What do you think?
Rate this book
Warhammer Fantasy
Honourkeeper
Dwarfs and elves are pitched into battle in this stirring fantasy tale by Oathbreaker author, Nick Kyme.
416 pages, Paperback
First published March 31, 2009
7 people are currently reading
270 people want to read
About the author
Nick Kyme
280 books162 followersNick Kyme (b. 1977) writes mostly for Black Library. His credits include the popular Salamanders series and several audio dramas.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
July 4, 2025
I read this for my (roughly)chronological read through of the Warhammer fantasy novels, this one following the The Sundering trilogy. It serves as a perfect bridge between that and the War of Vengeance trilogy.
I am generally not a huge Dwarf fan but, like The Sundering before did for the High Elves, this book gave me a new appreciation for their culture and demeanor, if not always a positive one.
At its heart this is a culture clash between the Dwarfs and the Elves in a post-sundering world and a prelude to what will be the War of Vengeance, or the War of the Beard as the Elves call it.
The mainline of the plot revolves around the burgeoning ties between the Elven colony of Tor Eorfith and the Dwarven hold of Karak Ungor. It is a hard sell for both parties and there are many factors destabilizing the proposed alliance.
It is also very grimdark in that very few characters can be really called good, most of them have pretty rotten personalities and major prejudices against scores of different things.
Racism is rampant and it is quite apparent from the start how macho and patriarchal the Dwarven society is with female slurs being thrown about at the regular.
That is not to say that there isn’t a female presence or condonoing of these sentiments. Some Warhammer readers, and in darker fantasy in general, appear to equate the sexism, racism, homophobia and overall backwardness of many of its settings and cultures as an excuse to adopt these sentiments and make the storytelling fit these narrowminded and bigoted viewpoints.
If anything, a story with these elements is so much better when it offers the viewpoints of the marginalized and excluded people that live under these conditions.
In this, the novel does quite a good job. There is less than a handful of female characters, but they are quite important to the story and their experiences are a wonderful contrast to those of the haughty, gruff and stubborn male counterparts.
I was quite impressed with Kyme’s writing, especially outside of the combat segments.
His prose is elegant, weighty and often visually vibrant. The dialogues are often tense and emotional and the descriptions and worldbuilding pulls you into the world.
That is about 40% of the novel, for there, of course, is quite a large amount of time spent on battle. Partially, this is fine, the engagements themselves feel distinct, tense and the outcome is often uncertain.
Strategically and spatially, they leave some things to be desired. The scale of things isn’t often very clear nor are the relative positions always obvious, though there are decent overviews of formations and battle line drawing, even if they don’t always make sense.
The biggest frustration in these is the switch to a more simple, quick writing style in these battles and a lack of weight to the abilities of the main characters. They all appear to have incredible strength as the large majority of blows decapitate, split in two or otherwise amputate appendages. When nearly every blow dealt is able to cuts through their target like smooth butter or wet parchment (as the descriptors often go), it really lessens the sense of any of these foes (from goblin and humans, to giant monsters and souped-up chaos champions) being all that tough. This repetition makes the actual combat encounters less interesting, which is a shame, since the storytelling and character arcs connected to them are well done.
There are some other weird oversights like nonsensical geology: copper staining brown, obsidian being labeled as a metal, etc.
There are some plot and storytelling criticisms I have though. On multiple occasions it was very hard to parse how a person could be viewing a specific scene in the detail it was described in and then relatively easily appear at that location to participate in the scene. Again, spatial issues.
Some plot points were telegraphed well ahead of time, but most were fun to speculate about as the story progressed. The narrator made good use of obfuscating information while at time filling in some background points without having to do a bunch of character exposition.
On that note, Kyme has a tendency to sometimes be too heavy handed in social ques of dialogues. The story is very politically heavy and everyone has feelings, motives and opinions that they are trying to keep from one another, when this fails, the narrator will in these moments deliberately tell the reader that the ‘mask slipped off’ or ‘they showed their true feelings’. As someone on the spectrum I can appreciate this style, though it does feel a bit too overt. The pacing is very well done, with relatively large chapters that round out specific story arcs and provide dramatic cliffhangers. We get multiple POVs per chapter as we drift through the scenes but the paragraphs stick to the same character long enough to get a good feel for their mindset.
