Barbas said:
EDIT: Oh no, I read some atrocious Space Wolves book a while ago...I think it was written by three people. Ah, jayzus, it's coming back to me now...three dollars in a charity shop, [small]argh argh argh...[/small]
A good example.
William King, who is an author who's published lots of stuff outside of the Black Library, writes a decent series about the Space Wolves, which I still reread regularly (though it dragged in bits, especially in the first book, and to a lesser extent, the second). Then he left BL (for a bit), so they gave his series to two people who've never written anything before, but who were big fans, and didn't seem too concerned with what they ended up with. There comes a time when a franchise can stick it's logo on anything and it will sell, and when they realised they'd reached that point, they stopped trying.
(They also gave King's Gotrek and Felix series to Nathan Long, who'd written 3 rather poor books for BL in the past. However, he was clearly really trying. I'd not recommend his G&F, the original stuff was much better (and I started re-reading them last month, as it happens, though got distracted by other books and I skipped the first two), but Long's heart was in it, so I can't fault him on that)
Barbas said:
Ciaphas Cain's adventures by Sandy Mitchell (Alex Stewart) were my thing back in the day, while Dan Abnett and Gav Thorpe's works have also given me a fair bit of joy. Dan's works are a cut above anything else I've read.
Yeah, though the Cain series tended to be one joke pushed too far, IMHO. A cowardly commissar had potential, but he makes a fuss to say that Cain isn't really a coward, he's just another boring hero underneath. I liked Caves of Ice, though. Also, his Blood on the Reik series, which seemed a lot like an updated version of the pre-BL Konrad.
Gav Thorpe is a bit hit or miss, but his Angels of Darkness was, IMHO, THE space marine story when it was written, later surpassed by Si Spurrier's Lord of the Night (with owed a lot to Angels of Darkness). The first Last Chancers book was so-so, the second rather dull (and really showing it's roots as The Dirty Dozen), the third started out quite good, but lots it and 2/3 of the way through (I re-read the first 2/3 about a month ago, it still holds up fairly well).
Abnett...for me he is very over-rated, and all his stories have similar endings. Either a Deus ex Machina saves the heroes, or they kill the enemy leader and the enemy army gives up, or both. Seemingly for every story he writes for BL. He also seems not to care at all for fluff consistency or sensible plots. However, he is very good at writing scenes. The Gaunt's Ghosts series got very OtT and they became terrible Mary Sues (people would complain he was so heartless in killing off characters they liked. He doesn't kill off anything like a major character until the 5th book, and it was maybe one a book from then on. The Ghosts would spend their time fighting horrific battles, and allied regiments would consistently be wiped out, mind. They were playing on god mode). I liked the early GG though.
Also, you'll note that Abnett has written everything for everyone, quite apart from his BL stuff. He does novelisations for Torchwood and Primeval, he did Doctor Who comics back in Sylvester McCoy's run etc. Likewise, Sandy Mitchell, not as prolific, but had a definite career before BL. He's not a games designer, or totally random they've got a book out of, he was successful as an author on his own merit.
