Warhammer Wednesday: Funko Pop! Space Marines

The news broke on the Warhammer Community website Monday that Games Workshop and Funko have joined forces to bring the world the first Warhammer 40,000 Funko Pop! figures. And which characters have they chosen for the first tranche of releases? Why, the four iconic Chapters Space Marines...

Ultramarines

Space Wolves

Dark Angels

Blood Angels

I probably found the news more exciting than a man of my age should, but the thing is, I am a big fan of Funko Pops. I am such a fan that I had to make a rule for myself long ago, so that I wouldn't fill my flat with the things: I will only buy a figure if I have written for the character.

It is for this reason that I own Funko Pops of Judge Dredd, the Twelfth Doctor, Alice, the Cheshire Cat, Krampus, Cthulhu, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Leonardo, and Frankentstein's Creature*. (I could also have figures of the Tenth Doctor and Eleventh Doctor, the other Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and even their van, Jabba the Hutt and the Rancor Beast, but have managed to resist so far.)

When the Space Marine Funko Pops are released, according to my rule, three will be eligible for purchase because my first Warhammer 40,000 short story Salvation featured an Ultramarine, and I wrote the colour text for the old Angels of Death Codex, which included both the Dark Angels and Blood Angels Chapters. So now I just need to write a story about a Space Wolf...

* I would also love to have a Funko Pop! of a Flying Monkey, but they go for over £200 on eBay.

Tie-in Tuesday: Inferno! is back!

In the June of 1997, issue #210 of White Dwarf magazine was published and contained within was a strange pull-out called Inferno! "Issue Zero". It was a teaser for a forthcoming bi-monthly short story magazine, being put out by a new branch of Games Workshop, the Black Library. One of the stories contained within the taster copy of Inferno! was The Hounds of Winter, by Your Truly.

Skip forward 21 years and Inferno! is coming back this week, in the form of a short story anthology, and to celebrate Black Library are making the early issues of the original Inferno! available again through their Print on Demand service. Which means that you can get your hands on hard-to-get-hold-of short stories of mine, including the ever-popular Salvation - a story of Ultramarines, Tyranids and humanity that appeared in Inferno! #1 - and the first ever Nathan Creed Necromunda story Bad Spirits, which appeared in issue #3, not to mention the Kislevite mercenaries versus vampires slug-fest that is Dark Heart, in issue #5.

To find out more, simply follow this link. But don't hang around - this offer is only available for one month!

And in case you're wondering, I wrote a total of 13 short stories for the original incarnation of Inferno! - five Torben Badenov stories, five Nathan Creed stories, two Space Marines stories, and one Warhammer fire wizard story - along with various comic strips and other pieces.

Warhammer Wednesday: JG talks Salvation (again)

Last week I posted a link to a review of my first proper short story for Black Library, Salvation, which was written 20 years after I wrote the story!

I was actually interviewed by Track of Words about my recollections regarding the writing of the story (which were a bit fuzzy, considering it was two decades ago!) and the resultant brain-fart was posted online here.

Enjoy.

Warhammer Wednesday: Salvation Revisited

The Track of Words blog kicked off a new series of articles today, articles that will look back at classic Black Library short stories from way back when.

As well as featuring a review of the story in question, each piece will examine how each story fits into Warhammer and 40K as they are now, as well as how it stands up to scrutiny today.

And the first story to receive the retrospective treatment is my very own tale of Ultramarines vs Tyranids Salvation - written 20 years ago last October!

You can find out how Salvation has stood up to the test of time here.

Warhammer Wednesday: Genestealer Cults

I was in the central London Warhammer store at the weekend and I have to say, I love the look of the new Genestealer Cults codex. I love the look of the miniatures, and the variation between them. I many way, they remind me of the good old days of Necromunda, and the huge range of figures that came with that game, birthed from its fertile background. Which is appropriate, seeing as how my first novel for Black Library was originally going to be a Nathan Creed novel, the climax of which had the bounty hunter uncovering a Genestealer cult.

I've always had a soft spot for Genestealers. The first short story I wrote for Inferno! magazine (and my first published 40K short story), Salvation, featured Genestealers (and a Carnifex).

Six years later I wrote another Space Marines vs Genestealers story, Sanctuary, which was reprinted in The Amargeddon Omnibus in 2011. It would be nice if Black Library republished that one as part of a collection of Genestealer stories. (In the illustration, Chaplain Wolfram of the Black Templars Solemnus Crusade takes on the Genestealers, as drawn by Dave Allsop.)

