Mass Movement Magazine

Priests Of Mars – Graham McNeill (Black Library www.blacklibrary.com)
I am, I’ll freely admit, a sucker for good old fashioned, genre defying, and defining, Space Opera, and ‘Priests Of Mars’ is the latest novel to throw down the gauntlet, challenging all and sundry to follow in it’s wake as it triumphantly enters the fray, beginning a series that will, if this opening instalment is anything to go by, eventually become one of the genre benchmarks. Combing political machination, the harsh reality of inter-dimensional space travel, with the personal stories and relationships of a frankly enormous cast of incredibly well developed and rounded characters in a future Universe in which science, religion and magic are merely facets of the same whole, ‘Priests Of Mars’ charts the tale of the Adeptus Mechanicus’ secondary expedition, and attempt, to travel beyond the realms of known space in an effort to discover the scientific secrets of man that have been lots to history, and to discover the eventual fate of the first expedition. It is, suffice to say, an incredible undertaking and one which Graham McNeill brings to glorious, vivid life, delivering a multi-arc story in which everything and everyone is connected, threads that weave in and out of each other throughout ‘Priests…’, as the expedition takes it’s first steps beyond the veil, beyond a curtain, that you can’t help feeling was never meant to be opened by humanity. McNeill has transcended the Warhammer 40,000 Universe, merely using it as setting in which to base his latest story and has created something spectacular, a novel that drags its reader in and leaves them desperate for more as they turn the final page. This is science fiction at its absolute best, Space Opera at its absolute finest, and one of the most challenging, and rewarding novels that the Black Library have released. McNeill has embarked on an incredible journey, a journey that we’re all invited to enjoy, a journey that I’m more than happy to join him on… Tim Mass Movement