Teaser

Andreti Sorokin is the one man holding the gangs of the Spoil together. And now he is dead. Civilisation abhors a power vacuum, and now all of Varangantua fights for control of the Spoil . . .

Review

The Warhammer Crime range has only been around for three years, but it’s already proving to be fertile ground for newer authors. As well as the shot fiction anthologies showcasing new talent at Black Library, both Marc Collins and Alec Worley saw their full-length Warhammer debut come under the Crime banner. With The King of the Spoil, Jonathan D Beer joins those ranks. As before, a new author means a new corner of the city to be explored, and a new cast of characters to do the exploring.

One of my concerns in the wake of The Vorbis Conspiracy was that the Warhammer Crime books would lose the small-scale feel of the stories. These fears have thankfully proven to be unfounded, at least to judge by this release. There are no off-world threats, no world-altering events, no xenos threat. Just criminals being awful to one another. However, The King of the Spoil is set on a larger scale than previous releases, and this did prove detrimental to my enjoyment.

What I have enjoyed about the other Warhammer Crime novels is their tight focus. There’s a criminal and a detective matching wits, always with some uniquely grimdark flair, be it an ancient cult or a servitor factory’s involvement. Like previous novels, The King of the Spoil is tagged as belonging to a single character, in this case ‘A Melita Voronova Novel.’ But in this case it’s not really accurate. There are a lot of characters in this book, perhaps too many, all vying for control of both the Spoil and the narrative. No wonder then that this is the longest Warhammer Crime novel by some margin. The book ends up being a bit too busy, with gang politics eclipsing the investigatory angle that draws me to these books.

Sort through the narrative overload though, and there is some very good stuff in here. Melita is a fascinating character, and one I hope to see more from. As the cover hints at, this augmented investigator adds a dash of cyberpunk to the grimdark future, and I always enjoy seeing Black Library authors adding twists of other genres into the universe. And then there’s the Spoil itself. Giving each author a chance to build one specific region of Varagantua was a masterstroke of the Crime range, and the Spoil is just as well-realised and fascinating as any other.

Although I think it’s the weakest Warhammer Crime novel I’ve read, The King of the Spoil has enough going for it that it gets a recommendation for fans of the range. And if Melita Vordnova appears in the upcoming Once a Killer anthology, I shall be a happy man indeed.

Book Stats

• A Standalone Novel
• A Warhammer Crime novel
• First published in 2023
• Published by Black Library
• SF Crime
• 436 Pages