Goonhammer Reviews: The Great Work & Genefather, by Guy Haley

This past December, I had the privilege of reviewing one of the Black Library's newest novels, Archmagos, but in that breakdown I made quite a few references to Haley's other works cataloguing the exploits of everyone's favorite Heretek. Yes, Archmagos was the third of these modern Cawl stories, as a follow-up to 2019's Belisarius Cawl: The Great Work & 2023's Genefather, though the degree to which it's a sequel to the latter is a bit nebulous. Still, I wanted to cover all my bases and backtrack a bit, as if you've been interested in Archmagos, it's worth your time to start from the beginning! These stories set up Cawl as a character, his various dealings with Necron technology, and even manage to include non-Admech mainstays like Genestealers, Fabius Bile, and even the world's saddest Primaris Marine prototype.

This is going to be a bit less in-depth than my look at Archmagos, given we're reviewing two books today, but it's vital I make one thing clear: These are some of my favorite books set in the Warhammer universe, and certainly my favorites not set at the time of the Heresy. Haley manages to succeed at the one thing he truly needed to—making Cawl himself compelling, eloquent, and suitably unhinged.

Image Credit: Games Workshop.

The Great Work

To understand from where The Great Work stems, Haley's previous work with the Dark Imperium series is an important factor. He's an author familiar with the trappings of writing Marines, with their militaristic pomp and tactical expertise, and a number of Astartes characters created for Dark Imperium appear here; that said, I'd not say those books are required background, as I had no trouble going in blind during my first read back when the book came out. I mention this instead because Haley's take on Cawl is so juxtaposed from his bodyguards and attaches that it leads to some of the best character work in current canon. If you're used to how Marines are normally written, so-called 'bolter porn', any time Cawl speaks ought to be a breath of fresh air.

Cawl turned around like a serpent coiling. ‘Oh, Decimus,’ said Cawl admonishingly. ‘Let’s be civil. I realise that you bear me some ill will. The taking away of childhood. The sleep of methalon hyper-freeze, the pain of the procedures of apotheosis and, I admit,’ said Cawl, raising several limbs and his voice to forestall Felix’s objections, ‘that I was a very poor substitute father, although I did try my best. All of you are my children.’

Belisarius Cawl: The Great Work, page 59

I mentioned in Archmagos that Cawl had some literary aspects of a Holmes-type, where he feels like the smartest person in a given room, and that all started here—a stand-out moment concerns Cawl educating a Techmarine on atmospheric science, and while it's cloaked in some of our beloved 40k jargon, there's enough actual logic present that it's intended you follow along with the Prime Conduit's thinking. Belisarius Cawl is allowed to, in a universe and Imperium so set in its ways, bring a twisted 21st century college professor's knack for figuring things out into the fray. As for other characters in the The Great Work, Cawl is surrounded by a number of Marines, from the exasperated Ultramarines liaison to Cawl, Decimus Felix, to the doomed Chapter Master of the Scythes of the Emperor, Thracian. An aspect worth highlighting about these Marines is that they're treated as significantly more human than we might see in a Marine-only novel; Thracian feels fear, and is aggressively fallible, while Felix's plight to manage Cawl—in spite of the Archmagos' glibness about the entire Sotha operation—constantly brings into question whether the latter is more loyal to the Imperium or his own ambitions. The Marines in The Great Work feel like soldiers, super-soldiers perhaps, yet more grounded than the implacable and unflinching bulwark of the Imperium is often allowed to be.

They were in the warp. There were no xenos monsters. No Space Marines fighting. No burning ambition.

‘Silence on the Silencia.’

Cawl looked up from the cylinder with a scowl. ‘Are you making a joke, Friedisch?’

Friedisch gave a little grin. ‘I am!’

Cawl turned back to his work with a shake of his head.

Friedisch gripped his friend’s shoulder amicably. ‘You always have to be the best at everything, Belisarius. The most intelligent, the most gifted, the quickest witted.’

‘That is because I usually am.’

