Publisher: Black Library (Audiobook – 1 February 2012)
Series: Ciaphas Cain – Book Eight
Length: 9 hours and 29 minutes
My Rating: 4.75 out of 5 stars
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The mighty hero of the Imperium returns for another rip-roaring and highly entertaining Warhammer 40,000 adventure, with The Last Ditch by Sandy Mitchell, a wonderful Ciaphas Cain novel that proves exceptionally hard to put down.
I have been in a real Warhammer 40,000 mood lately, so I decided to continue my exploration of the franchise by diving back into one of its best and most hilarious series with another Ciaphas Cain novel by Sandy Mitchell. The Ciaphas Cain series are particularly awesome Warhammer 40,000 novels that follow the adventures of the legendary human hero Commissar Ciaphas Cain as he faces down the many horrors the grimdark Warhammer universe has to offer. However, what sets the series apart from other series in the franchise is the fantastic tongue-in-cheek way in which the supposed hero of the series sees himself as a substantial coward concerned more with his own survival, and whose heroic exploits are down more to luck and chance. This results in a fantastic collection of books, each one of which throws the protagonist into danger despite his best efforts, often resulting in a series of hilarious and over-the-top adventures. I have had an outstanding team reading the previous entries in the series, including For the Emperor, Caves of Ice, The Traitor’s Hand, Death or Glory, Duty Calls, Cain’s Last Stand and The Emperor’s Finest, and I have been eager to read the eighth novel in the series, The Last Ditch for some time.
Commissar Ciaphas Cain, famed hero of the Imperium of Man, is at the height of his legendary career, fighting back the many enemies of humanity despite his best attempts to stay out of battle. However, despite his reputation usually landing him in the most challenging of conflicts, Cain’s next mission seems to be relatively straightforward. Once again accompanied by the Valhallan 597th regiment of Imperial Guard, Cain is tasked with eradicating a simple ork infestation on the frozen planet of Nusquam Fundumentibus. However, not even Cain’s most pessimistic musings of the future can prepare him for the horrors to come.
Travelling aboard a disreputable freighter, Cain and his soldiers are forced to make a deadly crashlanding on Nusquam Fundumentibus, right into the middle of an ork horde. Engaged in a desperate fight for their lives against the greenskins, the Imperial Guard are blind to other threats hiding on the planet, threats that are far more insidious than a group of rampaging orks.
As the conflict continues and several isolated communities on the planet start to go dark, Cain soon becomes aware that something apart from the orks are stalking the citizens of Nusquam Fundumentibus. Something ancient and malevolent lies hidden beneath the ice of the planet, and the new war has finally woken them up. Outnumbered and outmatched, the Imperial Guard need to pull a desperate and no doubt suicidal plan to survive. Luckily, they have a bonified hero to lead the charge, even if he’d rather be anywhere else in the galaxy.
The always outstanding Ciaphas Cain series continues in impressive form, as Sandy Mitchell adds further depth to some of the more entertaining and gripping novels in the Warhammer 40,000 franchise. Combining intense action with the protagonist’s unique insights into the grimdark Warhammer universe, The Last Ditch was a brilliant addition to the series that I couldn’t get enough of.
Mitchell once again came up with an outstanding narrative for The Last Ditch that grabs your attention early on and keeps you hooked to the very end. I must admit that I was a little apprehensive about reading The Last Ditch, as it looked like Mitchell was going to rehash the similar ice-world story found in Caves of Ice. However, this book has a very different narrative, while still maintaining all the familiar story elements that make this series to dependable to read. Starting off on a different footing with a fun transport arc that ends in deadly tears, The Last Ditch has an explosive first third (literally), which provided a lot of initial drama and risk.
