Nemesis

This was the second book by James Swallow that I've read, and as the first was Flight of the Eisenstein I was expecting great things. I don't know whether it was Heresy burnout but I didn't enjoy this book much and because of that it's taken me about 2 months to finish!

The story follows a group of assassins as they try to carry out a mission set to them by Valdor, the head Custode. There's plenty of variety in characters from the Custodes, Dorn, and all the types of assassins. My main problem with the story was how slow it was. It took a couple of hundred pages just to get to the action. There were small moments of excitement like when they go to collect the Eversor, known as the Garantine. But it generally trundles along at a pedestrian pace.

Running alongside the story of the assassins was a detective story about some cops chasing down a murderer. While it's nice to have a break from full-on Asartes action I didn't get on with a lot of the characters in this part.

Towards the end when the assassins were being chased through the city by the Sons of Horus and battling with Spear it really picked up and I enjoyed that a lot.

There's not a lot else I can really say about this one. If you're after something that explores other areas of the Heresy that isn't focused on Marines and like a good thriller then this is definitely a book for you. If you're looking for all out war like in the previous book, A Thousand Sons, then you might not get on so well with this one.

It's just my personal opinion but I'm going to give Nemesis a 3/10. It showed promise but unfortunately wasn't my cup of tea. The First Heretic is next, my first Aaron Dembski-Bowden book!