Belisarius Cawl: The Great Work, page 123

Then, there's Friedisch Adum Silip Qvo, the only character in Haley's work to be nearly as funny as Cawl himself. Qvo is something of a farcical literary contraption, at once Cawl's only real friend and link back to a pre-augmented sense of humanity, yet so far-removed from the latter concept that his very being is denoted by a series number, here Qvo-87. Cawl fundamentally cannot let Qvo go, both out of pride for even being able to revivify some aspect of his best friend, and because his time in the Heresy still wounds him. Qvo is, as I said, a literary device more than a strict character, and performs his duties as insight into Cawl's fears and failings marvelously (while being a riot, might I add). As a sidenote, this isn't actually Qvo's first appearance—both he and Cawl get their origin in Wolfsbane, set in the Horus Heresy era, and that novel makes for excellent follow-up to The Great Work if you want more Cawl. Think of Great Work->Wolfsbane->Genefather->Archmagos as the proverbial 'Machete Order' of Haley's Cawl novels, to borrow a term from Star Wars.

‘My lord,’ Diamedes voxed. ‘Company. Cawl’s creature.’

Alpha Primus emerged from Cawl’s transport and strode towards the others. The uncoloured ceramite of his plain armour was as grey as the landscape. His helm, though perfectly maintained, somehow conveyed the ugliness of his butchered face.

‘Stand aside,’ he said. ‘The archmagos has commanded that I deal with this obstruction.’

‘On your own?’ said Tullio in disbelief. ‘Let us help you dig, brother.’

‘I have no brothers,’ said Alpha Primus.

Belisarius Cawl: The Great Work, page 77

Sadly, before we cover Genefather, there's one more character I've dreaded to mention: Alpha Primus. Primus is the F1 for the Primaris as a created breed, the wretched monument to Cawl's hubris as an Emperor analogue; he is regarded at once with fear and respect by his better-made follow-ups, and is perhaps written the best in The Great Work, compared to further appearances in Haley's Cawl series. Not exactly high praise. I quite like the idea of Primus, as a representation of Cawl's drive to genuinely innovate (in spite of what he'd say outwardly), but he's such a wet sock, and used as a such blunt instrument, that there's little to be actually compelled by. Shelley's Frankenstein, he is not. In terms of the broad plot, however, this book leaves us with a few key takeaways as we move into the next Haley novel: Cawl's discovered a pylon network of Necron origin he aims to explore, the Scythes are to be reborn fully via Primaris reinforcements, and Felix needs some Advil.

Image Credit: Games Workshop.

Genefather

Knights, Mutants, Cawl, Bile. A trial straight out of Ace Attorney. Genefather is a full-feeling book, bursting at the seams for what it attempts to fit in, yet somehow succeeding in feeling complete. Given I have little but praise for the novel, as it's one of my favorites in the entire Black Library catalog, I think it's important to speak on my issues with the book first: Not only is Alpha Primus worse here than he is in The Great Work, Genefather's place in the overall canon/Cawl series order has been nebulous. This is due in part to the fact that it's split between the perspectives of both Cawl & Bile, and the latter's literary history was quite a bit denser at the time of the novel's penning. Indeed, Bile comes out ahead in Genefather, and it feels more to be his triumph, and merely Cawl's stepping stone along the path we'd see for him in Archmagos. Quibbles about canon and focus aside, boy is this book good.

‘Do you have a point to make?’ said Frenk. ‘Surely you simply activated the STC.’

‘On this occasion, no, I did not,’ said Cawl. ‘I wished to test my theorem. Using my developing understanding of the methods of the ancients, I set out to experiment, and recreate the device within the STC. It took fifteen years, but once I had a working prototype, I opened that STC. Do you know what I found?’

‘Enlighten us,’ said Frenk. It sounded like he was gritting his teeth behind his respirator, if he had teeth.

‘My device was almost exactly the same as theirs. So I did it again, and again, and again, until I matched the precise designs of seven STCs I had uncovered, not opening them until I had pursued the same results using the same techniques. Therefore, I put it to you that I am no innovator. The use of the techniques of the ancestors to rediscover the knowledge of the ancestors cannot possibly be regarded as a crime.’

Genefather, pages 176-177

Haley's writing for Cawl here comes alive, and after we see more of his wit in The Great Work, his ingenuity is on full display here. Cawl's portion of Genefather concerns his meeting with several high-ranking members of the Adeptus Mechanicus, dealing with Inquisitorial oversight, and thematically, his relationship with the Imperium's future as a whole. The comparison between Cawl & Bile could have been surface-level, with each of them obsessed with the continuance of humanity in their own way, but Genefather goes extremely in-depth to how their philosophy differs, and that Cawl is ultimately the more human of the two. I won't spoil how the book illustrates that, but I will say that he's certainly a better father than Fabius Bile, small wonder that is.

‘He is not designed! Not completely. Do you not see? I made him from myself. In his genecode, I live on. I nurtured him. I…’ He paused, unsure whether he could voice the words. ‘I love him. He is my son.’

‘Then I am sorry that I must do this,’ said Bile, and pushed his hand deep into Primus’ chest cavity. Cawl tensed, trapped. For the first time in a long time, he felt defeated. Bile’s face twisted in concentration.

Genefather, page 300

Critically, The Fabius Bile trilogy is not authored by Haley, but is instead the opus of Josh Reynolds (who no longer writes for Black Library). This leaves Bile as a character avid readers know extremely well, meaning a misstep in his character would be disastrous for the quality of Genefather as a whole to enfranchised readers. I'm going to have an even hand here, because the spectrum I've heard between 'Haley's Bile ruins the book' and 'Haley's Bile is a solid take that doesn't reach the same heights' is vast, and I'll admit I quite liked Bile when I first read Genefather. He's scheming, pompous, and heartlessly charming, but after having read Primogenitor (first in Reynolds' trilogy), I'd agree that Bile here is a bit lacking. Bile is a wicked creature, that much is true, but his outlook and motivations are more compelling with him as the protagonist, compared to him sharing the saddle with Cawl, here. It seems a silly thing to note, given the overall tone of 40k, but Bile comes off as a villain in Genefather, not simply Cawl's more morally unscrupulous foil. That does him a disservice.

Where this book succeeds though, is in fleshing out Cawl's relationships. We will not see my favorite of the Archmagos' merry band until, appropriately, Archmagos, but here Qvo is both at his funniest and his most prudent as a point made about Cawl. Genefather gets to the heart of why Cawl is ultimately on a path to save the Imperium, despite some very explicit heresy, a portion of which is indefensible: His humanity is allowed to pierce the veil of Imperial thought. He thinks freely, loves dearly, and mourns messily, just as we all do. Qvo's emblematic of that last bit especially, as Cawl is forced to recount his reconstruction. While some simulacra of Friedisch could be retained, that pain causes Cawl to make some dubious sacrifices in the end, and it exemplifies why he's my favorite Warhammer character in this novel in the same breath that Bile falls a bit flat...if you've read his Trilogy, that is. I would bet Genefather has the chance to be anyone's favorite Black Library book, in a relative vacuum, and it being mildly burdened by context before it, on top of its context in Haley's Cawl series, are just unfortunate hangers-on.

Final Thoughts

‘These people who fall for the lies of the Dark Gods, they do it from despair. They fall into the trap of thinking that the gentler human emotions are worthless, that they leave us with vulnerabilities that can be exploited. All they have room for is hate and fear and horror. They neglect affection. They chase individual strength and forget that human beings only succeed together. No man is an island, a great thinker once said. A man is remembered for his deeds, but he is remembered by his companions. In short, we all need friends, and so I need you.’

Genefather, page 310

Belisarius Cawl believes he can do anything, and in saying so, makes it reality. There are different flavors of competence in the Warhammer universe, from the armored übermenschen we see in Marine-centered novels, to crafty xenos finding their way in a horribly reason-averse universe (go read Elemental Council). Cawl, however is a thinker. Moreover, he's a feeler, and not in the way Primarchs are so often written, that their pain over lost sons and their fathers' arrogance spur ever-greater soliloquies—Cawl is just a man. It takes a bit for us to realize this, given his position of power and relative aloofness on Sotha, but the moment those close to him are truly threatened, we're able to get a glimpse at how those unconditioned by the dogma of their time try, with great effort, to save the Imperium. Cawl isn't even especially xenophobic, by human standards, and is more fascinated with extant alien cultures and technology than afraid (even when he ought to be). If you've enjoyed reading stories including Malcador, Cawl has some similar things going on as a character, albeit substantially more hopeful, and less lethally pragmatic.

Haley clearly enjoys writing Cawl, and you can tell that he's found a voice for the man in Genefather, far more eager to converse than monologue. That being said, at no point in either of these books was I as a reader uninterested in what our lead had to say—he is eminently intriguing, often funny, and never boring. A lot of the magic of Cawl is in the fact that he's not a warrior, he's a scientist (and later, an investigator), standing in contrast to a bevy of Black Library books that emphasize the War in Warhammer. If you want to read stories of a man—just a man—in the 41st millennium who thinks, feels, and jokes, this series is for you. I can only hope that Haley comes back for a fourth installment.

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