The Last Ditch’s story quickly dives into even more awesome action, as the protagonist is reluctantly forced into action against the orks, while other dangerous threats lurk beneath the surface. I liked how Mitchell did a good job building up tension in advance of the reveal about the true antagonists of the novel, with the reader knowing that something worse was coming thanks to Cain’s prescient narration from the future, and the author used this time to expand on his new setting. The eventual sequence revealing this enemy had a great horror vibe to it as Cain explored tight quarters underground, and it led naturally into an extended campaign. The rest of the book is a good mixture of connected action scenes, as Cain and the other characters slowly work out just how desperate the situation is and attempt to take steps to address it. This works well as an overarching narrative, and you really appreciate the scope of the situation and the protagonist’s continued accidental heroics as he tries to run away.
All this perfectly leads up to a final big sequence, where the desperate protagonists are forced into a particularly brutal fight with little hope of survival. Unsurprisingly, this requires Cain to engage in another suicide mission, which leads to some of the best action scenes in the entire book. This entire last section of The Last Ditch is a particularly awesome thrill ride which I powered through so very quickly to see how everything came to an end. Readers come away very satisfied from The Last Ditch, which honestly was one of the stronger books in this cool series, and I really enjoyed how Mitchell continues to entertain with his amazing and entertaining Warhammer 40,000 premise.
Mitchell maintains pretty much the same writing style for The Last Ditch he has previously utilised in the other Ciaphas Cain books, which allows for a very impressive light read. It is told primarily in a chronicle/journal format written by an older Cain, which recounts the events of this adventure through the narrow focus of the protagonist’s unreliable memory. This allows for a fun and self-centred take on events that examines Cain’s reluctant action while also loading up the story with some entertaining humour that provides a great satirical look at the usually grimdark Warhammer 40,000 universe. This main narrative of action, adventure and supposedly cowardly behaviour is cleverly interspersed with a range of entertaining footnotes, commentary and in-universe texts that have been provided by the account’s patient, if sarcastic, editor, Inquisitor Amberly Vail. This combination of narrative elements not only cleverly provides readers with and informative and light-hearted look at events taking place outside of Cain’s selfish storytelling, but it also pumps up both the humour and the stakes of the plot, especially as you become aware of the planet-wide impacts of the central adventure.
As with all the books in the series, The Last Ditch does work well as a standalone novel that readers can enjoy without any previous knowledge of the other Ciaphas Cain books, or indeed the wider Warhammer 40,000 universe. While this novel is set in the middle of Cain’s personal chronology and makes mentions of several previous adventures, readers should have no trouble following along, with the point of these references made clear quickly through the writing and context. Established fans of the series will also have a lot of fun with this book, especially as Mitchell continues Cain’s adventures with the Valhallan 597th, and there are a lot of entertaining familiar beats with this newer entry. Like many of the previous books, The Last Ditch does have some repetition issues, with Mitchell reusing a lot of basic story ideas and phrases in Cain and Vail’s descriptions that returning readers will notice. However, I felt that this entry was distinctive enough, especially with a more horror vibe to it, that any readers can come in and easily enjoy it. This allows The Last Ditch to remain an awesome addition to the overall series, and it’s one I personally had an outstanding time getting through.
I also must once again highlight some of the great character work in this novel, especially when it comes to the main character of Commissar Ciaphas Cain. A complex figure and self-professed coward, Cain spends most of the book trying to come up with ways to avoid combat and survive the inevitable danger his reputation and own bad lack force him to participate in. With a very cynical and self-deprecating writing style, Mitchell always tries to emulate classic, comedic and craven military figures like Flashman or Blackadder with his depictions of Cain. However, despite the protagonist’s best efforts to showcase himself as a dishonourable coward, his resultant heroic actions and Inquisitor Vail’s notes help to show the reader that his is somewhat lying to both us and himself, as he continues to be an inspirational figure. This allows for quite a complex and relatively light-hearted read, as you are constantly wondering just how honest the protagonist is being with his observations and descriptions of his actions. This all blends well with Cain’s witty and sarcastic humour, which lightly lampoons the usually serious Warhammer 40,000 universe and ensures that you are constantly entertained as you follow Commissar Cain into danger once again.
