# HH Thousand Sons books



## maelstrom48 (Sep 5, 2012)

Random question and I didn't want to hijack someone else's HH thread, so at the risk of getting shouted at for adding yet another HH thread to the pile...

Is it necessary to read A Thousand Sons (Graham McNeil) and Prospero Burns (Dan Abnett) in chronological order?

The reason I ask is that I just finished reading Angels Exterminatus, and I'm really hesitant to read something by McNeil right now. He has a tendency of throwing a withering array of adjectives at the reader. Not to say he doesnt do it _well_ or that it Angels Exterminatus was a bad book (it was a great read actually).

Anyway. If I skip right to Prospero Burns, will I miss anything excruciatingly important?


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## Khorne's Fist (Jul 18, 2008)

In a word, yes. They were written together and were meant to be released only a month apart, with ATS coming out first. Due to some pretty serious health issues for Dan Abnett however, this did not go as planned.

ATS covers the fall of Magnus and his legion, while PB goes into great depth about the SWs and their structure, and why it was them that were sent to Prospero when it all fell apart. If you read them back to front you'd miss out on the build up to why they were sent in the first place, because this is set up in ATS. They are two of the best novels in the series though, so whatever way you read them you won't be too disappointed.


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## Alhom (Aug 17, 2012)

Khorne's Fist said:


> In a word, yes. They were written together and were meant to be released only a month apart, with ATS coming out first. Due to some pretty serious health issues for Dan Abnett however, this did not go as planned.
> 
> ATS covers the fall of Magnus and his legion, while PB goes into great depth about the SWs and their structure, and why it was them that were sent to Prospero when it all fell apart. If you read them back to front you'd miss out on the build up to why they were sent in the first place, because this is set up in ATS. They are two of the best novels in the series though, so whatever way you read them you won't be too disappointed.


Nothing to add


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## maelstrom48 (Sep 5, 2012)

Ok, I'll give them both a try! I've heard nothing but good about both books so I'm sure it's worth my $15.

Thank you for the replies!


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## TechPr1est (Nov 6, 2011)

i remenber someone telling me prospero burns is shit compared to a 1000 sons. 


i never read it but now i just think i will.


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## Doelago (Nov 29, 2009)

TechPr1est said:


> i remenber someone telling me prospero burns is shit compared to a 1000 sons.


Thats because people expect it to be bolter porn from page 1 to 448. The book is a lot more about the build up for the attack on Prospero than about the battle for Prospero itself. If you expect a bolter round to be fired at least once every 10 pages you might be let down by it, but if you enjoy reading a sort of mystery book then this is great.

Personally I loved it. Easily in my top 5 of Black Library books.


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## DeathJester921 (Feb 15, 2009)

Doelago said:


> Thats because people expect it to be bolter porn from page 1 to 448. The book is a lot more about the build up for the attack on Prospero than about the battle for Prospero itself. If you expect a bolter round to be fired at least once every 10 pages you might be let down by it, but if you enjoy reading a sort of mystery book then this is great.
> 
> Personally I loved it. Easily in my top 5 of Black Library books.


Plus, it didn't really cover the battle all that well compared to A Thousand Sons. Its to be expected since its from the point of view from the one person, but can't stop it from getting to people. I think, for me, what constantly turned me away from the book at points was the same description involving the Space Wolves growls. That description being, "Wet leopard growl." It got really annoying. Repetition can be a good thing, but too much repetition, and BAM! Instantly annoying. 

It was all right to me. Far, far, far from the worst Horus Heresy book, but certainly not one of the best, IMO. I liked A Thousand Sons better. It encompasses a bigger part of the battle for Prospero. Details their fall. It just makes you feel for the TSons. Prospero Burns doesn't give you that. It just lets you see that the Space Wolves butcher everything in their path with no remorse and no pity whatsoever. All because Russ was a fool.

Sad to think if Russ had not let himself be influenced, that battle could've been avoided.

I'd only read it for the point of view from the other side, as small as that point of view may be.


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## Angel of Blood (Aug 18, 2010)

I honestly didn't really notice the 'wet-leopard growl' until pointed out on here. Even now it still doesn't bother me, really can't see why people get so worked up over it tbh.

In regards to it not covering the battle as well as ATS, why would it need to? What would be the benefit of seeing the exact same battle in from the other side. Do we need to see Istvaan V from all of the other perspectives? No, not at all, we would gain very little from it. The Burning of Prospero was captured perfectly in ATS and simply doesn't need any more. I always wonder, were people actually hoping for an entire novel dedicated to one battle? Because that wouldn't have dragged at all.....

ATS shows Prospero being destroyed. _Prospero Burns_ shows _why_ it was destroyed and all the events and manipulations that led to it's destruction. It wasn't even close to a let down for me, was exactly what was needed imo. 

