Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A stunning return to form, 8 Dec 2008
Literally just finished Mechanicum and I am utterly blown away. In my last review of Battle for the Abyss I suggested that 'movie moments', scenes written well enough that you can instantly picture them in the glorious technicolour of your minds eye, are what make books in this genre successful - achingly cool scenes of action, or soaring emotion, or punch the air moments of triumph. The first three books of the series were laden with these moments, Flight of the Eisenstein and Fulgrim to a lesser, but still stirring degree - hell, even BFTA had a couple of these moments, albeit too late and too little.
This entire book is a movie moment.
After the disappointment of DOA and BFTA, and the downright weirdness of Legion, Graham McNeil has conjured something epic, wonderful, tragic and glorious. This book in the adrenaline shot the series needed, and what's even more astonishing is that this is accomplished with the almost total absence of marines, apart from a cool few scenes (and a reference to one of 40k's great secrets that will have fans drooling - the '13/15' moment).
My only slight grumble is what I feel is a recurring problem with the whole series - the apparent readiness of formerly loyal subjects to switch allegiences with really not much soul-searching. In my opinion, this happens a little too easily throughout the whole series, and Mechanicum is no different in this respect. However, this is a minor blip in an entralling tale.
If you have been put off this series by some of this books very average predecessors, and can see that what the series needed more than anything is a fresh perspective, with characters with more depth than the now sadly two-dimensional marines, then this will restore your faith. McNeil manages to invest even the machines of this book with more character than BFTA's main players.
What a shame that, at the moment, we only have an anthology of short stories to look forward to, and more Dark Angel ramblings, neither of which is going to move the series along. Having said that, Mechanicum doesn't really move the series along either, but when it's this well written, you just dont care....
Fantastic stuff.
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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Mechanicum; Book 9 in the Horus Heresy series, 6 Dec 2008
After the bitterly disappointing 'Battle for the Abyss' I had high hopes for Graham McNeil's 'Mechanicum', which deals with events on Mars leading up to the siege on Terra. And I must say those high hopes were met.
In terms of the time line, we are really no closer to the finale of this series. The events of Istvaan III have just happened, and the Abyss of the 'Battle for the Abyss' is still being constructed. This gives you a very real sense of where you are in terms of it all, but I feel like the story isn't advancing in terms of time. It is however, good to see the Heresy from different points of view.
As with all the Heresy series, there are several storylines interwoven together. In this piece more than any other, we seem to side more heavily on the side of the Imperial supporters. The cheif storyline follows Dalia, a young Terran logistician with a talent for machines. She is brought to Mars by a Mechanicum adept by the name of Zeth, because of her incredible intuition for machines and latent almost psychic ability to see how machines work. Now I don't want to give too much away but she ends up being drawn through a mystery that helped to form the Mechanicum in the ancient past. For those of you who are fans of 40k lore, you will appreciate this story line as it concerns a certain 'Dragon' of Mars....
The problem however, is that this story line has little to do with the Heresy itself, and whilst it is interesting to see this past, it really adds nothing to the Heresy storyline itself. The other story lines are concerned with the Legio Tempestus, a Titan legion, and for those old school workshop fans amongst you you'll appreciate the appearance of several knight palladin characters too. The battle scenes are well written, especially from the Titan perspectives and it's so great to see large scale battles fought with Titans. The names of various Titans and characters do become a little confusing though. If you are in possession of the Horus heresy artwork book 'Collected Visions', then the short story 'The Kaban project' also by McNeil is referenced several times and we meet characters contained within that story too.
I like the way that BL has interwoven these story lines, but I feel it is really time to start moving on in terms of time line now. It's also nice to look at a section of the Imperium not really explored much before, and the description of machines and the thought processes behind them is well executed.
All in all it is a satisfying read, light on Space Marines (which is no bad thing!), filled with intrigue, plot, well rounded characters, unexpected turns, and a real sense of what is going on in the universe as the galaxy slowly tears itself apart. Well done Black Library. More like this please!!!
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6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
A bit of a let down., 11 Feb 2009
Some books grow on you as you get pulled into the twisting plot and characters come to life, you read the book at an accelerated pace to reach the conclusion.. this book is only like that in reverse.
I read the first half with interest, willing the plot onwards, and then found myself skipping pages and wincing at scenes until I didn't really care what happened at the end.
The pantomime villains stride on sneering at there rivals (this is common in all Horus heresy books, you can usually guess whose going to become the warp crazed murderer after about 50 pages) and at the flick of a switch literally half of Mars becomes covered in spikes and skulls.
So much could have been made out of the mechanicums quest for progress and advancement and the soul searching of individuals at the promise of the research and learning of 'secret knowledge' that the Emperor has forbidden. Good, wise men may have opted to seek knowledge and found themselves opposing the Emperor out of good intentions, instead its power, revenge, destruction, ha ha ha!
The main character, Dalia, is meant to be the young adept we sympathise with but comes over abit like someone whose just arrived at university in a strange town, viewing a vast millenium old forge complex she says 'Did it take you long to build?' it might as well have been 'hmmm, I like what you've done with the curtains!' The motley crew of helpers shes straddled with are equally chummy and annoying.
..and don't get me started on the plot about the dragon. Don't ask.
If this was a DVD there would be a few scenes I'd find impressive, including some cinematic battles between Titans, but I doubt I'd ever watch the whole film more than once.
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