The rest of the cast of this novel are also a ton of fun, especially as many fan favourite characters from the previous novels are well utilised here. This includes Cain’s faithful aide, Jurgen, who continues to toe the line between gormless soldier and ultra-effective sidekick, and is a very entertaining inclusion in any of these books. Inquisitor Amberly Vail once again has a big impact, despite her actual appearance in the novel being quite negligible, and her no-nonsense overarching commentary allows for quite an amusing read. The returning members of the Valhallan 597th regiment were a welcome inclusion, and it is always cool to see the close relationship that Cain has with these soldiers after so many adventures. Throw in a young gung-ho commissar that Cain is forced to school, and a planetary governor trying to stay in control of her planet amongst the chaos of war, and the cast of The Last Ditch was pretty exceptional and continues Mitchell’s habit of showcasing entertaining and complex supporting characters.
I have long extolled the impressive virtues of the audiobook format when it comes to Warhammer 40,000 fiction, as it is just so much fun having the over-the-top stories read out loud. Some of the very best Warhammer books in this format are the Ciaphas Cain audiobooks, due to their elaborate casts and the fantastic way their narrators capture the unique style of the series. This is particularly true for The Last Ditch, which was another absolute joy to listen to, as its amazing narrators perfectly captured both the humour and complex action. Coming in with a decent run time of nine and a half hours, listeners can absolutely fly through The Last Ditch audiobook, which once again features all the awesome elements that the rest of the series had. This includes the use of several different narrators, with the incredible vocal talents of Stephen Perring, Penelope Rawlins, Emma Gregory, Toby Longworth and Andrew James Spooner, all adding a lot to the impact of this fun and fantastic story.
Perring is particularly awesome as he voices the main plot of The Last Ditch from the perspective of Cain. Voicing the protagonist’s conflicted memories of the events, Perring perfectly captures the complex personality of the main character, while also providing a fun take on the action and adventure occurring around the protagonist. Perring has a great range of different voices for this part of the book, with each of the characters getting a very fitting tone that showcases their separate personalities, including many recurring voices the narrator used in previous audiobooks in the series. Perring is once again supported by Penelope Rawlins, who voices the character of Inquisitor Amberley Vail as she edits Cain’s memoirs. Rawlins really dives into the sarcastic character of Inquisitor Vail in these supporting parts of the book, providing a calm, indulgently humorous voice that fits the fun feel of the series. Rawlins’s interruptions and inclusions as Vail complement Perring’s narration extremely well, adding some great humour to the plot without ruining the flow of the main story. These two narrators work together extremely well to bring out much of the book’s humour, and I love how they both have kept coming back to this series to ensure some excellent continuity.
While Perring and Rawlins do the main narration, the additional narrators each have a fun supporting role in proceedings. Emma Gregory probably gets the most use of the three as she once again voices the memoirs of an ambitious officer in Cain’s regiment, retelling events in a particularly bombastic way. Gregory deliberately over-acts her part of the audiobook to show off the brash personality of the memoir’s author, and you have to love the pomp and self-importance that Gregory adds to her voice work in these scenes. The other two, Longworth and Spooner, both of whom are well-established narrators of Warhammer fiction in their own right, have a lot of fun with more minor supporting roles in The Last Ditch, and their cool, if short, inclusions added some fun variety to the experience. The overall result was another excellent listen that really enhances the fun and impact of the story and the larger franchise. I honestly think that the Ciaphas Cain series has some of the best audiobooks, and The Last Ditch perfectly showcased how well these books come across in this fun format.
With all the fun action, humour and great focus on a fantastically flawed protagonist fans have come to know and love, Sandy Mitchell continues his exceptional Ciaphas Cain Warhammer 40,000 series with The Last Ditch. A wonderful and deeply entertaining read, The Last Ditch was a joy to read from start to finish and I had such a brilliant time with it. Indeed, I enjoyed The Last Ditch so much that I immediately dove into the next book in the series, The Greater Good, the second I finished it.
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