Overlords of the Iron Dragon

Overlords of the Iron Dragon gives us a glimpse into what it would be like to voyage with the avaricious, sky-fairing duardin of the Kharadron Overlords.

I like the premise of the book, moving away from the ‘Hero-hammer' world of noble Stormcast and evil, moustache-twiddling Chaos worshipers to take a look at what it's like to voyage in search of profit rather than glory or conquest.

I may also be in the minority in enjoying how the classic fantasy trope whereby dwarfs are obsessed with oaths and honour is subverted by the Kharadron into an obsession with contracts (and their loopholes). I'm not the most experienced fantasy reader, but the idea of a people basing their morality on a very black letter interpretation of contracts, rules and regulations feel fresh and different to me. This aspect of the Kharadron comes through really well in this book and their interactions with these rules help to push the plot forward in a pleasing way.

My main problem with the book is that most of the characters feel a bit thinly drawn. We get some sense of motivation but it's quite basic. Skaggi is the greedy money counter, so everything he does is about trying to increase profits. Brokrin is worried about a curse on his fortunes, so he's always really cautious. Drumark loves beer.

Black Library books are not known for rich and nuanced characterisation, but normally this doesn't matter too much because there is enough action to draw you through the book. Overlords avoids the kind of superfluous fight-scenes for the sake of fight-scenes you get in books like Primogenitor, but this leaves us hanging around on the decks of the Iron Dragon for large parts of the book, waiting for something to happen.

Contract negotiations and legal-wrangling are difficult raw material for a work of fiction, especially the kind of action-packed adventure one expects of Black Library works. Even as a trainee lawyer, I found some parts of this book consequently dragged a little. With the characters so simply drawn, I didn't really care enough about what was going to happen to the protagonists to be especially motivated to carry on reading.

Nevertheless, I persisted but, sadly, was not well rewarded. The climax feels a little bit contrived to me and the final outcome not especially satisfying. Some of the challenges which have driven the Kharadron on through the book haven't really been overcome, but are swept quickly below decks so we can simulate a resolution.

As a glimpse into the life of the Kharadron, I think this book is quite successful. I closed it with a good sense of what they are supposed to be like and a sneaking desire to pop onto the Games Workshop website and take a look at some Ironclads. As a satisfying fantasy adventure novel, however, I think it could have benefited from a bit of editing down into what would be a decent enough 100-odd page novella.

After hard negotiations and careful reading of the small print, I give Overlords of the Iron Dragon two spurts of aether-gold and a barrel of stale grog out of five frigates.