Storm of Damocles

Space Marine Battles #18

by Justin D. Hill

With the Tau Empire at war with the Imperium in the Damocles Gulf, a Deathwatch kill-team seize their opportunity to deal with a new threat posed by the tau: the mighty Stormsurge ballistic suit.

As the war in the Damocles Gulf continues to rage between the Imperium and the Tau Empire, the alien-hunting Deathwatch discover the existence of an enemy weapon that could tip the balance of the conflict against them. The deadly Stormsurge is the apex of alien tau technology, capable of destroying even the mighty Titans of the Imperium. Though the Deathwatch have located the threat, they alone cannot vanquish it and one of their number must call upon his erstwhile brothers in the White Scars Chapter for aid, an alliance that will stretch the bonds of brotherhood to their very limit.

It's the Deathwatch doing what they do best – hunting those pesky aliens, in this case the tau. And with added struggles between Chapter and Deathwatch service, this is a must-read tale from the fires of the Damocles Gulf.

Genres: Science Fiction, 40k

276 pages, Hardcover

Published September 10, 2016

About the author

Justin is a long-time Astra Militarum player with a trophy cabinet of painting and gaming awards. He now leads his Imperial Fists into the hell of the Horus Heresy.

Reviews

[Andrey Nalyotov · Rating 5 out of 5]

Justin D Hill is a very prominent author, of whom, to my eternal shame, I have known nothing till the latest BL novel. But now I will fix that case, because I WILL READ HIS EVERY NOVEL TO DATE.
And he has a lot of them outside GW setting (which gives me a long list to follow): The Drink and Dream Teahouse; Passing Under Heaven; Ciao Asmara; Shieldwall; Viking Fire; Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon II: The Green Legend etc.
I started Storm of Damocles because I had nothing new to read for that moment and was fully expecting another 'novella sized' story - how some new author will write about another total tau victory over guel'a.
Synopsis tells us exactly what we should expect: 'As the war in the Damocles Gulf continues to rage between the Imperium and the Tau Empire, the alien-hunting Deathwatch discover the existence of an enemy weapon that could tip the balance of the conflict against them. The deadly Stormsurge is the apex of alien tau technology, capable of destroying even the mighty Titans of the Imperium. Though the Deathwatch have located the threat, they alone cannot vanquish it and one of their number must call upon his erstwhile brothers in the White Scars Chapter for aid, an alliance that will stretch the bonds of brotherhood to their very limit'. That's exactly how it all started.
But later on…… Well — it's delicious.
As a person who is also sometimes a player (and coincidentally immersed in Imperial Guard (now changed to absurd Astra Militarum) - it was unbeatable emotional sensation to see how Space Marines show the Imperium might to a 'plot armoured' upstart tau. More known as 'blue fething fish' amongst Imperial Guard/Space Marine players who suffered at the their hands for too long.... As an author said himself - 'it was time to take revenge!' And that he did — BRILLIANTLY.
This novel not only shows the greatness of Space Marines but also shows exact specifications and strategy of Deathwatch in all it's glory. And why this organization should be feared by all the xenos and unclean.
There are no dark places in the Galaxy where aliens can hide from the vengeful fist of Imperium first and last anti-xenos force.
Writing style. I still can't exactly figure out what Hill's writing style reminds me — but it is easy to comprehend and understand. It's unique in itself and could be easily interpreted into visuals, while you reading it. So, from the point of reader view — his writing style is truly great.
Plot . It is fundamentally structured and easy to follow. Which is an unexpected and pleasant surprise in itself after a long list of badly structured and hard to follow previous SMB novels. Being and example of Space Marine Battles series it's plot are based exactly on major SM battle in Damocles Gulf, one of the turning points of this conflict that at last could be fully interpreted as a victory for the side which for too long were a beating experiment for the young blue fishes empire weaponry and arsenal. Which in itself is outstanding.
Characters. Author was able to create a truly interesting set of characters to follow. We have an amazing antagonists, awesome Protagonists and great supportive cast. All the characters are depicted as living and breathing entities. Reading about them fully show the reader their feelings, ideas and struggles. Captain Nergui fully epitomise what's it to be a WS and sacred bonds of brotherhood; Watch-Commander Jotuhn epitomise the loneliness of command and decision making; Leonas truly show what is to be the 'last' as a Space Marine; Moaz Khileni what is to be a loner and a true Raven Guard. Same could be said about the tau POVs. Fireblade M’au epitomise the 'rushness' and 'hotheadeness' of Fire Caste; Fio’ui K’or are an equivalent of ingenuinity of Earth caste technicians; Shas’vre Ch’an and Shas’el Sham’bal how the veterans, pilots and lost in age and sadness live in 'united tau Empire'.

This novel covers it all. All the aspects of life of both the Deathwatch and Tau Empire.
Conclusion. Add to that great action scenes; black humor; specialized warfare and big mecha suits and you will have an ubersomely lovely read. And Kill tallies of some SMs plus a mound of battlesuits heads just made my day even better.
It has it's small minor issues. But due to the fact of the great and easy to follow story, plus spectacular ending and fully destroyed 'plot armoured' Imperial Guard's boogeymen image this novel got full fledged 5 stars from me.
And thanks to that novel — I now have a lot of Justin D Hill books to read :)

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This starts with a mystery and quickly moves to an intense action story. It makes you almost feel for the Tau, but then you remember to suffer not the xenos to live. Good story, check it out.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very fun solid Space Marine story. Justin D. Hill is always a good pick for a Warhammer story as he executes things juuust right.

