Bloody Books Review: The Lords of Silence by Chris Wraight

The Lords of Silence takes a closer look at the Death Guard in the wake of the Cicatrix Maledictum.  The galaxy burns in the wake of Abaddon's victories, as they rip a new landscape onto the universe. The Lords of Silence, led by the wonderfully philosophical Seigemaster Vorx, find that this new galaxy comes with a new collection of challenges to be overcome.  Knocked off course and deep in Imperial territory and attempting to make a decision of which way to step next. 

Wraight  is known for characterful explorations of each faction he takes on, and Lords of Silence is a wealth of detail surrounding mindset and realities of the Death Guard. These are minds informed by the Horus Heresy and the knowledge they have vastly changed since then.   Vorx is the centre of attention, and he is a oddly endearing sort.  Worn, weary but also calm and benevolent to his fellows,  honourable of a sort, fatherly of a kind,  He is corrupted in every sense possible but he is still very much his own person.  he fascinatingholds a  viewpoint in all parts of the The 40k of Now. 

We shift between Vorx and his lieutenants and gain a range of these views in variation on what would be expected of the Death Guard. It's all done beautifully and less conventionally through a non-linear frame, in a perfectly measured pace. It has a slow and methodical approach and weighs heavily towards the dissent and intrigue rather than combat, though The Lords do enter battlefields with horrifying aplomb

Lords is a smaller scale and an unconventional take on the subject matter, but slowing things down to layer on the details, such as what a Tallyman does, the importance of numerology, leads to a fascinating book. A must-read.