Skaven Pestilens

Legends of the Age of Sigmar

by Joshua Reynolds

A Legends of the Age of Sigmar novel

The Crawling City is under siege. The diseased hordes of the skaven Clans Pestilens seek the way to one of the Thirteen Great Plagues and this colossal worm holds the key – but to claim it, they must defeat the might of Sigmar's Stormcast Eternals...

READ IT BECAUSE
It's your first look at the Clans Pestilens in action as they continue their eternal quest to claim the thirteen Great Plagues.

THE STORY
On the Amber Steppes of Ghur, the Crawling City is dying. The rabid devotees of the Clans Pestilens have infested this colossal worm and the structures upon its back, bringing poison and corruption with them. They seek to glorify their foul deity by unleashing one of the prophesied Great Plagues, and the Crawling City holds the key. In their way stand Sigmar’s Stormhosts, and stranger enemies still – the skaven must overcome not only these foes but their natural disunity and suspicion, if they are to lay their claws upon the baleful prize at the Crawling City’s heart.

Genres: Fantasy, 40k

183 pages, Hardcover

First published March 3, 2016

About the author

Josh Reynolds’ work has previously appeared in such anthologies as Historical Lovecraft from Innsmouth Free Press and Horror for the Holidays from Miskatonic River Press, and his novel, Knight of the Blazing Sun, is currently available from Black Library. He can be found at: http://joshuamreynolds.wordpress.com

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.

Reviews

[Christian · Rating 2 out of 5]

Stormcast Eternals and Seraphon take on the Skaven in a city inside a massive slug. Really. It's basically another extended action scene that wraps up far too quickly for the build it had been building to. Yes, I just wrote that.

[Walt · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is the first Age of Sigmar book I've read. I thought space marines were pretentious and arrogant, but in this regard GW's new fair haired faction, the stormcast, totally outclass even the space marines. They sound like poorly acted heroes in a bad two-penny opera. "Quickly brothers to me that we might smite the foul foe for the glory of sigmar! Biggus Dickus use your overly powerful holy power to destroy those who would besmirch the beauty of yon fair city!" I'm exaggerating but not by much. Yuck. It really makes you want to root for the Skaven. Like most GW fiction there isn't much plot beyond the two forces in the book pounding the snot out of each other. But if you like reading these like I do that's pretty much what you expected. This book is slightly worse in that one of the characters can see the future and so knows what everyone on his side needs to do to ensure victory. Likewise if you read a lot of GW fiction you'll know who wins before you even start the book, but it still takes a little away. It's not well written or thick on plot but it will kill a couple afternoons until your next game.

[Dan Findlay-Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Josh Reynolds does a fine job of bringing the duplicitous shaven to life in this Legends of AOS novel.

It includes all you could want in back stabbing, double crossing and plague from the shaven and is contrasted well against the Beast borne stormcast and their allies.

All in all an enjoyable read and recommended

[Josh · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slow start, picked up in the middle, lacklustre end

[Chris Dennison · Rating 4 out of 5]

An enjoyable read from start to finish. Reynolds brings the goals and ambitions of Clan Pestilens front and centre and firmly grounds them in the mortal realms of the Age of Sigmar. Recommended.

[Abhinav · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can read the full review over at my blog:

https://shadowhawksshade.wordpress.co...

When the Warhammer Fantasy Battles setting died out and Age of Sigmar took its place, there were tons of lore changes for many of the mega factions of the old setting. One such faction, the Skaven, had ever been one of the most popular factions, owing partly to the comedic nature of many of the Skaven characters we saw in the novels and short stories, none more so than the all-powerful Grey Seer Thanquol. The Skaven were a rather innovative and fascinating race of rat-kin in all of fantasy, and with the shift from WHFB to AoS, a lot was expected and demanded of the Skaven redesign.

Thankfully, it seems that the designers and writers have not disappointed, for Josh Reynolds' Skaven Pestilens is written in the finest tradition of these old favourites. The novel tells the story of the battle for the Crawling City, an old stronghold of Sigmar's faith which has been overrun by Skaven, and how a force of the God-King's Stormcast Eternals is sent to liberate it and wipe out the Chaos threat. Full of some really delightful characters and a wonderful action-adventure plot set on a most fascinating location, Skaven Pestilens is a damn good introductory read to anyone wanting to dip into Age of Sigmar, and more besides.

The Skaven are not your typical fantasy race. Humanoid rat-kin with a penchant for self-destructive tendencies and heavy doses of paranoia, they can be likened to a comedic, evil version of dwarves, although they are much more than that simple description would imply. Their redesign for Age of Sigmar has consisted, in one instance, of their patron god, the Horned Rat, being inducted into the Chaos Pantheon, which is actually a huge change. Reading through Skaven Pestilens, that's certainly my take-away and something that excites me a lot since it adds an intriguing shift to the faction.

Which is what made this novel such a joy to read. The delight that Josh takes in introducing the various Skaven characters and showing their in-built natural paranoia towards each other was highly entertaining to say the least. Vretch, Kruk, Squeelch and Skuralanx have such an enticing relationship with each other and honestly, in them Josh captures the best of the old Skaven. Nothing can quite top Thanquol, of course, for he is a most singular villain in all of fantasy, but in Skaven Pestilens Josh makes an excellent case for being one of the best writers of Skaven stories. Without these four, and even their many subordinates, the novel would be nowhere near as delightfully entertaining as it turned out to be.

Then we have the Stormcast Eternals led by Lord-Celestant Zephacleas of the Beast-Bane warrior chamber of the Astral Templars Stormhost. Quite a mouthful I know; the organization of a Stormhost and its warrior chambers is still very confusing to me. Anyhow, having read a fair bit ahead in the setting with the Realmgate Wars series, I was somewhat familiar with Zephacleas Beast-Bane already and going back to read this spin-off story here added some fun to the overall experience. I like Zephacleas as a character, and he is much more "believable" than someone like Lord-Celestant Vandus Hammerhand of the Hammers of Sigmar. Hammerhand is a very typical type of Stormcast Eternal whereas the Beast-Bane has many more rough edges to his personality and attitude. It just adds that extra dimension to the story and seeing how Zephacleas leads his many brothers-in-arms was a good change from the norm.

[Michael Dodd · Rating 3 out of 5]

Despite feeling more like a Realmgate Wars novel with skaven antagonists than a book primarily about the skaven, this is an enjoyable story in its own right, and does a good job of highlighting the Clans Pestilens – either as a somewhat nostalgic reminder to existing fans or a solid introduction to new readers. It works best when it’s fully focused on the skaven, and suggests that a purely ratman-centric story from Reynolds would be a thing of joy, but it also continues to add to the depth of the Mortal Realms as well.

Read the full review at https://www.trackofwords.com/2017/10/...

[Scott Waldie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stormcast and Slann vs Skaven seems a little unbalanced, but the skaven are thoroughly disgusting, treacherous and entertaining here and the setting, a ruined civilization riding on the back of a colossal worm, is impressive, as is Reynold’s descriptive, action-packed prose.

[Liam Dolan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slow start but picked up in the last few chapters