Character wise, the cast is pretty small with the majority being Dwarfs, about 5 main Elf and 8 main Dwarf POVs with some smaller roles thrown in. All characters feel distinct and layered, the names were very typical but generally not very memorable. As said, most are complex enough to have some positive sides and a load of negative ones. It doesn’t make them particularly likable, but it makes the tense conversations that much more interesting when you know what issues are being clashed against one another.
King Bagrik is the Dwarven leader of Karak Ungor, he is old, bitter and quick to anger. His story arc is concerned with his legacy and the future of the Dwarven hold.
Queen Brunvilda is a balancing counterpart to the old king. More levelheaded, empathic and generally positive but with the same driving passion and conviction. Her story interweaves with Bagrik’s perceived mortality and the resolution of the issue of their first crippled child. It is dramatic, sad and an open wound to much of the bigoted, misogynistic backwardness of the Dwarven culture.
Morek is in command of the hold’s Hearth Guard, the elite infantry home defense. He is incredibly proud and prejudiced in constant conflict with others to preserve his or their perceived honour. He’s a douche and a half and, outside of the battlefield, hardly ever helping the tense situations.
Kandor(Dwarf) and Malbeth(Elf) are the ambassadors responsible for the negotiations and are in near-constant damage control mode. They have interesting and dramatic story arcs of their own and are among the more likable characters in the cast.
Prince Ithalred is the ruler of the Elven colony and a stereotypical character for the High Elven race (haughty, elitist, racist and refined all tastes and senses). As such he is somewhat less interesting as a personality and more of a baseline for the Dwarven perspective. It is his direct close staff that brings the more impactful and extravagant characters.
Arthelas, as seer and sorceress is Ithalred’s sister. She stays in the background for large part of the novel but has tremendous influence over everyone that interacts with her. It irked me at first that a bunch of men were lusting over her from the start, but when she is shown doing this kind of beguilement on a massive scale, things started to fall into place.
Ithalred is the raven-haired sword master traveling with Ithalred. He is an antagonizer, constantly trying to start fires and conflicts, pompous in the extreme and lusting for both violence and Arthelas.
Ithalred’s Charcian White Lion bodyguard Korvale is brooding, tense, loyal but introvert and sensitive. He gives off creep vibes as, he too, is obsessed with Arthelas. He struggles with his honour much in the way Morek does throughout the story and more and more social and political nastiness boils to the surface.
There are a handful of other POV characters, like the mechanical-armed battle standard bearer Haggar clinging onto the holds banner in a desperate plight to uphold his clan’s tainted honour.
Young Dwarven Prince Nagrim who spends most of his time hunting Goblins and his drunkard disgraced friend Rugnir.
Finally there is there is the Norscan Skaeling warlord and Chaos champion Ulfjarl. His perspectives show a wild and unhinged world as he and his war party burn their way through the Old World millennia before the other Human tribes would form their kingdoms and empires we know.
So yeah, I was decently impressed with this introduction to the author. There were some things that irked me with the largest culprit being the lack of power dynamics in combat and some issues in spatial storytelling and logic. But I greatly enjoyed my time with the book and am glad to have finished it. It is the perfect interlude to the The War Of Vengeance Omnibus trilogy, but I will hold off starting that until I can get the last 2 books in that series for a reasonable price. Instead I’ll deviate from my chronological readthrough and start Lords of the Lance to coincide with my new The Old World Bretonnia army.
As an aside, I have felt like my reviews haven’t been as positive or in-depth as I’d like them for a while, but I am decently satisfied with this review, proving again that a book (or any media) doesn’t need to be exceptionally complex to provoke thoughtful discussion.
I am generally not a huge Dwarf fan but, like The Sundering before did for the High Elves, this book gave me a new appreciation for their culture and demeanor, if not always a positive one.
At its heart this is a culture clash between the Dwarfs and the Elves in a post-sundering world and a prelude to what will be the War of Vengeance, or the War of the Beard as the Elves call it.
The mainline of the plot revolves around the burgeoning ties between the Elven colony of Tor Eorfith and the Dwarven hold of Karak Ungor. It is a hard sell for both parties and there are many factors destabilizing the proposed alliance.
It is also very grimdark in that very few characters can be really called good, most of them have pretty rotten personalities and major prejudices against scores of different things.