As Doelago says, I wouldn't listen to the criticism you hear, bolter porn it is not. Good literature, that it is.


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## Khorne's Fist (Jul 18, 2008)

Angel of Blood said:


> In regards to it not covering the battle as well as ATS, why would it need to?


Oh, I don't know, because of the title? It's called_ Prospero Burns_, but it only burned for the last 10 pages. 

While it is one of the best HH novels IMO, I was disappointed by the misleading title. As covered in many, many threads, most people did not get what they expected or what was advertised in all the hype leading up to the release of the two books. That's not to say that it turned out to be a bad thing though.


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## Angel of Blood (Aug 18, 2010)

The entire book is about the Burning of Prospero though, just why it happened and not how. Again, I'm still baffled as to how people thought an entire books could be spent on one battle, a battle that had already been almost entirely covered in ATS.


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## maelstrom48 (Sep 5, 2012)

I'm glad you guys mentioned the subjects of both volumes. This way I can read both knowing what to expect. I'm fifty pages into ATS right now. It's a difficult novel to get into. Instead of adjectives now, McNeil is throwing in lots of egyptian terms for cults and such. It's confusing and interfering with the flow of the plot, but I'm sure I'll get used to it.


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## dickie bell (Jul 8, 2012)

maelstrom48 said:


> I'm glad you guys mentioned the subjects of both volumes. This way I can read both knowing what to expect. I'm fifty pages into ATS right now. It's a difficult novel to get into. Instead of adjectives now, McNeil is throwing in lots of egyptian terms for cults and such. It's confusing and interfering with the flow of the plot, but I'm sure I'll get used to it.


i am sorry but i don't get what some of you guys are going on about , why on earth do you want to know what the story is about before reading it and i am sorry but i personally did not find ATS at all confusing ? i apologize for hijacking your thread and very possibly insulting you but i have been read 40k and HH for nearly a year now and i love it and since joining heresy online all i ever see is people whining about plot inconsistencies , i may not be the sharpest tool in the box but i have not picked up on anything so far out to ruin a story for me, if you all think you can do better why don't you write something and submit it to the black library since they take submissions, ok rant over have a nice day. :ireful2:


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## maelstrom48 (Sep 5, 2012)

I don't really understand the need for a rant. The other posters didn't give away any key points. They absolutely didn't ruin the plot; I already knew that the Thousand Sons are going to lose their homeworld to the Space Wolves. I'm not exactly a stranger to 40k fluff.

It just seems that people went into these books expecting something different from what actually happened in the plot. It's good to know what to expect so I can avoid pre-conceptualizing. Now I can enjoy reading the books for what they are, rather than what I think they should be. It's also nice to know the general consensus on whether a book is good or bad before spending hard-earned cash on it--moreover, spending valuable personal time actually reading the book. On the whole, probably half of BL books aren't really worth my cash or my time. And absolutely, I think I can do better than that bad half. It doesn't take much talent to exceed crap quality.


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## Child-of-the-Emperor (Feb 22, 2009)

dickie bell said:


> but i have been read 40k and HH for nearly a year now and i love it and since joining heresy online all i ever see is people whining about plot inconsistencies , i may not be the sharpest tool in the box but i have not picked up on anything so far out to ruin a story for me, if you all think you can do better why don't you write something and submit it to the black library since they take submissions, ok rant over have a nice day. :ireful2:


Good for you. But if you've read every Heresy publication and haven't picked up on any inconsistencies or unintentional contradictions then there is something wrong.

As I've said before, minor and inconsequential mistakes can be accepted as inevitable. But when several seem to occur in almost every book, with a handful being major and unforgivable it becomes more than frustrating.

Also, I'm fairly sure my dog could have wrote a better novel than one or two of the ones that plague the series.


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## Mossy Toes (Jun 8, 2009)

If you have an infinite number of dogs with an infinite number of typewriters, perhaps.

As for _Prospero Burns_: there are some very legitimate complaints about this novel, the largest being that it was mis-marketed and mis-titled. Yeah, it should have been called "The Wolves Unleashed" with a sub-heading of "Prospero Burns," rather than the other way around, or something. Also, the dragged-out introductory sequence of the first 50 pages could have been cut in half and that wordcount added to the last battle of the novel, yeah (though its not like Abnett's any stranger to the "rushed climax happens in a handful of pages" syndrome).

Despite this--people going into it with an entirely wrong set of expectations and feeling ripped off when those expectations aren't met; a very difficult/somewhat boring introduction that sets an exceedingly high entry bar into the book--_Prospero Burns_ is one of my absolute favorite books of the Horus Heresy. It is certainly the most literary book in the Heresy*, and probably published by Black Library. It is highly cerebral, isn't afraid to play with heady themes, is distinctly non-chronological, etc.

