Welcome to this instalment of Rapid Fire, my ongoing series of quick interviews with Black Library authors talking about their new releases. These are short and sweet interviews, with the idea being that each author will answer (more or less) the same questions – by the end of each interview I hope you will have a good idea of what the new book (or audio drama) is about, what inspired it and why you might want to read or listen to it.
In this instalment I spoke to Mike Lee about his latest 40k Crimson Fists novel, Legacy of Dorn, which is available to order right now.
Without further ado, let’s get straight to Mike’s answers.
Track of Words: What’s the elevator pitch summary for Legacy of Dorn?
Mike Lee: Legacy of Dorn is about a Veteran Squad of Crimson Fists Space Marines who are trapped behind ork lines during the catastrophic events of Snagrod’s invasion of Rynn’s World. With the Chapter Master, Pedro Kantor, believed dead and the Chapter itself on the verge of annihilation, Veteran Sergeant Sandor Galleas finds his courage and convictions put to the ultimate test. Though all appears lost, Galleas must rally his squad and a desperate band of human survivors and fight the greenskin invaders by any means necessary if Rynn’s World – and the Chapter – are to survive.
ToW: Without spoiling anything, who are the main characters and what do we need to know about them?
ML: The main characters of the story are Veteran Sergeant Sandor Galleas and Lieutenant Antonia Mitra. Galleas is an idealistic, hard-charging Crimson Fists Space Marine. He’s relatively young for a Veteran Sergeant, and is absolutely devoted to his Chapter and especially the Chapter Master, who has been a mentor to him over the years. Lieutenant Mitra is a Rynnsguard officer who is trying to keep her troops alive amid the horror of Snagrod’s invasion. For both Galleas and Mitra, the world as they know it has come to a sudden and crushing end. Together, they have to figure out how to face what comes next.
ToW: Where and when is it set?
ML: The story is set on Rynn’s World, and follows the events of the ork warlord Snagrod’s invasion in 989.M41.
ToW: Is there anything that you’d recommend readers check out before reading this?
ML: That’s an interesting question. The story is kind of a companion piece to Steve Parker’s excellent novel Rynn’s World, and pretty closely follows the course of events portrayed in his story from a different perspective. Rynn’s World is a big, epic tale that covers the invasion from start to end, while Legacy of Dorn is told from more of a soldier’s-eye view of the conflict. Reading Rynn’s World first gives the big picture of what’s happening around the events of Legacy of Dorn, but it also kind of spoils some major events.
If readers want to get a bit more background to Galleas and his squad, there’s a prequel short story called None More Loyal that takes place years before the invasion and covers one of the squad’s earlier adventures.
ToW: Why this story? What made you want to write this in particular?
ML: The Crimson Fists are one of my all-time favorite Space Marine Chapters, and Rynn’s World is their defining moment. How does anyone, even a posthuman super-soldier, fight on in the face of catastrophic loss? I wanted to tackle that concept from the perspective of a handful of Space Marines caught up in the chaos of the invasion.
ToW: How did you find coming back to the Crimson Fists five years or so after writing Traitor’s Gorge?
ML: It actually wasn’t that long. The initial pitch for Legacy of Dorn was written in July of 2013, not long after completing Traitor’s Gorge. The outline and pitch went through a fairly long approval process, and then I started work in early 2014. Unfortunately, due to a lengthy family illness, I couldn’t devote my full attention to the book for a very long time, so the draft wasn’t finished until the summer of 2017. Also in that time I wrote The Few, a very short story about Veteran Sergeant Galleas that takes place after the events of Legacy of Dorn, and None More Loyal, which I mentioned previously. So I ended up writing both a sequel and a prequel to a book I hadn’t even finished yet.
ToW: What were your main influences when writing this? Did you draw upon any real-life experience to help you plan or write it?
ML: Considering all the horrors that Galleas and his squad face over the course of the book, I consider myself very lucky that I didn’t have any real-life experience to draw on for the story! Mostly I had a detailed timeline of events from Steve Parker’s novel to build my story around, and then went from there.
ToW: How does the final product compare to your original concept? Has anything changed much from your first ideas?
ML: There were some fairly major changes in the third and fourth acts of the story, simply because there just wasn’t enough space to cover the events as I originally planned them. The story covers 18 months, and a lot happens to Galleas and his squad mates in that time. Honestly, I had 2-3 books worth of story planned, and only one book to tell it all in, so I had to really think though what scenes I wanted to keep and what I needed to skip. In terms of the character arcs, though, they stuck pretty closely to the original concept.
ToW: How does this story compare to the rest of your work? Is it a familiar style, or a departure?
ML: The style is similar to my other Space Marine novels and short stories, which is somewhat different from my work on the Darkblade and Nagash books.
ToW: Do you have plans to continue any aspects of this story, or is it a standalone piece?
ML: Legacy of Dorn was conceived as the first of a series of stories about Galleas and the Chapter’s epic struggle for survival after the invasion of Rynn’s World. If the book is well received, I hope to continue the adventures of Galleas and his team for some time to come!
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Thanks, as always, to Mike for taking the time to answer these questions. I’ll post a review of Legacy of Dorn as soon as I get hold of a copy. If you fancy taking a look at some other Rapid Fire interviews, just click here.
If you’ve got any questions, comments or other thoughts please do let me know in the comments below, on Facebook or Twitter, or by emailing me at michael@trackofwords.com.