Racism is rampant and it is quite apparent from the start how macho and patriarchal the Dwarven society is with female slurs being thrown about at the regular.
That is not to say that there isn’t a female presence or condonoing of these sentiments. Some Warhammer readers, and in darker fantasy in general, appear to equate the sexism, racism, homophobia and overall backwardness of many of its settings and cultures as an excuse to adopt these sentiments and make the storytelling fit these narrowminded and bigoted viewpoints.
If anything, a story with these elements is so much better when it offers the viewpoints of the marginalized and excluded people that live under these conditions.
In this, the novel does quite a good job. There is less than a handful of female characters, but they are quite important to the story and their experiences are a wonderful contrast to those of the haughty, gruff and stubborn male counterparts.
I was quite impressed with Kyme’s writing, especially outside of the combat segments.
His prose is elegant, weighty and often visually vibrant. The dialogues are often tense and emotional and the descriptions and worldbuilding pulls you into the world.
That is about 40% of the novel, for there, of course, is quite a large amount of time spent on battle. Partially, this is fine, the engagements themselves feel distinct, tense and the outcome is often uncertain.
Strategically and spatially, they leave some things to be desired. The scale of things isn’t often very clear nor are the relative positions always obvious, though there are decent overviews of formations and battle line drawing, even if they don’t always make sense.
The biggest frustration in these is the switch to a more simple, quick writing style in these battles and a lack of weight to the abilities of the main characters. They all appear to have incredible strength as the large majority of blows decapitate, split in two or otherwise amputate appendages. When nearly every blow dealt is able to cuts through their target like smooth butter or wet parchment (as the descriptors often go), it really lessens the sense of any of these foes (from goblin and humans, to giant monsters and souped-up chaos champions) being all that tough. This repetition makes the actual combat encounters less interesting, which is a shame, since the storytelling and character arcs connected to them are well done.
There are some other weird oversights like nonsensical geology: copper staining brown, obsidian being labeled as a metal, etc.
There are some plot and storytelling criticisms I have though. On multiple occasions it was very hard to parse how a person could be viewing a specific scene in the detail it was described in and then relatively easily appear at that location to participate in the scene. Again, spatial issues.
Some plot points were telegraphed well ahead of time, but most were fun to speculate about as the story progressed. The narrator made good use of obfuscating information while at time filling in some background points without having to do a bunch of character exposition.
On that note, Kyme has a tendency to sometimes be too heavy handed in social ques of dialogues. The story is very politically heavy and everyone has feelings, motives and opinions that they are trying to keep from one another, when this fails, the narrator will in these moments deliberately tell the reader that the ‘mask slipped off’ or ‘they showed their true feelings’. As someone on the spectrum I can appreciate this style, though it does feel a bit too overt. The pacing is very well done, with relatively large chapters that round out specific story arcs and provide dramatic cliffhangers. We get multiple POVs per chapter as we drift through the scenes but the paragraphs stick to the same character long enough to get a good feel for their mindset.
Character wise, the cast is pretty small with the majority being Dwarfs, about 5 main Elf and 8 main Dwarf POVs with some smaller roles thrown in. All characters feel distinct and layered, the names were very typical but generally not very memorable. As said, most are complex enough to have some positive sides and a load of negative ones. It doesn’t make them particularly likable, but it makes the tense conversations that much more interesting when you know what issues are being clashed against one another.
King Bagrik is the Dwarven leader of Karak Ungor, he is old, bitter and quick to anger. His story arc is concerned with his legacy and the future of the Dwarven hold.
Queen Brunvilda is a balancing counterpart to the old king. More levelheaded, empathic and generally positive but with the same driving passion and conviction. Her story interweaves with Bagrik’s perceived mortality and the resolution of the issue of their first crippled child. It is dramatic, sad and an open wound to much of the bigoted, misogynistic backwardness of the Dwarven culture.
Morek is in command of the hold’s Hearth Guard, the elite infantry home defense. He is incredibly proud and prejudiced in constant conflict with others to preserve his or their perceived honour. He’s a douche and a half and, outside of the battlefield, hardly ever helping the tense situations.
Kandor(Dwarf) and Malbeth(Elf) are the ambassadors responsible for the negotiations and are in near-constant damage control mode. They have interesting and dramatic story arcs of their own and are among the more likable characters in the cast.