[Corey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not quite as good as the books preceeding it still fun.

[Jack Neighbour · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really good deathwatch book. Thoroughly enjoyed the interplay between marines of different chapters. Great action and good plot.

[Michael Dodd · Rating 4 out of 5]

After a handful of excellent short stories, Justin D. Hill gets his first Black Library novel with Storm of Damocles, in the Space Marine Battles series. Tying in nicely with recent Deathwatch releases as well as the ongoing story of the Damocles Crusade, this follows Nergui of the White Scars, now Captain of the Deathwatch, as he investigates the loss of two full squads of his brothers. What he learns suggests that the war in the Damocles Gulf might be about to take a turn for the worse, unless he can find a way to neutralise the latest weapon in the tau’s arsenal.

Read the rest of the review at https://trackofwords.wordpress.com/20...

[Mat McPeak · Rating 2 out of 5]

Storm of Damocles had a rather interesting premise, the 1st sections of the book was pretty well done, the characters had some nice flavor to them & the interpersonal interactions were interesting. However, much of the writing just didn't feel polished, and the story just didn't live up to it's potential. It's unfortunate, the plot had a good foundation but the text itself feels unfocused and like with a bit more work they could have really cleaned it up.

The action in particular felt really poorly written, and almost unedited, given the amount of inconsistency. Hit's from weapons that are described as shredding through armor as it offered no protection against them are 'shrugged off' by character wearing the exact same armor. While, on both sides of the conflict, foes which are built up and made out to be a big deal are continuously being unceremoniously killed off multiple at a time in a single sentence. Descriptions of the big final battle jumps around in order of events in ways that made one paragraph to the next sometimes feel really disjointed and disconnected. Skipping forward at seemingly random times and occasionally rewinding to re-narrate events from the other side of the conflict, which was often fine, but sometimes was done in ways that felt like it was directly contradicting the action just described rather than showing it from a different perspective.

While I can hardly blame the author that the way Deathwatch gear & weapons are highlighted and focused on in this book makes it feel like it was written as advertisement for the Codex: Deathwatch for the table top game, (after all, in many ways, that's what fan's are going to want to see, stuff from the game used in associated fiction). Unfortunately the heavy use of key-worded phrases (i.e weapons types/names) at every opportunity makes it jarringly obvious when you have continuity errors that involve them. For example, when Leonas' Combi-Bolter and Lighting Claws transform into a Storm-Bolter when he reloads it on the next page (without a break in the action, or indication he switched weapons that might explain it.) And he is specifically described as reloading the then Combi-now-Storm-Bolter with Special Ammunition that a Storm-Bolter can't use in the table top game. The wrong ammo wouldn't be bad on it's own, this is "fluff" that's "Crunch" the two don't always have to coincide... except that since the original weapon Leonas is described as having could have used that ammo, while the new weapon it became could not. Thus, it draws attention to the slip, making the error more obvious to the target audience the book is written towards (considering how many items, equipment and even characters allegiances/backgrounds are described only by their name/title and the reader is assumed to know what they are just from the name, it's safe to assume this was written for pre-existing fans.)

That said, I'm being so hard on this book in the review mostly because I really did enjoy premise of the book: The Deathwatch is probably one of the most fascinating factions of Space Marines in the setting, and as far as putting Space Marines in an interesting situation to read about, the essential ideas this book is built upon had me quite excited to read it, so I'm really disappointed to find there was so much to detract from it. I really wanted this book to be GOOD, because I'd really love to see more Deathwatch interaction with other chapters/factions, intrigue and Xenos perspective that truly feel like an alien mindset/culture, and parts of Storm of Damocles were an enjoyable read, but overall it felt kinda lacking.

I'd like to say I want to see more books like this, but I just can't bring myself to do so when parts of it feel kind of like a rough draft rather than a finished, polished work and I find myself thinking "I really would have liked the book this could have been, but this book just isn't it."

[Eleena Yasmin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love any excuse to read about the Deathwatch and I’ve quite liked Nergui Khan in the stories we’ve seen him in before, so this was a great quick read in the middle of a busy week. The action was fast paced and made the blood sing, and isn’t that mainly what you want from a space marine book? Storm of Damocles delivered in spades on that end.

There is this pervasive sort of… sadness and somberness that took hold of the story as it went on, and it ended on that note as well. It wasn’t a triumphant ending, but rather a bleak one. And I absolutely loved that. Because yes, they have won. But at what cost? Many of the Deathwatch brothers are dead. Many of the White Scars. Nergui might have damaged any fraternity left between he and his home chapter, between he and Batbayar, beyond repair. So now what awaits him when he returns home, if he even lives to return? And out there, there are more fights to be had in the Damocles Gulf, more losses and sacrifice awaiting. The drop in mood at the end was perfectly placed, and I liked the book all the more for how low it ended, mirroring the morale of our Deathwatch teams.

All in all, a highly enjoyable read, and one I’m most certainly going to come back to.

[Phillip Wyrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

A really good 40k book that is unfortunately scarred by a few bad decisions. The dialogue...its bad. The Space Marines talking to each other sounds like two robots conversing with each other. In the latter part of the book, there are several chapters from the Tau point of view. These chapters are completely filler and add nothing to the overall plot.

Otherwise the action and overall story is pretty enjoyable. Worth a read, just temper expectation.

[Ulzeta · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read.