And if the opportunity ever arose, I would love to write a gamebook featuring a Genestealer cult.

Meanwhile, the new/old White Dwarf continues to go from strength to strength, and this month comes with a free comic written by George Mann.

Warhammer Wednesday: The New/Old White Dwarf

They say, what's old is new and what's new is old. Well they couldn't have said a truer word about the new White Dwarf Magazine.

I subscribed to White Dwarf for many years, even when I was no longer writing for the Black Library, but when the old monthly split to become Warhammer Visions and the weekly I called it a day. I am not a hobbyist and so Visions did not appeal. I didn't dislike the weekly White Dwarf, it was just that as it was only available in stores, it was too tricky to get hold of on a regular basis.

But now the old monthly mag is back - as the new monthly mag. And as far as I can see, it's a return to form. One of the things I used to like the most about the old incarnation of White Dwarf were the articles about the lore of the Warhammer World and the ones that added depth to the Warhammer 40,000 universe of the 41st millennium. The good news is that elements of those background articles have returned, notably in 'Illuminations' (this month focusing on the Deathwatch) and 'The Ultimate Guide To...' (the Kightly Houses, in this particular issue).

The old familiar favourites are all there, including battle reports and painting guides, but there is also a new section called 'Temporal Distort' which looks back to an old issues of the mag. On this occasion the issue is question is WD202, published in October 1996.

This is the issue that featured the two new armies in the 5th edition of Warhammer - the Lizardmen and the Bretonnians - but it also a memorable one for me for another reason.

In August 1996 I had moved from Nottingham (where I had been doing freelance work for Games Workshop, amongst other things) to live and work in West London. October 1996 found me writing my first short story for Inferno! magazine - fan-favourite 'Salvation'. That first story led to more and more, and then to novels, and, in a big way, to where I am now writing-wise.

So, to sum up, as it says on the cover, the new White Dwarf is bigger and better, and I may just have to renew my subscription.

Warhammer Wednesday: Black Templars Quick Reads Collection

Black Library have released another of their eBook Quick Reads collections, this time for the crusading Black Templars chapter.

Two of my Warhammer 40K stories really seemed to have captured readers' imaginations over the years. One is my first published Space Marine story Salvation, and the other is The Relic, which is included in this collection.

So why not download the Black Templars: Quick Reads Collection today?

Celebrating 15 years of Black Library

Black Library celebrates its 15th birthday this week* and for the next 15 days is releasing 15 brand new eShorts.

But did you know, the very first published BL short story was my very own The Hounds of Winter? And did you know the very first Warhammer 40K short story published by BL was my very own Salvation? Well, you do now.

Black Library and I go right back to the beginning so it was nice to receive a package from BL this morning. Here it is...

And here's what it contained...

That's right - it's various novels, short stories and even a comic strip of mine that are back in print thanks to BL's Direct Exclusives line. And it just so happens that my next BL book is going to be released as one of those Direct Exclusives, but more on that soon... hopefully.

But for now, short stories for the price of a bar of chocolate**? What are you waiting for?


* What a year 2012 is for anniversaries! 200 years of Dickens, 35 years of 2000AD, 30 years of Fighting Fantasy, 25 years of Warhammer 40,000, 20 years of Jonathan Green Author, 15 years of Black Library... and the world's supposed to end too!

** Or less, if you like really expensive chocolate.

My short stories #1: Salvation

Here's one from the archives (a.k.a. my old blog Unnatural History) presented here to mark Black Library's 15th birthday this week...

As I mentioned in my last post, the autumn of 1996 found me writing both an entire book (albeit a very brief one) and a short story. The story in question was ‘Salvation’, which appeared in Issue #1 of the Black Library’s now defunct ‘Inferno!’ anthology magazine.

During the period 1994 to 1997 I had written various pieces of colour text for six different Games Workshop projects, from ‘Warhammer Armies: Dark Elves’ through to ‘Epic 40,000’. The type of colour text that appears in Games Workshop projects is best described as very short snippets of fiction designed to highlight features of a particular army. It often throws you into the middle of the action, implying that you are dipping your toe into a bigger story. There isn’t much in the way of either plot or character development but it is rich in atmosphere, adding colour to what would otherwise possibly be a rather dry rulebook.