Prince Ithalred is the ruler of the Elven colony and a stereotypical character for the High Elven race (haughty, elitist, racist and refined all tastes and senses). As such he is somewhat less interesting as a personality and more of a baseline for the Dwarven perspective. It is his direct close staff that brings the more impactful and extravagant characters.
Arthelas, as seer and sorceress is Ithalred’s sister. She stays in the background for large part of the novel but has tremendous influence over everyone that interacts with her. It irked me at first that a bunch of men were lusting over her from the start, but when she is shown doing this kind of beguilement on a massive scale, things started to fall into place.
Ithalred is the raven-haired sword master traveling with Ithalred. He is an antagonizer, constantly trying to start fires and conflicts, pompous in the extreme and lusting for both violence and Arthelas.
Ithalred’s Charcian White Lion bodyguard Korvale is brooding, tense, loyal but introvert and sensitive. He gives off creep vibes as, he too, is obsessed with Arthelas. He struggles with his honour much in the way Morek does throughout the story and more and more social and political nastiness boils to the surface.
There are a handful of other POV characters, like the mechanical-armed battle standard bearer Haggar clinging onto the holds banner in a desperate plight to uphold his clan’s tainted honour.
Young Dwarven Prince Nagrim who spends most of his time hunting Goblins and his drunkard disgraced friend Rugnir.
Finally there is there is the Norscan Skaeling warlord and Chaos champion Ulfjarl. His perspectives show a wild and unhinged world as he and his war party burn their way through the Old World millennia before the other Human tribes would form their kingdoms and empires we know.
So yeah, I was decently impressed with this introduction to the author. There were some things that irked me with the largest culprit being the lack of power dynamics in combat and some issues in spatial storytelling and logic. But I greatly enjoyed my time with the book and am glad to have finished it. It is the perfect interlude to the The War Of Vengeance Omnibus trilogy, but I will hold off starting that until I can get the last 2 books in that series for a reasonable price. Instead I’ll deviate from my chronological readthrough and start Lords of the Lance to coincide with my new The Old World Bretonnia army.
As an aside, I have felt like my reviews haven’t been as positive or in-depth as I’d like them for a while, but I am decently satisfied with this review, proving again that a book (or any media) doesn’t need to be exceptionally complex to provoke thoughtful discussion.
April 2, 2021
The book was typical, about what you would expect, the battle scenes were good, however a lot of the plot was predictable, you can see the plot twists coming from a mile away, if you haven;t read many books or seen many movies then they will surprise you other wise you will generally have an idea about what to expect.
Seemingly strong chas lord with a super cool weapon? check
A scene showing how bad ass he is? check
A super large army? check
Not explaining how the army arrived there, seeing how the scene with the boats has them lose a lot of ships to the journey. check
Tells us how badass the chaos lord is without showing us because the actions take place off screen, we lear about smashing the elven ships and them raising the outer outposts however we never see such a thing. Check
I will give the writer credit he did write the dwarfs rather well, descriptions of their lives, their way of life, the stuborn attitude, etc. I think it's them being more mellow and less grim, before shit really hit the fan.
Overall it is one of the better warhammer books at least compared to some of the other offerings, I just wish things had been a bit less preditcable, I would have given it 3 stars if not for that element.
I have a rather long rant about the dwarf queen about her actions during the book and especially towards the end.
Seemingly strong chas lord with a super cool weapon? check
A scene showing how bad ass he is? check
A super large army? check
Not explaining how the army arrived there, seeing how the scene with the boats has them lose a lot of ships to the journey. check
Tells us how badass the chaos lord is without showing us because the actions take place off screen, we lear about smashing the elven ships and them raising the outer outposts however we never see such a thing. Check
I will give the writer credit he did write the dwarfs rather well, descriptions of their lives, their way of life, the stuborn attitude, etc. I think it's them being more mellow and less grim, before shit really hit the fan.
Overall it is one of the better warhammer books at least compared to some of the other offerings, I just wish things had been a bit less preditcable, I would have given it 3 stars if not for that element.
I have a rather long rant about the dwarf queen about her actions during the book and especially towards the end.
