Showing results by narrator "Richard Reed" in All Categories

At the stroke of midnight on the dawn of December, five-year-old Finn Albedo is found frozen in the city park on a pedestal of ice. The doctor says his heart is beating, but no one can wake him. Finn’s big sister, Bianca, suspects the beautiful sparkling book Finn got from the library has something to do with it all but the mysterious book has vanished and no one will listen. As more children are frozen, Bianca realises she’s running out of time.

On Periremunda, the populace are rioting. With local forces unable to contain the widespread civil disorder, Commissar Cain and his regiment of Valhallans are called in to help. However, it seems there is more to the rebellion than first appeared, and Cain suspects sinister forces at work behind the scenes. When the commissar is reunited with Inquisitor Amberley Vail, it seems his fears are realised. In this the fifth book in the popular Ciaphas Cain series, our hero is thrown into a deadly conspiracy that even he might not be able to emerge from alive.

Commissar Ciaphas Cain and the Valhallan 597th are in the thick of it again, putting down an uprising of Chaos cultists on an Imperial mining world. Though their mission is a success, they find evidence that the corruption might have spread to other planets and that the forge world of Ironfound could now be at risk. The munitions Ironfound produces are vital to the Imperial war effort in the subsector; its safety must be assured at all costs. As battle explodes across the planet, Ciaphas Cain and his regiment come up against allies and enemies old and new in their fight for victory.

After a long and distinguished career defending the Imperium from its many enemies, Commissar Cain is enjoying a well-deserved retirement on Perlia, teaching in a schola progenium. But when a Black Crusade threatens the sector, all able-bodied citizens must rise to the defence, including Cain and his cadets. As the forces of Chaos overwhelm Perlia, can the wily commissar prove himself to be a real hero of the Imperium one last time?

Before the being called the Emperor revealed himself, before the rise of the aeldari, before the necrontyr traded their flesh for immortal metal, the world was born in violence. Even when they inhabited bodies of flesh, Trazyn the Infinite and Orikan the Diviner were polar opposites. Trazyn, a collector of historical oddities, presides over a gallery full of the most dangerous artefacts - and people - of the galactic past. Orikan, a chronomancer without peer, draws zodiacs that predict and manipulate the future.

Exile to the miserable world of Sedh, the disgraced Necron Lord Oltyx is consumed with bitterness. Once heir to the throne of a dynasty, he now commands nothing but a dwindling garrison of warriors, in a never-ending struggle against Ork invaders. Oltyx can think of nothing but the prospect of vengeance against his betrayers, and the reclamation of his birthright. But the Orks are merely the harbingers of a truly unstoppable force. Unless Oltyx acts to save his dynasty, revenge will win him only ashes.

Once again, reluctant hero Commissar Cain is catapulted into glory in the fourth instalment of this tremendously popular series. Escaping from a disastrous space battle, the commissar and his malodorous sidekick Jurgen crash-land behind enemy lines. Even the sly Cain can't avoid a straight fight this time, as the only way out is to round up what few troops they can find and fight their way back to safety. Unfortunately, hundreds of thousands of barbaric alien orks stand in their way.

An age ago, the Seraphon temple-ship Wings of Serendipitous Fire was blasted from the skies of Shyish. Now, Irixi Starseer, servant of the mage-priest Sek'atta, is sent to the ancient ruin of the temple-ship to recover a prophecy inscribed on its walls, a prophecy as shattered as the rest of the fallen vessel. The Stormcast Vael Scar-Helm seeks the same ruin, chasing a memory that has haunted him through many Reforgings. Simultaneously, the mage Perlo leads a group of Steelhelms to the site, pursuing rumours of a treasure beyond imagining.

Follow the exploits of Oltyx, who, having finally been granted the throne of the Ithakas Dynasty, now faces far greater threats, from within and without. He soon learns that the lessons of kingship are not quite what he had hoped.

For generations, the people of the Howling Vale have fought against this madness, largely in vain. Now, Kosomir Vornarov, the city’s Master Patriarch, risks everything – his reputation, friends, even his people’s survival – to destroy the flesh-eater menace entirely and forge a brighter future in his name. Two ambitious lords, two haunted souls. Whose madness will prove the stronger?

