Hammerhal + Other Stories

Warhammer Age of Sigmar

By: David Annandale, David Guymer, Robbie MacNiven, Josh Reynolds, C L Werner, Matt Westbrook

Narrated by: John Banks, Jonathan Keeble

Within this book you will find Hammerhal, a fantastic new novella from Josh Reynolds:

Dark forces stir within the bowers of the mysterious Hexwood. A great warhost of Tzaangor beastkin, creatures devoted to Tzeentch, the Architect of Fate, defile the once verdant lands of Ghyran. All that opposes them are the noble Stormcast Eternals of the Hallowed Knights. Reforged in resplendent sigmarite and wielding the lightning of Azyr, few can stand against these heroes. But Tzeentch's followers are cunning, and as the Hallowed Knights wage bloody war, a second attack on the city of Hammerhal, which the Stormcasts are oathsword to defend, is coming to pass. Both the warriors without and the hunters within the city must act fast, or the truth about the Hexwood will undo everything they have fought so hard to protect.

Also within this book is a host of awesome short stories giving you a flavour of the many warring armies that exist within the worlds of Warhammer Age of Sigmar.

Contents

'The Keys to Ruin' by David Annandale

'Beneath the Black Thumb' and 'Great Red' by David Guymer

'Heartwood' by Robbie MacNiven

'Assault on the Mandrake Bastion', 'Hammerhal' and 'The Prisoner of the Black Sun' by Josh Reynolds

'Vengeance Eternal' by Matt Westbrook

Plus excerpts from:

'Eight Lamentations: Spear of Shadows' and 'Skaven Pestilens' by Josh Reynolds

'Overlords of the Iron Dragon' by C L Werner

©2017 Games Workshop Limited (P)2017 Games Workshop Limited

good bang for your buck.

not as awesome as the other mortal realms books. but most the stories are good. the stories are diverse, well written, and great narration.

A great compilation

Amazing book to get anyone into the Warhammer Age of Sigmar Books. It has plenty of good short stories and excerpts that make you want more. You can't beat the price for this compilation.

Amazing reader reading and amazing book

I totaly love hearing the gw wh aos book on my cell Phone while working walking or traveling

Not a starter, but Hammerhal is great.

General review:
First off this is not great for beginners and it assumes you know what the mortal realms are and at least have a cursory understanding of the factions.

I'm not fond of excerpts in anthologies as it's going to feel incomplete and like I'm losing something so it's a shame there's 3 in here. Most of the voicing is good but the Skaven voices can be grating. It's irritating that everything is labeled as Chapter (Whatever) on audible instead of how the stories are labeled if I was reading it. The food stories are good enough to give this a positive because the 2 stories that are real letdowns are 1 excerpt and 1 stormcast story.

individual story reviews:
"Hammerhal" is great, gives some DND adventures vibes although the changing perspective could be hard to track if you're not expecting it. It's a lot more deserving of being the title story than some other anthology headers.

"Vengeance Eternal" is just the right size for a stormcast story to not wear itself out, but through being interesting enough drags down the other full stormcast story "Assault on Mandrake Bastion" as it's not too interesting beyond the namesake.

"Beneath the Black Thumb" is segmented weird and that bothered me. But the actual story is a look at chaos inifting that feel very fable-esque definitely a plus.

"The Prisoner of The Black Sun" has a great sense of tension and the *twist* is shocking if you know your history. "Assault on Mandrake Bastion" and "Great Red" are a sort of follow up on this story but are focused more on the stormcast and after 2 good/good enough stormcast portrayals these fall flat.

The excerpt "Skaven Pestilens" was not my thing, the voices were distracting and I don't find the ratmen super compelling and the story is of course not resolved.

"Heartwood" in this collection after reading "Hammerhal" lets you look into the Sylvaneth and gives you mysticism, a high point.

The excerpt "Overlords of the Iron Dragon" feels more complete as an opener but leaves enough hanging where you might want to listen to the story in full but since the focus is just part of one battle and it's very short there's not a lot here.

"The keys to Ruin" is what the other battle stories should have been like, much more focus on the point of it all then trying to describe fights. A plus.

The excerpt "Eight Lamentations: Spear of Shadows" is how an excerpt should be done, it sets up the background and has a very interesting premise that makes you want to read more and pickup the book, very intriguing and I might have to track it down.

The old world is dead....

I have read almost every single book written as part of the Black Library since the late 80’s. Most of them are excellent with but few exceptions. I’m not sure if Games Workshop has decided that since 40K is so popular they need to prop up their fantasy line with space marines, but this book was a ham fisted attempt to hide a 40K story behind a sad and repetitive space marine meets steampunk storyline. Bring back Gotrek or Brenner, or even the Wine of Dreams... it was all better than this rubbish. GW, you have once again given your souls in a pathetic run on the cash till. You should be ashamed considering the rich background your predecessors left you to squander. I cannot return this, not can I get back the 15 hours of my life I spent listening to it. I am sad that the voice actor, who was quite good tarnished his reputation with this collection of second string space marine stories that only lacked bolters.

If you want a great story of sword and sorcery, look elsewhere.

Shallow

Plenty of action but spent zero time making me care about the world or the people in it. Very disappointing.

the dull adventures of the sigmar-ines

and other adventures of chaos corruption
I did get trough it but I HATED a lot of it

Stormcasts in Combat

"Only the faithful!"

At some point, this sounded like the only lines. The short stories seemed heavy in combat which adds little to the plot. I suggest getting WH40K Crusades instead.