April 26, 2018
For a Warhammer book is way above average, well written, lengthy, interesting characters, and nice story telling (8/10)
Comparing to non-warhammer books it is still simple, does not require critical thinking or leave a mark on you. (6/10)
Comparing to non-warhammer books it is still simple, does not require critical thinking or leave a mark on you. (6/10)
September 28, 2017
It's a shame Nick Kyme didn't write more of the dawi in the Old World. This book tells the tale of a, massive, Armada of Norscans invading across the Sea of Claws an elven stronghold near the Karaz Ankor called Tor Eofirth.
In desperate need of military aid, Prince Ithalred of the elves beseeches King Bagrik of Karak Ungor for an alliance. Despite some major diplomatic and cultural snafus, dwarf and elf march to war against Chaos together.
And then, we discover it's all been a conspiracy, and nothing is as it appears.
Kyme writes enormous battle scenes, the dawi march out with 100,000 dwarven warriors to aid the elves initially, putting to shame most dark fantasy. And he put considerable thought into the action, rarely is one battlescene the same as the other, and no fight is a foregone conclusion.
Kyme does great with the culture of the Dwarves, as well as the High Elves. There's plenty of twists, unexpected turns, and although the final reveal was rushed, it was a great way to end the story.
Seems to take place well before the 'current' age of the World that was pre End Times, possibly even before the War of the Beard. No mention is made of the Empire, or even men outside the Norscans, so I assume this is an 'ancient history' Warhammer novel.
Regardless, it's the best of the Dwarves tales, and a shame so few Dwarf books were ever penned.
Easily one of Kyme's best works.
In desperate need of military aid, Prince Ithalred of the elves beseeches King Bagrik of Karak Ungor for an alliance. Despite some major diplomatic and cultural snafus, dwarf and elf march to war against Chaos together.
And then, we discover it's all been a conspiracy, and nothing is as it appears.
Kyme writes enormous battle scenes, the dawi march out with 100,000 dwarven warriors to aid the elves initially, putting to shame most dark fantasy. And he put considerable thought into the action, rarely is one battlescene the same as the other, and no fight is a foregone conclusion.
Kyme does great with the culture of the Dwarves, as well as the High Elves. There's plenty of twists, unexpected turns, and although the final reveal was rushed, it was a great way to end the story.
Seems to take place well before the 'current' age of the World that was pre End Times, possibly even before the War of the Beard. No mention is made of the Empire, or even men outside the Norscans, so I assume this is an 'ancient history' Warhammer novel.
Regardless, it's the best of the Dwarves tales, and a shame so few Dwarf books were ever penned.
Easily one of Kyme's best works.
October 10, 2020
After being underwhelmed by Oathbreaker, I was pleasantly surprised to find Honourkeeper straightaway had none of the flaws of the former. The plot was neat, the characters were clearly set out and developed appropriately and enjoyably over time, and the ending was entirely satisfying. If you enjoy Warhammer Fantasy, especially the dwarfs, this would be a must-read book and is easily within my favorite Warhammer books across both Fantasy and 40k.
August 28, 2019
Far better than Oathbreaker, Writing was steady and felt a better connection with the different characters.
November 30, 2011
Nick Kyme is by far my favourite Dwarf story writer. He really gets the mentality of the dour race and manages to fit in bucketloads of Khazalid, which (at least for me) makes it a joy to read.
Unlike other titles of his I've read, I found this one to be a LITTLE disjointed in places; seeming to describe the odd thing as though it had been neglected previously. It almost felt as though he was hurriedly filling in some gaps. This in no way made it any less of a brilliant story and a very fun read, it's just the ONLY reason I didn't press that all-important 5 star button.
Unlike other titles of his I've read, I found this one to be a LITTLE disjointed in places; seeming to describe the odd thing as though it had been neglected previously. It almost felt as though he was hurriedly filling in some gaps. This in no way made it any less of a brilliant story and a very fun read, it's just the ONLY reason I didn't press that all-important 5 star button.
November 5, 2015
Incredible battles, drama, intrigue and no small part in the showcase of dwarven culture, the sorrow of a father losing a son, a wife losing a husband and a Karak's iron endurance in the face of overwhelming adversity. A must read for fans of dwarvish grimazul.
July 25, 2012
Incredible carnage! Twists and twists. Pretty solid characters and storytelling. The dwarfs kick so much ass.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews