Ian Watson, The Inquisition War. Nottingham, UK: Black Library, 2009. ISBN: 9781844169245.
Genre: science fiction
Subgenre: Warhammer, 40,000
Format: Omnibus paperback edition, print
Source: I own this one.
"In the land of a thousand million people, what does the death of one million of these count in the cause of purity?" --from Draco.
The volume opens with the short story "The Alien Beast Within" that basically gives us some back story to Meh'Lindi, an assassin of the Callidus shrine that ends up working for Inquisitor Draco. We learn of how her order betrays her and basically ruins her powers, or limits them severely. This betrayal eventually leads her to her work with Draco, and it works well as a way to start the volume.
The first novel, Draco, introduces the main character and his crew. Draco and his companions soon find themselves trying to unravel a plot that goes all the way to the depths of the Inquisition itself. Are these other inquisitors on the true path, or are they plotting to set up a new tyrannical regime? Soon we learn that not everything is as it seems. Still the novel can get a bit convoluted at times, and the author does enjoy descriptive passages a bit too much in favor of moving the plot along.
The novel opens, as many Warhammer 40,000 stories often open, with a frame prologue, where someone is examining the files of Jaq Draco from a farther future. Did Draco even exist and was he even an inquisitor? These are questions the researcher writing the opening reports asks as he or she responds to the inquiry of the Lord High Inquisitor. The novel itself is mainly told from Draco's point of view, which sets up an unreliable, or at least questionable, narrator situation. Or was Draco telling the truth all along and the bureaucracy buried that truth? Falls to readers to decide. The story then starts in Stalinvast where Draco is checking on the workings of another inquisitor, Harq Obispal, one of those who turn out to be more than the incompetent fool they show, who is there to help put out a genestealers infiltration. The novel ends with the researcher providing a summary report to his superiors about Draco's text and his companions, still speculating whether what happened was true or not.
On a small side note, a small detail of interest for me is that Draco uses a Tarot deck for his psychic work. No, it is not the same type of Tarot we would use, but still interesting touch.
The second story, "Warped Stars", is about Grimm before he came to work for Draco. In this story an inquisitor is trying to find a very psychically gifted child before the forces of Chaos find him first. The story itself is pretty good with a bit of action and suspense, and it gives another view of how the Imperium, despite officially prohibiting psykers, actually exploits them.
I am not going to dwell much more on the other two novels because to be honest things do not get better as you read along. There are events, such as Draco making it the legendary Black Library, that barely get considered; you'd think the author would expand on that, but not really. Then again, when Draco breaks into the Emperor's room it's same thing, it just gets glossed over.
The main issue with the book overall and the novels is that they just have way too much filler and not enough actual story and action. Ian Watson is a known and respected science fiction author, but to be honest this is not his best work. There is too much verbiage, too much description in extreme detail of things that are not really that big a deal, and overall the stories just drag. This volume collects some of the earliest if not the earliest novels in the Warhammer 40,000 series, and they are definitely not the best work from the publisher. Note: The omnibus edition is 2009, but the first novel, Draco (previously published as Inquisitor) date to 1990. The rest of the works are from the 1990s as well.
The stories do explore some interesting ideas, and they provide a look at the depths of the Inquisition, but the execution and telling of the stories leave a lot to be desired. It is a pity really. As I said, there are interesting ideas here, but they were just not handled well. They are just outright boring, and I probably should have dropped this book a lot sooner as there are plenty of other stories I could have been reading.
This book is mainly for the seriously hardcore fans of Warhammer 40,000, though I think even a few of them might agree with my assessment. For casual readers of this series, this is a book to skip. This is one I am not recommending for readers nor for libraries. If you want a good story about inquisitors, I'd suggest you pick up the Eisenhorn series; there is an omnibus that collects the first three novels of that series.
1 out of 5 stars.
Book qualifies for these 2021 Reading Challenges:
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