Despite having cut my teeth as a short fiction writer on GW’s Army books and Codices, I still consider ‘Salvation’ my first proper short story. It came about while I was working as a freelance writer and living in Nottingham, the city where Games Workshop has its headquarters. Whilst visiting GW to talk about other projects I ended up in an impromptu meeting with Andy Jones, who was the company’s special projects guy (as far as I can recall). He was formulating a plan for what was to become ‘Carnage!’ magazine and I was hoping to write something for it.

To cut a long story short, as it were, the magazine ended up being called ‘Inferno!’ and I wrote the Warhammer 40,000 short story that appeared in Issue #1. ‘Salvation’ finally saw print in 1997. It is a classic, straightforward tale of heroism and sacrifice, featuring the stalwart Space Marines, genetically-engineered superhuman champions of the Imperium, facing off against the utterly alien menace of the Tyranids, extra-galactic monsters who utilise bio-weapons in their war to consume every living thing in their path. And it proved to be rather popular.

The editors of ‘Inferno!’ let me know, from time to time, that people still talked about ‘Salvation’ years after its initial publication. It has been reprinted twice in two different anthologies – ‘Into the Maelstrom’ (1999) and ‘Let the Galaxy Burn’ (2006) – and off the back of it I ended up creating Torben Badenov and his mercenary band for a Warhammer short story that appeared in a preview issue of ‘Inferno!’ given away with White Dwarf magazine.

And it was only just the beginning...

In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war

Today marks the 25th anniversary of the Warhammer 40,000 game. To find out how Black Library is marking this momentous occasion follow this link. And in other 40K-related news...

To hear about how Dan Abnett found the experience of writing his latest Horus Heresy novel Know No Fear, click here. (The interview starts at about 01.45.)

And there's an interesting insight into the writing process here by another Horus Heresy author, James Swallow.

Tony Hough, who illustrated my books Knights of Doom and Bloodbones, also illustrated the 40K universe in the early days. And he just so happens to be selling some of those illustrations here.

And lastly, I discovered the other day that The Armageddon Omnibus and Iron Hands (my 40K novels available again as Direct Exclusives from Black Library) are BL's two best-selling PoD reprint titles. Which is nice.

I first wrote for the 40K universe before the foundation of Black Library, contributing colour text to Codex: Tyranids, Codex: Chaos, Codex: Angels of Death, and Epic 40,000. My very first piece for Inferno! Magazine (one of BL's early publications) was a 40K story called Salvation.

If you're curious about my other 40K fiction contributions, click here. And of course this summer sees the publication of Herald of Oblivion, my first Warhammer 40K gamebook.

I is for Inferno!

For those of you who don't know, Inferno! was a bi-monthly magazine published from 1997 to 2004 by Games Workshop's publishing division, Black Library. It was launched with a teaser Issue Zero appearing as a section in the Games Workshop hobby magazine White Dwarf. Issue #1 of the actual magazine was launched shortly afterwards with Games Workshop staffer Andy Jones in the role of Editor, with Marc Gascoigne acting as Assisstant Editor (although he was later to rise to the heady heights of Publisher).

The magazine soon settled into a standard format of two fantasy and two science fiction stories per issue (although there were the occasional specials which focused on one setting in particular, such as the Gaunt's Ghosts Daniverse), but included other features such as standalone artwork, comics, cutaway diagrams, battle maps, and mocked-up dossiers, etc. With the exception of one early comic series, Inferno! published individual, complete stories, not serials. That was to become the preserve of Warhammer Monthly.

Of course, being a Games Workshop product, Inferno! only presented fiction, artwork, and comics set in the fictional universes of Warhammer and Warhammer 40,000, including stories specific to the Necromunda, Battlefleet Gothic, Gorkamorka and Mordheim game settings.

Now, you may not know this, but I was involved in some of the early meetings about Inferno!, only at the time it was being referred to as Carnage! I was writing colour text for the Warhammer Armies books and 40K Codexes at the time - this was back when GW HQ was in the shadow of Nottingham Castle and not some Fourth Reich Imperial Complex a mile down the road. Anyway, I remember having a chat with Andy Jones - which was interrupted by a tannoy announcement telling everyone to clean up their desks! (The things you remember!) - and he was up for having me on board, and asked me to pitch him some ideas.

Bill King was on board for the first issue (having written extensively for GW in the past and even worked in their design studio for a while) as was artist David Pugh. The story idea I had which was commissioned was about an Ultramarine and a Tyranid Carnifex (the old-fashioned version with no discernible head, four scything arms and which spat plasma, or something). It was called Salvation, and quite a lot of people liked it.