The primarch Roboute Guilliman of the Ultramarines has returned in the galaxy’s hour of need, and all muster to his Indomitus Crusade to hold back the darkness. Amongst these heroes is Cato Sicarius, Master of the Watch and vaunted captain of Second Company. Disaster befalls Sicarius and his brave warriors as their ship, the Emperor’s Will, is lost to the hellish warp, its entire crew believed slain. But Sicarius endures, though he and his men are fighting for their very survival against the denizens of the Great Rift - the daemons and renegades of Chaos.

Deep in Imperium Nihilus, Blood Angels Chief Librarian Mephiston and his comrades are drawn into battle with a cabal of Thousand Sons sorcerers – with worlds at stake and hidden truths threatening to overwhelm him, this is Mephiston's darkest hour. Experience a battle of psychic might in the Dark Imperium and witness Mephiston taking on his greatest challenges ever, physically, mentally and emotionally.

Beyond the mountain range of the Adamantine Chain, Aqshy lies destroyed. Noxious fires light up the horizon, death skitters in the smoke, and a wasteland of horror threatens the entire realm. Humanity has but a single hope: the Reclusians of the Ruination Chamber. These Stormcast Eternals, though few in number, are the only force capable of enduring the perils of this dark era, for their souls are already broken.

Lieutenant Heyd Calder is a Primaris Marine whose mastery of warfare is matched only by his diplomatic prowess. Under the orders of Roboute Guilliman, he is deployed to Almace, a minor seat of the Ecclesiarchy, to protect the world at whatever cost. Yet even as diabolical forces leer from the system's edge, Calder discovers that the capital's Cardinal-Governor, a sharp, inscrutable figure of spiritual and material authority, is hiding something. When it becomes clear that conquest is not the enemy’s sole aim, Calder resolves to uncover the secret of Almace.

As the Great Rift tears the galaxy apart, portents and darkness beset Mephiston. At the time when he needs his psychic sight the most, the chief librarian's powers are rendered blind. Haunted by the ghosts of the damned, their purpose unclear, Mephiston takes his ship the Blood Oath and the Blood Angels in his charge to the world of Morsus, where he believes the source of his psychic blindness is to be found. But Morsus is embroiled in conflict too, a longstanding struggle between the Imperium and some of its most ancient foes called the Revenant Crusade.

The successor Chapters of the Space Marines number in the hundreds, founded to fight for the survival of the Imperium. Across 13 short stories by 10 different authors, discover the history, customs and stories of 12 different successor Chapters, from famed warriors to unsung heroes.

A single, harrowing trial stands between supplicant Ferendir and a life of loyal service to his Alarith temple. But on the day of the young aelf’s final initiation, a Slaaneshi warhost descends upon his mountain home, leaving slaughter and destruction in their wake and stealing a long-hidden Lumineth treasure of terrible power. His world now torn asunder, Ferendir and his stalwart masters, Serath and Desriel, are forced to navigate a realm at war to stop the depraved warriors of the Dark Prince.

Sent to avenge the deaths of his brothers and purge a dangerous cult, Imperial Fists Primaris Librarian Aster Lydorran finds a foe beyond imagining on Ghyre. Lydorran must use all his strength, will and psychic might to defeat his hidden enemies and avert catastrophe.

On 7th November 1843, Harriet Monckton, 23 years old and a woman of respectable parentage and religious habits, is found murdered in the privy behind the chapel she regularly attended in Bromley, Kent. The community is appalled by her death, apparently as a result of swallowing a fatal dose of prussic acid, and even more so when the surgeon reports that Harriet was around six months pregnant. Drawing on the coroner’s reports and witness testimonies, Elizabeth Haynes builds a compelling picture of Harriet’s final hours through the eyes of those closest to her and the last people to see her alive.

Varangantua is in turmoil. After the district of Korsk is obliterated in a fiery cataclysm, the city’s enforcers must pick up the pieces. As sanctioner teams comb the wreckage for survivors, dogged probators such as Agusto Zidarov and Lycia Calix seek to uncover the truth about what happened. Their stories become intertwined with those of petty criminals and desperate citizens, even drawing the vaunted attention of agents beyond Alecto itself, painting a picture of sprawling conspiracy.