I have always been a huge fan of the Mongols. When I was six, I would get my mom to take me to the library to rent Genghis Khan, a turn based strategy game for the NES. When I was 7, I would make the same request for Genghis Khan II: Clan of the Grey Wolf for the Sega Genesis. A couple of years later, Sid Meier's Civilization came out for PC, and being the TBS-obsessed 9 year old that I was, I spent thousands of hours building and conquering empires, mostly as the Mongols. This scene repeated itself over the years as Civilization gave way to Civ 2, to Civ 3, and so forth. In fact, a part of me really believes that I have spent more time conquering in the name of the Mongol Empire short of anyone named Genghis, Khublai, or Tamerlane. (I'm fairly certain I have the edge on Ogedei and Chagatai). I have also read through Marco Polo's The Travels and Jack Weatherford's Genghis Khan and the Makings of the Modern World and The Secret History of the Mongol Queens. All this said, while I don't profess to be the leading scholar of the medieval Steppe, I am obsessed with the Mongols and do have a fair bit of knowledge for a layman.
So imagine my disappointment when I read Hunt for Voldorius. I love Black Library stuff, particularly 40k, so I went in thinking 'Space Mongols?! How can this go wrong?' Well, for starters, it can. Essentially this is a 40k bolter-porn fanfic that spends the majority of the story droning on about a completely one-sided battle that the Space Marines never once threaten to lose. Hundreds of pages are devoted to Space Marines carving their way through hordes of terrified, untrained conscripts with bolters, chainswords, tanks, jetbikes, and Thunderhawks. The Alpha Legion spends the majority of the book hiding behind this gigantic meatshield and barely plays a role of any import. The two best characters, Voldorius and Malaya, get startlingly little page time due to the incessant descriptions of an incredibly dull battle.
But worse than all this is the incredibly cliché way in which the White Scars are portrayed. Constant references to 'The Hunt', 'The Khan', and the implied comparison of space marines on jetbikes hunting down Jim Bob from accounts receivable (who just happened to be forcibly conscripted into the army of a malevolent demon prince) to the Mongols on horseback wiping out professional armies of Russia, Ukraine, and Northern China really get old. The only thing they didn't do is sit in their yurts and drink fermented mare's milk while waiting for a kurultai.
Anyway, this may be harsh, but if you're looking for something that rivals the quality of Rynn's World and Helsreach, you won't find it here. This one will mainly appeal to those looking for 411 pages of space marines kicking the living shit out of everything they encounter, in which case The Hunt for Voldorius expertly delivers.