously recovers from his almost dead state to blast the Voidbringer with fireballs from his eyes, and bolts of lightning from his arse. L A M E.

Not to be outdone however, we have Sicarious struck down by the crazy destroyer lord (I didnt realize Necron Destoyers were crazy btw) I believe the line said "Sicarius was dead."

Horray! The Necrons might lose this battle, but at least some good has come out of it. An arrogant Ultramarine who doesnt seem to follow the Codex at all with his reckless abandon has been killed off.....but wait, one chapter later, he is being air lifted off of the planet, and is ok, just a little winded.....Seriously? A Warscythe cut his *** down, it was said he was DEAD, and now he will be perfectly fine, just needs some time in the bacta tank? U L T R A L A M E.

Finally we have the Architect (the traitor Necron that screwed his side out of winning with his random feelings) waking up anothe more powerful Necron Lord (probably should have woke his *** up first eh?) elluding to a second book. I cant wait to buy it, have the Necrons beat the snot out of the Marines for another 300 pages, only to lose out in the end.

Sorry Nick Kyme, I loved the Salamander books, but am not pleased with this one.

I agree with the above posters, Dead Men Walking is much better.



PS. A leman russ ramming a monolith and destroying it has about as much chance as a unit of Tau surviving a charge of Khorne Berserkers. Must have had the Crusher Spearhead =P.

[eldargal]

Maybe the Space Marine fed Jynn a healing Tonic.:rolleyes:

/slinks back to her evil Lair of Terrible Jokes and Puns.



In regards to character development. We have Jynn, the miner turned guerilla warfare expert that mourns the loss of her husband. Then we have the main guy miner character, forget his name but it starts with a K, who is obviously in love with Jynn, says as much and I never saw a resolution between them. I suppose Jynn died, as she was being carried by one of the marines and she looked dead, but it didnt seem like K ever found out about her death. Maybe I missed it?

[aurionshidhe]

Okay, so I went back to my SM codex and verified that the Fall only covers the first part of the "Damnos Incident". Kyme couldn't have had the 2nd crushed at the end of the book because they still believe that they are winning.

We still need to see the other 2/3 of the Necron forces come out and play, the armored assault led by Chronus, the desperate fall back of the SMs, the heroism of Tigurius, and finally the death of Agrippan. :eek:

So is the BL planning for a part 2?

And this isn't giving anything away. It's all on pages 38 and 39 of the SM codex. And I can give Kyme some slack as his hands WERE a bit tied with the fluff already presented. He had to make sure that his book hit the points from the dex so he really only got to fill in the fluff between.

[jorz192]

I have never read a Black Library book or Games-workshop codex that featured strong character development. :p

[Occam]

@eldargal: that was truly painful and I love it.

@demonus: Thank you for listing some of the myriad reasons why this book is so terrible. My least favorite moment was the reference to 300 that bothered me. It was random, pretentious on behalf of the author (I'd red stuffz!) and just another lame attempt to make the GW Love boys look cool. Sicarious must not have died because that particular Necron lord must have used a rainbow instead of a weapon.

[Demonus]

LOL i was telling my friends about that the other day. "Did he just list the battle of Thermopole, and change 300 to 700?"

He also didnt mention that those 300 died horrible deaths =P.

Like I said, I liked his Salamander books, but was disappointed how this one ended.

[aurionshidhe]

Occam, I agree with most of your review on the book, but it wasn't entirely deplorable in my mind.

I don't expect high literature from ANY game related fiction. Or any fiction based on an existing IP for that matter. Star Wars, Star Trek, Video Games, RPGs, and so on all have a pretty poor track record. Gems do stand out and the books can be read and enjoyed as long as you are not expecting too much from them.

I don't think that Kyme was referring to 300 when he spoke of the "ancient" Battle of Thermopylae. 300 is a movie based on a comic book that has very little to do with history. The Battle of Thermopylae is still an impressive story and I could see it being preserved in the military history of the Imperium. It is especially appropriate in the heavy Greco-Roman themed Ultramarines.

[Occam]

What would I like to have seen in this book?

1) Pick a direction and go with it. If it's a battle report, fine. Make the force org chart in the book outline what the forces for each are as they stand with current books or codices. Or wait until the Necron book is released so they can both match up. Or choose the literary route and make it something worth reading. I understand that having your hands tied at certain points is hard, but it isn't always an excuse to have the book suck.

Also, why not have made this into a graphic novel? I'm sure there are enough poor art students who'd do this for a commercial or college credit.


2) Another round, or eight, or editing.


3) How cool would it have been to see a reference to the Anti-Life Equation a la Kirby's Fourth World? Better yet, make it the Necron's prime motivation, since 40k is already a pastiche of other great Sci-Fi stuff. Just think of what the Warp would be like if they did have the equation? (I love this one the most!)

Just think of how bad *** a "senior/gold" lord would be if he acted more like Darkseid?


4) Symbolism about life vs. death. How awesome a theme would it have been, especially if theme/motif revealed that while life thrives because of death, the Necrons are worse in that they aren't death but instead oblivion? I think that would make a great theme for both armies. Hell, sound and silence would have been as good.


5) Special guest appearance by Billy Mays!


6) More Necron character development --OR--leave us completely in the dark! Yes, they appear to be classist, but why? Why can't they become flesh and blood if that's their motivation?

7) Less cheating! See review

8) Less Sentence. Fragments.


I'm actually going to mail Kyme my review. Not expecting a response.
Anyway, would do you all think would have made this better?