Fluff, no not that wispy grey junk you pull from your belly button, Fluff. The background, the Lore, the History of the people and places of the worlds we imagine for our creations to live, love and war in.
I must first admit that while I am a HUGE fan of well written Fluff, I almost never read what could be more commonly called "fan fiction" as in general I have found it to be a lot of overworked, dry, lifeless drivel. That being said I very much appreciate that most of you fine readers may well share that thought and equally that opinion of MY work so feel free to move on rather than continue reading! I know I would.
Over the years since my first getting into the fantasy or sci-fi genre I have often, as I am sure many people have, put pen to paper and scribbled down all manner of things from equipment lists for RPGs, to short histories of people or places right through to short and meandering stories or scenes that have sprung into my mind.
For some years I even kept a note book by my bed so I could jot down the random thoughts and ideas that filtered through my settling brain as I drifted into or out of sleep.
While my interest and available time for the hobbying side of my passion for sci-fi and fantasy waned my enjoyment of reading and writing fiction never faded and without doubt my digestion of some amazing authors over the years has shaped who I am and may tastes for the genre immensely.
I am a prodigious reader and rarely is a moment of empty time not filled by the addition of a book. Once I find an author I enjoy I will work my way through his or her writings with a unhealthy speed far outstripping their ability to keep up meaning I am often left chomping at the bit for a new book and sadly often railing at the how inconsiderate it was of an author to die without finishing at least on more novel!
David Gemmell was the first author to manage to make me cry, an impressive feat you many think given his normal writing but perhaps you can share my feeling when in novel after novel there is a tragic anti-hero who in there last actions in life restore your hope for humanity in how they choose to leave this world.
Bernard Cornwall and his Sharpe series I blame for a love of all things Napoleonic and on-going interest in the Peninsula Campaign of Wellington. In more recent years his Arthurian novels and novels of the years of King Alfred and the dawn of England have drawn me into a whole new period of gritty sword swinging. Interestingly his American Civil War (or are the War of Independence?) left me dry and I don't believe I managed to finish the first of the series (something almost unheard of)
In the world of GW the fluff has always drawn me in like a moth to a flame, the people and places of the 41st Millenium offer such a rich depth of variety that almost anything that comes into your head can be found and turned into something spectacular.
The first novels I read of what would ultimately many years later become Black Library were the Inquisition War novels by Ian Watson. I do recommend if you have not already that you go and get a copy of Draco, Harlequin and Chaos Child. This trilogy is a crime thriller wrapped around an actions story around a history of time. It includes many things that have gone on to be conveniently forgotten by GW as they became unsuitable or uneconomical to include within the creation (Draco is accompanied by a Squat for example). His books were also one of the only I know of that involve clandestinely sneaking into the Imperial Palace into the very throne room of the Emperor Himself and a very surreal conversation between Draco and the increasingly fragmented mind of the Emperor giving us an insight into what may really be going on and also I am sure planting some seeds for intrigue in the far more recent works on the Horus Heresy.
Which conveniently leads me to The Horus Heresy.
I, as I am sure any of you living and hobbying GW style through the 80s and 90s hoped and prayed for information about the dark and mysterious time of the Horus Heresy, of the Emperor, the Primarchs and the Great Crusade. Every little snippet, any nuggets snuck into White Dwarf or a Codex or novel was poured over and over. So you maybe surprised when I tell you the announcement of the Horus Heresy series of Novels filled me with dread! What if they cocked it up?? Twenty years of my formative years and youthful enthusiasm had created in my mind ideas and images of what each of the Primarchs was like, what the Heresy had been, who was right and who was wrong. What if they wrote it differently? Would that mysterious period be forever ruined for me? In something akin to a much loved novel being turned into a film with the wrong actor playing the part of your favourite character I was terrified that they would just get it wrong!
And to a degree I think I was right and wrong at the same time. Yes the Novels have shattered some of the imagines, some of the stories I had created in my mind and thankfully they have also opened whole new areas and new mysteries to the period.
Some of what has been written I feel is just wrong, is not suitable or fitting, simply takes away from the marvellous spectacle. (Ollanius Pious is immortal?? How on earth is his death for the Emperor any kind of sacrifice?)
Much more has been added however that was missing or simply overlooked, we have more hints and mystery around the missing Primarchs, more intrigue about the loyalty of both the perceived Loyalists and the Rebels both. (Dark Angels, Alpha Legion, Ultramarines and Imperium Secundus anyone?)
I still have much more to read of the series and standalones and side series and all the multitudes of other bits that have been thrown on the band wagon but I think it safe to say that I will be taking away the bits I like and casting the unfitting pieces away in the trash as if they had never happened.
I have now reached the point where my rambling has touched on everything apart from the very point of this post; Fluff, or more to the point; MY Fluff. Yes I have finally decided that in the time honoured tradition of bloggers everywhere I will force my bad grammar and poor spelling upon you the uncaring masses in some sort of cathartic purging of my soul. You have been warned.....
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