Having put together the first couple of issues, the Inferno! editorial team set about producing the promotional Issue Zero for White Dwarf and asked me to write them a short story. This time I chose (or was asked, I can't rightly recall) to write a fantasy story. So the first piece of short fiction to appear in Issue Zero - and the first published piece of Inferno! fiction ever - was my Warhammer short story The Hounds of Winter. It unleashed Torben Badenov's band of mercenaries upon the Warhammer world and eventually became part of my first novel

(although it's really a short story collection) The Dead and the Damned.

I eventually wrote a total of thirteen short stories for Inferno!, featuring such characters as Badenov's Band, the Necromundan underhive bounty hunter Nathan Creed, the Black Templars of the Solemnus Crusade, and the pyromancer Gerhart Brenned. The last of these stories, The Hanging Tree, appeared in Issue #42. Inferno! was cancelled four issues later, apparently so that the editorial team could focus on producing novels (although BL was also setting up the Solaris imprint at the time), and I for one mourned its passing. I had plenty more stories to pitch and was sorry that I now wouldn't get the opportunity to write them.

And then at last September's Games Day 2010, Hammer & Bolter was launched by Black Library's nascent digital department. Hammer & Bolter isn't the same beast as Inferno! (there's no comic strip or art, for a start, and it is currently running a new chapter of a serialised novel with every issue) but it does include short fiction - and two weeks ago, I received my first commission for it.

I'm writing the story at the moment. I can tell you that it's a Warhammer tale, currently titled Sir Dagobert's Last Battle, but at this stage I can't tell you when it's going to be released. But I have to say that I'm loving writing a new tale set within the Warhammer world - a story that I first thought of seven years ago, just as the cancellation of Inferno! was announced...

The only time one of my stories featured on the cover of Warhammer Monthly

For those of you who are interested, here's a list of my complete contribution to Inferno! which includes collaborations with the brilliant artist Ralph Horsley and a number of comic strips:

The Hounds of Winter – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! # 0, given away with White Dwarf magazine (1997) – re-printed in the anthology Realm of Chaos (2000), and (in a revised form) in The Dead and the Damned (2002)

Salvation – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction story – Inferno! #1 (1997) – re-printed in the anthologies Into the Maelstrom (1999) and Let the Galaxy Burn (2006)

The Siege of Gisoreux – Warhammer fantasy colour text – Inferno! #1 (1997)

The Doom of Kazad Grund – Warhammer fantasy colour text – Inferno! #2 (1997) – re-printed in the role-playing games supplement Dwarfs: Stone and Steel (2002, Hogshead Publishing)

Bad Spirits – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! Magazine #3 (1997) – re-printed in the anthology Status: Deadzone (2000)

Dark Heart – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! Magazine #5 (1998) – re-printed in the anthology Realm of Chaos (2000), and (in a revised form) in The Dead and the Damned (2002)

The Plague Pit – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! #20 (2000) – re-printed in the anthology Lords of Valour (2001), and (in a revised form) in The Dead and the Damned (2002)

Mama’s Boys – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! #21 (2000)

Boyz in the Hive – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! #23 (2001)

Firestarter! – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! #26 (2001) – re-printed in the anthology Crucible of War (2003)

The Nagenhof Bell – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! #27 (2001) – re-printed in the anthology Swords of the Empire (2004)

The Executioner’s Tale – Warhammer fantasy comic strip – Inferno! #28 (2002) – re-printed in the graphic novels Tales from the Ten-Tailed Cat Volume 2 (2003) and The Complete Tales from the Ten-Tailed Cat (2005)

Bad Medicine – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! #29 (2002)

The Miner’s Tale – Warhammer fantasy comic strip – Inferno! #32 (2002) – re-printed in the graphic novels Tales from the Ten-Tailed Cat Volume 2 (2003) and The Complete Tales from the Ten-Tailed Cat (2005)

Mark of the Beast – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! #34 (2003) – re-printed in the anthology Way of the Dead (2003)

Sanctuary – Warhammer 40,000 science fiction short story – Inferno! #38 (2003), and in The Armageddon Omnibus (2011)

The Hanging Tree – Warhammer fantasy short story – Inferno! #42 (2004) – re-printed in the anthology Tales from the Old World (2007)