‘Deathworlder’ – Victoria Hayward (Black Library)

Before I get into the review proper, thank you Black Library for sending me a copy of ‘Deathworlder’ in return for a fair and honest review. Talking of ‘fair and honest’… There will be loads of the latter but I enjoyed the hell out of ‘Deathworlder’ so… We’ll see how being fair goes ;o) That’s your only warning, lets talk ‘Deathworlder’…

Lazulai is a world beyond the brink, its battle against the tyranids all but lost. Once-magnificent cities lie in ruin. The seas boil. The skies crack. Horrific alien bioforms devour. In mere days the planet will be consumed.

The 903rd Catachan ‘Night Shrikes’ defend one of the last fortresses still standing. Led by Major Wulf Khan, to die fighting is all that is expected of them… until she is given one last mission: to lead a squad through the apocalypse and recover a piece of archeotech that may doom or deliver the entire Lazulai System.

Facing insurmountable odds and zero hope for aid, the major must hold her squad together as they pick their way through an endless xenos jungle. The enemy is merciless, relentless, endlessly adaptable and formidably resourceful... but so too is Khan.

Wow… Where to start with ‘Deathworlder’? Well, lets just say that while I don’t normally get on so well with my Kindle, these last few days have seen me carrying it everywhere, just in case I got a chance to polish off a few more pages. ‘Deathworlder’ is very much the kind of book that’s easy to get into and then suddenly very difficult to put down. And a large chunk of that is down to the slightly unpredictable directions that Hayward is willing to let the plot move in. When the Black Library kicked off their ‘Warhammer Crime’ and ‘Warhammer Horror’ lines, I joked that the logical next step should be ‘Warhammer Romance’. Well… Amongst other things, ‘Deathworlder’ gives us a little look at how romance might work in the grim dark universe of the far future with two potential couples doing the ‘will they, won’t they dance’ in the face of a planet being consumed by Tyranids. And you know what? I loved it :o) In a galaxy of endless war, these moments in ‘Deathworlder’ go more or less how you’d expect but I love the fact that even here, war can lead to these unexpected developments and Hayward draws these moments out beautifully with more reasons to root for heroes that we’re already invested in. Moments like these highlight how grim the setting is but gives us a little hope for it at the same time. 

‘Deathworlder’ isn’t just about the romance though. Of course it isn’t, not on a dying planet where even the air that you breathe will eat you from the inside out. Seriously… In terms of sheer body horror, ‘Deathworlder’ gives ‘The Thing’ a good run for its money. We all know what the Tyranids are capable of but I’ve never seen it laid out on the page in such a blunt, honest way. There are definitely moments where you read ‘Deathworlder’ and find yourself thinking that it could just as easily sit in the ‘Warhammer Horror’ line. That’s the beauty (you know what I mean) of the setting and Hayward places you right there in the thick of it. And it all adds to the ‘high stakes’ feel of ‘Deathworlder’, an approach that comes at you from more than one direction. Can Khan and her team beat back the Tyranids before the planet is truly lost? Can Khan and her team beat back the Tyranids before their own bodies fall apart and become biomass…? There’s so much at stake that you can’t help but read.

But ‘Deathworlder’ isn’t just about the horror either (although that is a large part of it). At its heart, ‘Deathworlder’ is a war story with all the compelling stuff that you’d expect to find. Difficult decisions (dialled up to 11 at the very least) have to be faced and while it’s very clear that the Guard can hold it’s own against anything, the inability of various factions to co-operate is leading humanity to an inevitably grim conclusion. What can Khan do, in the meantime, except fight? It might only be putting off the inevitable but that end will come all the quicker if she doesn’t fight. There’s a lesson there for us :o)

And all of this is played out to the accompaniment of millions of space insects coming into contact with every single last bullet, shell and flamethrower on the planet, spectacle is never in short supply here.

‘Deathworlder’ is a superb read then with plenty to get you hooked and plenty more to keep you reading. Victoria Hayward has made the Catachan’s her very own and I’ve got all my fingers crossed for more books, featuring the 903rd ‘Night Shrikes’, in the future.