The Carrion Throne
Warhammer 40,000
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4.5 • 42 Ratings
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- £6.49
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- £6.49
Publisher Description
In the hellish sprawl of Imperial Terra, Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor Erasmus Crowl serves as a stalwart and vigilant protector, for even the Throneworld is not immune to the predations of its enemies. In the course of his Emperor-sworn duty, Crowl becomes embroiled in a dark conspiracy, one that leads all the way to the halls of the Imperial Palace. As he plunges deeper into the shadowy underbelly of the many palace districts, his investigation attracts the attention of hidden forces, and soon he and his acolyte Spinoza are being hunted – by heretics, xenos, servants of the Dark Powers, or perhaps even rival elements of the Inquisition itself. Soon they discover a terrible truth, one that if allowed to get out could undermine the very fabric of the Imperium itself.
Read it Because
It's a novel that gets into the seedy underbelly of the Throneworld, Terra itself, at the end of the 41st millennium!
Customer Reviews
Flawed but enjoyable
Set on Terra, featuring some of the scenes of famous art from the 40K backstory, this is definitely a fan’s book. Chris Wraight has captured some of the feel of the old Blanche illustrations and some of the 90s paintings - the scale and lunacy of this Grimdark heart. The plot also resonates with some unfinished lore left hanging for decades.
There are some oddities. The scale of everything grows and shrinks from page to page. One minute the palace is 500km away, the next a man with a limp has covered the entire distance on foot. Chasms wider than sight and leapt by ordinary humans whilst the augmented Transhuman Custodians seem to shuffle about at jogging pace. You have the colossal security of a billion defenders through which even hierarchs cannot pass but then a quick tech cheat admits anyone into the most sacred vaults (as long as they keep running! Which everyone can do in this book even over hundreds of kilometres)…
As with a lot of 40K stories, the ending comes up all of a sudden and has Very Important Consequences That Will Change Everything (TM) but it resolved by a couple of protagonists in a shoot out. I’m not dissing Chris Wraight for this in particular, as it’s pretty standard in the Black Library stable, but the first half of the book is a thrilling scene setting and it’s a bit of a letdown when all of the horrific grandeur boils down to a Lethal Weapon-esque 80s movie denouement. You know who the bad guys will be from the first chapter, who is betraying who etc.
But slightly cookie cutter characters and age old tropes aside, I did enjoy the book as a glimpse at the rotten heart of the 40K universe and the delight the author has in recreating those old images in prose form. It’s probably best when it’s a guided tour of the monumental environments and the psychological effect living near your God’s resting place has on human faculties. The plot, people and detective side is more like the drapes around the setting. It certainly feels more 40K than say Dan Abnett’s Inquisition series (which has virtually no gothic and a lot of James Bond in spaaaace moments) but I think you’d have to really enjoy the setting to enjoy this novel.