Just to be
clear: The Warmaster the
Warhammer 40,000 novel by Dan Abnett not The War Master the
Doctor Who audios starring Derek Jacobi. Bloody enjoyable confluence
of nerdy events to have both of those come out within a week of each
other but a bit difficult for casual discussion.
There
is a moment of pure fan service very early in the novel where
Commissar-Colonel Gaunt ends up reciting the names of troops under
his command who have died who meant something to him. Not to spoil
the circumstances but Abnett uses the moment to remind us that,
against all regulation, Gaunt cares about his regiment.
He
mentions all the names you'd expect him to like Dorden, Chief Soric,
Caffran, “Try Again” Bragg, MkVenner (yeah, right, as if I
believe he's dead for a second) but also characters he barely
interacted with like Merrt and names I don't even remember. Its
obviously written to be fanservice but Abnett is smart enough not to
use it only for fanservice. It tells us something new about Gaunt:
that the affection he clearly has for his inner circle isn't the
extent of his affection for the regiment, he feels all the deaths
even of people we don't know that well. Its easy enough to guess that
he'd miss Corbec or Bragg, people we the reader knew and liked, or
even someone we didn't particularly like but knew well like Feygor
but that he cares about someone I either don't remember like Rilke
who the internet informs me was a sniper but I don't recall him at
all.
Its
a good reminder that we don't know everything about Gaunt's interior
life, that he has more feeling than we've been privy to even fourteen
books into the series.
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