Showing results by narrator "Gareth Armstrong" in All Categories

Across the length and breadth of the galaxy, humankind celebrates its salvation and relishes the prospect of a return to peace. But the war against the orks has driven the political bedrock of the Imperium, exposing its rotten core. One man, one powerful man, decides he has the solution and launches a campaign of destruction so terrible that thousands of years later his actions will still be viewed with horror.

The attempt to hunt down and kill the orks' leader has ended in catastrophe. The Imperium is reeling from the loss of so many beloved heroes, and the military forces of mankind have been reduced to tatters. Koorland now knows that brute force is not the answer - but how else can the orks be fought? In a radical move, he creates small, mixed Chapter units of Adeptus Astartes - compact teams that will hit the enemy hard and fast and with deadly accuracy.

After centuries of peace, the Imperium is thrown into panic as human worlds everywhere are menaced by orks. In a relentless tide of slaughter, ork attack moons destroy planet after planet with gravity weapons of unstoppable power. On Terra, the High Lords are paralysed by the scale of the threat and fail to take any effective action. With entire Space Marine Chapters missing or known to have been wiped out, does anyone have the will and the power to rise to the Imperium's defence?

As the ork menace ravages the galaxy, the Imperium faces its darkest hour. Its fleets are in ruins, its armies devastated - amongst them the noble Imperial Fists - and even a primarch of myth has fallen against the Beast. As brute force fails, Koorland resorts to increasingly desperate tactics against the greenskins. A final hope lies in deploying the controversial Deathwatch and the Sisters of Silence in a deft strike at the heart of the ork empire.

As part of an elite Deathwatch kill team, Brother Balthasar of the Dark Angels joins a special Inquisitorial mission to the eldar craftworld of Kher-Ys. Long ago ravaged by the daemonic forces of Slaanesh, the craftworld may still harbour the unlikeliest of allies for the Space Marines and the key to a greater victory for the Chapter.

Renouncing fealty to all masters or driven mad by the rigours of war, the Blackshields are a stain upon any Legion they once served. Regarded as little better than pirates, their loyalty is only to themselves. Infamous among their mercenary ranks is Endryd Haar, a former World Eater, driven by hatred, his blade pledged to no banner but his own. But estranged from his Legion and surrounded by a battered warband of warriors, how long can Haar and his Blackshields hope to endure?

As the Tyrannic Wars sweep across the face of the Eastern Fringe, Cain and Jurgen find themselves on the jungle moon of a gas giant, fighting off a splinter fleet. The world is uninhabited, but must be protected to prevent the tyranid advance threatening several nearby systems. The situation goes from bad to worse when Cain and the Catachans run into a force of insidious xenos, and the two factions are thrown into a temporary alliance purely to survive.

'A scary portrait of put-upon servants and potty aristos ... this is arguably the most riotously funny volume published this year' Max Hastings, Sunday Times 'One of the funniest, most eccentric books of the year' Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday The highly acclaimed unexpurgated notes taken by James...

Tearing itself apart from within, the Imperium is still virtually powerless to resist the ork advance. When the Adeptus Mechanicus reveal they have discovered the orks' point of origin, the Adeptus Astartes start to gather their forces for a massive assault on their enemy's home world. But what the Imperial forces need is a figurehead, a hero from legend to lead them - a primarch.

Oll Persson stands apart from the rest of mankind. He is one of the old ones, one of the undying. One of the Perpetuals. Now, fleeing from the ruins of Calth with his band of fellow refugees, the vagaries of the warp have brought him through the backways of time and space to a city that rests on the edge of oblivion...and no further. The path has ended abruptly, and Oll's enemies are finally closing in. Will his immortality be enough to save him this time?

The Dark Angels and the Night Lords fought one another to a bloody stalemate during the Thramas Crusade and, though the Lion eventually claimed victory, it left both Legions scattered and under-strength. Jago Sevatarion, First Captain of the Night Lords, languishes in a gaol cell in the heart of Ultramar. Far from a spent force, the Night Lords must consider where their loyalties lie, and what path they will take in the days and months to come.

On the doorstep of Holy Terra, the shadow of treachery still lurks. Upon a comet-shrine dedicated to the glory of Unity, a group of heretic Word Bearers prepare to return to the Solar System after being abandoned by their brethren - only the forces commanded by Sigismund, First Captain of the Imperial Fists, stand between the traitors and their goal. But will the legendary Templar's skill at arms be enough to prevail over this new enemy, or will the doubt in his heart prove ultimately to be his undoing?

At what point in the day could the note have been slipped into his pocket, his left breast pocket? It was an ordinary sheet of glazed squared paper, probably torn out of an exercise book. The words were written in pencil, in a regular handwriting that looked to him like a woman's. For pity's sake, ask to see the patient in room 15. When Inspector Maigret's wife falls ill on their seaside holiday, a visit to the hospital leads him on an unexpected quest to find justice for a young girl.

Nearly a quarter of a million loyal Space Marines lost their lives on Isstvan V. The Dropsite Massacre lasted only a few hours, and yet the Iron Hands, Raven Guard, and Salamanders were slaughtered by those they had once called kin. Corax: Soulforge follows the defiant Raven Guard in the wake of Corax's failed plans to rebuild his Legion after the Dropsite Massacre.

From Rory Clements, winner of the Ellis Peters Historical Fiction Award, comes THE HERETICS, the fifth in his acclaimed John Shakespeare Elizabethan mystery series. 'Does for Elizabeth's reign what C. J. Sansom does for Henry VIII's' Sunday Times.

The Imperium's attempts to defeat the ork menace seem doomed to failure; it is only a matter of time before the greenskins triumph, and mankind is wiped from the galaxy. Yet there is some cause for hope - the psychic weakness of the orks has been found, and a few Sisters of Silence survive. Supported by the full might and technology of the Adeptus Mechanicus, the Space Marines head to the orks' home world one final time. This time there will be no retreat, no surrender. They must succeed...or die in the attempt.

From Rory Clements, winner of the Ellis Peters Historical Fiction Award, comes The Queen's Man, the sixth in his acclaimed bestselling John Shakespeare Elizabethan mystery series. England is a Judas nest of conspiracyIt is 1582, and the conflict between Protestant and Catholic threatens to tear the country in two. While Queen Elizabeth I holds the reins of power, there are those whose loyalty lies with her imprisoned cousin, Mary Queen of Scots.

As Calth burns, the Battle Titans of the Fire Masters legion take to the streets of the city of Ithraca, ready to massacre the fleeing civilian population in the name of their new, dark masters. But the remaining loyalist engines of the Legio Praesagius - the True Messengers - still stand ready to defend the Imperium, even in the face of almost certain death. With the nearby Ultramarines forces scattered and lost, the people of Ithraca must fend for themselves as gigantic war machines unleash apocalyptic weaponry across the ravaged skyline....

On the war-torn world of Armageddon, Gabriel Seth and his Flesh Tearers accompany an Imperial inquisitor and her retinue on a mission of vital importance. But the inquisitor has a hidden agenda that could imperil not only Seth's mission but the very existence of his Chapter...unless he takes drastic action.

A sparkling new translation of this flashback to the start of Inspector Maigret's career, part of the new Penguin Maigret series. The profession he had always yearned for did not actually exist...he imagined a cross between a doctor and a priest - a man capable of understanding another's destiny at first glance. The very first investigation by eager young police secretary Jules Maigret leads him to a wealthy Paris family's dark secrets.