Don't go into it expecting to see the Wolves blow up Prospero and Russ have an awesome showdown with Magnus. You already got this in _A Thousand Sons_. Go into it expecting an intrigue/thriller about one man as he enters the Space Wolves and explores their motivations--all revealing exactly why the showdown at Prospero was always doomed to occur, and how very far out of their depth the poor, naive Thousand Sons really were.

*Arguably, _The Outcast Dead_ tried to usurp this title by playing on many similar themes about the antiquity of Terra, then adding in many aspects of Matt Farrer's _Blind_, but then, _The Outcast Dead_ was altogether too ambitiously flawed to succeed. Don't blame it for its failures (which are many)--praise it for daring to fly so high, though its wax-bound wings melted in the sun.


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## DeathJester921 (Feb 15, 2009)

Mossy Toes said:


> If you have an infinite number of dogs with an infinite number of typewriters, perhaps.
> 
> As for _Prospero Burns_: there are some very legitimate complaints about this novel, the largest being that it was mis-marketed and mis-titled. Yeah, it should have been called "The Wolves Unleashed" with a sub-heading of "Prospero Burns," rather than the other way around, or something. Also, the dragged-out introductory sequence of the first 50 pages could have been cut in half and that wordcount added to the last battle of the novel, yeah (though its not like Abnett's any stranger to the "rushed climax happens in a handful of pages" syndrome).
> 
> ...


These are indeed fair points. I like the reference to Icarus. Nice touch


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## Brother Subtle (May 24, 2009)

Mossy Toes said:


> If you have an infinite number of dogs with an infinite number of typewriters, perhaps.
> 
> As for _Prospero Burns_: there are some very legitimate complaints about this novel, the largest being that it was mis-marketed and mis-titled. Yeah, it should have been called "The Wolves Unleashed" with a sub-heading of "Prospero Burns," rather than the other way around, or something. Also, the dragged-out introductory sequence of the first 50 pages could have been cut in half and that wordcount added to the last battle of the novel, yeah (though its not like Abnett's any stranger to the "rushed climax happens in a handful of pages" syndrome).
> 
> ...


Well said. Here here.


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## Stephen74 (Oct 1, 2010)

No it isn't necessary. Prosporo burns is about as much as prosporo burning as it is about farting in the wind. ATS covers everything you need to know on the subject. Prosporo Burns is several hours of your life you wont get back and wil leave you wondering what the hell a wet leopard growl is. Ok thats a bit harsh but your not getting a story that has practicaly nothing to do with the title. 

And if you dont want McNeills brand of irritating fluff, give ATS a miss. There is far far more of it in ATS than there is in Angel Exterminatus which is by far his least fluffy work.



I know there are a lot of PB fans but i'm not one of them. It's one of those books that doesn't match up with what's been said about the wolves before (ATS particularly) and it leaves loose ends all over the place that will never be answered. I believe its the worst book in the series so far. In fact, I don't believe it does anything to add to the series. It could have been completely left out and we would have been fine.


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## Angel of Blood (Aug 18, 2010)

Nothing to do with the Burning of Prospero? Sorry but you clearly missed the entire point and plot of the novel.


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## Djinn24 (Jan 12, 2008)

No we were not expecting Bolter porn for 450 pages, we were expecting what the marketing department, title and cover art promised us. Not some swiveling human that was annoying as hell and a catchphrase that was even more annoying. PB could have been a novella and covered everything that was needed to be covered. By far the worst Abnett book written and one of the worst HH books. Skip to about the last 75 pages of the book and you get all of the great material without the junk and lame buildup that takes forever and ever and ever.


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## Zondarian (Nov 17, 2007)

I personally didnt like Prospero Burns. There is one scene in particular I am thinking of, very repetitive, I nearly found myself skipping it out. The main thing I didn't enjoy is, for me at least, it did little to counteract the view of the space wolves as presented in ATS. And as you can imagine in ATS there are a number of scenes that really make the Sons look kick-ass at the expense of the Wolves. I would have liked to have seen more of the battle at the end of the book to really show off why the wolves were sent after Magnus. I feel Russ himself was fairly well done but the Wolves came across as inferior for me. My finding from the duology was that the battle for Prospero was for the Thousand Sons to lose rather than the Space Wolves to win


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## Straken's_Fist (Aug 15, 2012)

I am reading ATS at the moment and so far it's my favourite 40k novel. 

Now i know to have no expectations for Prospero Burns though...


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## Zondarian (Nov 17, 2007)

Prospero burns isn't bad. It is a very interesting read if you skip the first 50 pages and skip a recurring scene. ATS is by far my fav as well. I am a big
Thousand Sons supporter and I felt the book really did them justice.


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