Mark of Calth – Book Review – Part 2

Black Library’s Horus Heresy short story anthology Mark of Calth is themed to revolve around the aftermath of the Word Bearers treacherous attack on the Ultramarine planet of Calth, as detailed (among others) in Know No Fear.

This is part two of my Mark of Calth review. Here you’ll find part one.

The second half of the stores is easily as strong as the first. I particularly enjoyed the entries from Rob Sanders and John French. Dan Abnett’s closing Perpetual-tale left me a bit puzzled.

The Heresy came to Calth without warning. In just a few hours of betrayal and bloodshed, the proud warriors of the XIIIth Legion – Guilliman’s own Ultramarines – were laid low by the treachery of their erstwhile brothers of the XVIIth. Now, as the planet is scoured by solar flares from the wounded Veridian star, the survivors must take the fight to the remaining Word Bearers and their foul allies, or face damnation in the gloomy arcology shelters beneath the planet’s surface. A collection of stories by authors including Dan Abnett, Aaron Demsbki-Bowden and Rob Sanders. The battle for Calth is far from over…

Mark of Calth includes a total of 8 short stories.

• The Shards of Erebus by Guy Haley
• Calth That Was by Graham McNeill (at 120 pages, a novella even)
• Dark Heart by Anthony Reynolds
• The Traveller by David Annandale
• A Deeper Darkness by Rob Sanders
• The Underworld War by Aaron Dembski-Bowden
• Athame by John French
• Unmarked by Dan Abnett

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Mark of Calth Stories 5 – 8

A Deeper Darkness by Rob Sanders

Rob Sanders adds one of his best stories yet to this anthology. Admittedly, A Deeper Darkness starts off a bit slow. The reader is introduced to a surprisingly rebellious Ultramarine (telling the story from a first-person perspective), who goes against his superiours’ wishes to explore an uncharted cave of Calth’s underworld, after the Ultramarines found a destitute Word Bearer, who had gauged out his own eyes.

In the depths of the caves, he comes across a particularly vile Daemon. The battle between the Daemon and the Ultramarine (after the Daemon killed of pretty much everyone else) feels a lot like it was inspired by Greek mythology, in a good way.

It’s rare to see interesting new takes on Chaos Daemons in Warhammer 40K. I enjoyed this one, because the story was well told and because it brought out a truly alien Daemon.

The Underworld War by Aaron Dembski-Bowden

The Underworld War is easily the most misleading title in this anthology. Especially right after A Deeper Darkness, which is all about a fight in the dark caves, The Underworld War follows a possessed Word Bearer across the blasted surface of Calth (at least initially).

I am always awed by ADB’s ability to conjur interesting characters, and Kaurtal, the Word Bearers of this story (along with his personal Daemon), is no different. Easily one of the most memorable characters in Mark of Calth.

The story’s final twist, on the other hand, left me rather cold (nor, do I think, ist he premise very plausible).

Athame by John French

Rob Sanders’ A Deeper Darkness was told from a first-person perspective. John French’s Athame is actually told from a second-person perspective. Mark of Calth is full of surprises.

The premise of Athame is to tell the tale of a weapon, one of the Word Bearers ritual Athame, as it travels from owner to owner through the ages, leaving bloodshed and betrayal in its wake. It’s a fun idea, and well done. Not  to mention that Athame includes a highly unusual cameo.

Athame is a story that could easily have  failed, but I enjoyed it a lot. Reading it, my minds eye was following the knife’s story through the eons, like a time-lapse scene in a movie showing you the passing of time. Great stuff.

Unmarked by Dan Abnett

The final story and … as much as I enjoy Dan Abnett’s work … the most disappointing one for me. Unmarked is definitely well written, though it effectivelly suffers two problems.

First, it once again delves deeply into Perpetuals (and Perpetuals going on time-travel, no less). Second, because it is about Perpetuals travelling through time and space, it fails to build any real tension.

The entire story is a bit like constantly switching channels on TV, only to see the same group of people in different sets and settings. I am sure Dan Abnett has something big and fancy planned with his Perpetuals, and I might be glad I’ve read these „side-stories“ on the Perpetual-story-arc. As a short-story in itself however, Unmarked just wasn’t very interesting.

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Thoughts?

The second half of Mark of Calth has some real gems. Both A Deeper Darkness and Athame by John French were stories that both tried to pull off something new and different, and pulled it off well.

Likewise, both ADB’s The Underworld War and Dan Abnett’s Unmarked tried to step outside the usual ideas. In these two cases, it worked less well for me, but that is likely more down to my personal tastes (like my general confusion as to where that (now time-travelling?) Perpetual-tangent is ultimately heading!).

There is nothing as such, I could fault these stories with.

It’s a truism of sorts, that every anthology has “good stories” and “bad stories”, though even the worst story in Mark of Calth still above average.

The one caveat – which I already noted in the first part of my review – is that Mark of Calth is a very bleak, even depressing collections of stories. It is, in parts, this strong theme, which makes it stand out as an Anthology, but it might also put off people looking for a more gung-ho Space Marines Battles-style collection of stories.

Z.