"The Space Wolf Omnibus"

Space Wolf Omnibus: Space Wolf / Ragnar's Claw / Grey Hunter (William King)

Three novels about, umm, space wolves. I'm going to review all three novels in one post; never let it be said you don't get value here!

Space Wolf: This entire novel is a flashback showing how our hero, Ragnar (I kept thinking of the guy from Dragon Quest IV) became a Space Wolf, opening with him as a normal dude and ending as he's completed his initiation and is ready to head out into the galaxy to fight. I was going to complain about the fact that we know that he doesn't die because this is the first novel in the omnibus, but the novel itself spoils this by having him get whacked on the head and flash back, so you know he's gonna be okay. Plus, I guess, the novel is titled Space Wolf, not Guy Who Tried To Become a Space Wolf But Died. No, the real issue I have is that the writing is what could charitably be called workmanlike and perhaps more accurately be called pedestrian; this is a interesting book because of the novel-sized depth given to becoming a Space Marine, not necessarily because it's well-written. I'd probably only recommend this to people on the ends of the 40k fan spectrum: It's a good place to get started or an interesting read if you're really into the setting.

Grade: C+

Ragnar's Claw: Goofily enough, this is another novel-length flashback, this time with a older Ragnar flashing back to his first deployment. The plot's a bare-bones GET THE MCGUFFIN, and honestly it's not as interesting as the fact that this novel is where things start getting weird. King seems to be working off some old, no longer in canon idea of what a Space Marine is, as Ragnar meets a Inquisitor who is "almost as tall as [Ragnar] is" - no small feat considering Space Marines are usually 8 - 10 feet tall without shoes. (This gets even sillier when they meet a guy who is taller than a Space Marine who is "tall even for a Space Marine", which by my estimate would make this guy a normal human who is over ten feet tall.) More than that, these guys don't really act a lot like Space Marines, as I found myself incredulously reading about them farting and then teasing each other for who produced the most impressive gas.
In a way, this is interesting in itself, but it runs against one of the more interesting themes in W40k, which is how the Space Marines' super-humanity sets them apart from the average human (for a more nuanced take on this subject, I recommend, of all things, A Thousand Sons). The heroes of this book are just guys who can smell well and don't get tired, and this combined with the nothing special plot results in a novel that isn't bad, but doesn't really have much to recommend.

Grade: C-

Grey Hunter: Unbelievably, the omnibus goes three for three with flashbacks, as this novel too opens with a page of Ragnar in the present day and then the rest of the book is a huge flashback. I'm not really sure I have much to say about this novel; free of the first novel's unusual focus on the making of a space marine and the second novel's weird obsession with farting, this is just a straight up average old W40k novel. The basic plot is that some Chaos guys stole a MacGuffin that the Space Wolves want back, so they go and shoot and stab a bunch of people. It's perfectly serviceable and there's nothing wrong with it, but a few days after reading it I'm struggling to remember anything interesting about it at all.

Grade: C

In sum, I think this entire omnibus is like the first novel it contains - it can only really be recommended to someone looking to dip an exploratory toe in the W40K setting, or for superfans for whom $10 for 3 full-sized average-quality novels is irresistible. There's nothing really wrong with this collection, but even at such a cheap price for so much, there's some really excellent W40K material out there that this omnibus just can't stack up against.

Grade: C