“Let the Galaxy Burn”, edited by Marc Gascoigne and Christian Dunn

765 pages, The Black Library, ISBN-13: 978-1844163427

Let the Galaxy Burn is a collection of short stories set in Games Workshop’s Warhammer 40,000 science fiction setting (my favorite SciFi setting, if you haven’t figured that out by now). Published by Black Library – Games Workshop’s own publishing branch – it contains thirty eight tales, as well as an introduction and an excerpt from Dan Abnett’s “Eisenhorn” Omnibus. Like most 40K books, Let the Galaxy Burn is made for the fans; as such, it touches on a LOT of topics: xenos, classes, ranks, weapons, factions, chapters, objects, etc., so that if you’re a beginner and know nothing about 40K except that everyone says it’s awesome, you’re gonna pick up this book and right there in the first story you’ll find someone named Khorne, something called a bolter, stuff made out of plasteel and/or ceramite, some goddamn fanatic screaming “Blood for the blood god!”…and soon enough you’re left wondering what in the HELL is going on.

As with all anthologies, the quality varies from story to story. Some were quite well written (the ones from Dan Abnett, William King, Gav Thorpe and Ben Counter in particular), while some were terrible (“Tenebrae” by Mark Brendan, “Small Cogs” by Neil Rutledge, “Unthinking Justice” by Andras Millward and “The Raven’s Claw” by Jonathan Curran all come to mind). Sadly, many of these writers lack elementary knowledge of the 40K universe, and so we’re treated to a bunch of obvious mistakes that any editor worth his salt should’ve fixed before putting this thing into print (What’s that you say? You want examples? Okay: Leman Russ battle tanks being described and used as APCs; an over-two-meters-tall hive tyrant; a male Callidus Assassin; Space Wolf scouts who are also novices; Tzeentch-worshipping Alpha Legionnaires, and so-on and so-forth).

On the other hand, we’re given insight into some under-described facets of the 41^st Millennium, such as the lives of Imperial Navy pilots and slaves, life on some of the more primitive worlds, the insides of Tyranid hive ships, chaos worshippers as protagonists (!), etc. I expected at least one tale starring an Eldar or a Tau (or maybe even an Ork), but no such luck, as all of the stories are either about the Imperium, or the servants of chaos gods. On the whole, Let the Galaxy Burn is a good anthology: the stories are fast paced, the writing is alright for the most part, and the book itself is very affordable, considering its almost eight hundred pages long. Fans of 40K will enjoy the good stories and curse the bad; non-fans will just be confused.