Forged in Battle (Ragged Company)
This is straight forward plot with a fast paced pages.. The Beastman are starting to gather in the woods around a small village. There is some sacred stones than are calling the beastman and to finalize a ritual they need to kill one man from a family of some old forgotten hero than 2000 years before thwarted the plans of the beastman (of course the humans don't know this part). In this village of a couple hundreds humans they have a company of around one hundred human pikeman and handguners. Of course the beastman are more and they have 2000 years of rage with them. Well they start to incenerate the surroundings areas as they prepare to invade the village. There are some chaos cultists (some of them are not that well hidden). Then there is a final battle and such... I will not dwell on the end but suffice to say it ends well (maybe because the title says... Forged in Battle (a Ragged Company novel) It means Black Library thought of a series... But this author never again wrote anything for Black Library. It's a shame...Well.. as I said this is no-nonsence. There is no magic, no godfear characteres that never die, and such... Everyone is expendable... As I said before this is a small novel and if you want a novel with the depth exploration of warhammer world or character build just look somewhere else. If you want to entertain yourself with a good quick read then by all means.
Sometimes I thought there was too many characters and in then end only care for one. Edmunt. One guy who saw his family being butcher by the beastman and the main port-standart of the ragged company. He has a axe and my god, he is truly awesome with it... It kills and kills and kills... It looked like I was seeing a human Gotrek. But it was the only character I really cared.
There is some plots than go nowhere like why the sergeant dislike of our main character and his superior office. What happened to Edmunt (he didn't die but in the epilogue he is not mentioned). What happens to the chaos cultist that was saved in the end (nobody knew besides the captain and some men in the company of his true colours). And why not a new novel by him?
