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Empire Army #3
Call to Arms
Dieter Lanz is a young recruit to the 3rd Hochland Swordsmen, otherwise known as 'the Scarlets'. His regiment is called into the battle when an orc army starts to rampage across the countryside, and when the Scarlets are defeated, Hochland is threatened with collaspe. As a desperation measure, legendary general Ludwig Von Grahl is bought out of retirement-he is the last hope to stem the vicious green tide.
320 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 2010
About the author
Mitchel Scanlon
37 books50 followersMitchel Scanlon is a British writer of science fiction novels and comics. He wrote novels for the Warhammer 40,000 franchise, and novels featuring 2000 AD character Judge Anderson. He also writes a comic series called Tales of Hellbrandt Grimm.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 21, 2010
Details:
Call to Arms by Mitchel Scanlon
Black Library Publishing
320 Pages
*This is an advance copy review.
Description:
Dieter Lanz is a young recruit to the 3rd Hochland Swordsmen, otherwise known as 'the Scarlets'. His regiment is called into battle when an orc army starts to rampage across the countryside, and when the Scarlets are defeated, Hochland is threatened with collapse. As a desperation measure, legendary general Ludwig Von Grahl is brought out of retirement – he is the last hope to stem the vicious green tide.
Review:
It wasn't until I watched Star Wars, Episode One, The Phantom Menace when it dawned on me what bothered me about this novel. Well...it's not just one thing, but it is a biggie in my estimation.
I hate child prodigies. The new kid that is awesome, has elite skills and never makes a bad move or decision. Yeah. Hate him.
Why?
Because I can't relate to him. He's a superhero. A Player Character amongst a cast of NPCs. Call to Arms is fairly entertaining but at no time was I worried about the primary protagonist. There really is only one protagonist anyhow. Everyone else seems like window dressing. I ended up pulling for Holst and Gerhardt etc. more than Dieter "Skywalker" Lang.
Don't get me wrong, Mitchel Scanlon is a good writer. I won't disparage the man's skill as a writer: the scenes are nicely detailed. Some bits are very well thought out and tasty. For example the teen is accepted in to the regiment in a bit of ceremony that is very cool. There are several scenes like this. This isn't a "bad" book at all.
My issues with the story are as follows:
1. The protagonist isn't one I can get warmed up to. Too good, on every level. Makes no mistakes. As a teen he's hardly challenged by anything that he faces.
2. The side-characters are under-developed. They remain fairly peripheral yet I pulled for them more than Dieter. The roles they play are pretty typical "soldier story" fare. You have the old hand that sleeps every chance he gets, the pessimist, the grizzled sergeant and dependable good captain and a couple shit-bag troopers to serve as troublemakers.
3. In general the novel is very four-color. I think it would work great as a graphic novel or series of comics. The good guys are good and the bad guys are bad except a couple troublemakers who wear black hats. I have to admit though that some Black Library authors write the same way, Dan Abnett among them. I have to admit my preference is for authors that are able to leave the four-color world and dig deep in to shades of grey: having characters...protagonists that are human, fallible, make mistakes, do the wrong thing and learn from it (or not). It gives them character. Makes them easier to relate to.
4. Aside from the earlier parts of the story I never really worried about who was going to "win". There were very few surprises in the plot.
Again, I want to stress that the author is clearly a good writer, he can craft a scene, describe action nicely and all that. I just feel like this novel fell a bit short. I don't expect a batter to hit a home run every time at bat.
Rating:
It was somewhat enjoyable although a bit of a chore to finish. I kept hoping for more depth all the way to the end.
2 of 5 Stars.
Call to Arms by Mitchel Scanlon
Black Library Publishing
320 Pages
*This is an advance copy review.
Description:
Dieter Lanz is a young recruit to the 3rd Hochland Swordsmen, otherwise known as 'the Scarlets'. His regiment is called into battle when an orc army starts to rampage across the countryside, and when the Scarlets are defeated, Hochland is threatened with collapse. As a desperation measure, legendary general Ludwig Von Grahl is brought out of retirement – he is the last hope to stem the vicious green tide.
Review:
It wasn't until I watched Star Wars, Episode One, The Phantom Menace when it dawned on me what bothered me about this novel. Well...it's not just one thing, but it is a biggie in my estimation.
I hate child prodigies. The new kid that is awesome, has elite skills and never makes a bad move or decision. Yeah. Hate him.
Why?
Because I can't relate to him. He's a superhero. A Player Character amongst a cast of NPCs. Call to Arms is fairly entertaining but at no time was I worried about the primary protagonist. There really is only one protagonist anyhow. Everyone else seems like window dressing. I ended up pulling for Holst and Gerhardt etc. more than Dieter "Skywalker" Lang.
Don't get me wrong, Mitchel Scanlon is a good writer. I won't disparage the man's skill as a writer: the scenes are nicely detailed. Some bits are very well thought out and tasty. For example the teen is accepted in to the regiment in a bit of ceremony that is very cool. There are several scenes like this. This isn't a "bad" book at all.
My issues with the story are as follows:
1. The protagonist isn't one I can get warmed up to. Too good, on every level. Makes no mistakes. As a teen he's hardly challenged by anything that he faces.
2. The side-characters are under-developed. They remain fairly peripheral yet I pulled for them more than Dieter. The roles they play are pretty typical "soldier story" fare. You have the old hand that sleeps every chance he gets, the pessimist, the grizzled sergeant and dependable good captain and a couple shit-bag troopers to serve as troublemakers.
3. In general the novel is very four-color. I think it would work great as a graphic novel or series of comics. The good guys are good and the bad guys are bad except a couple troublemakers who wear black hats. I have to admit though that some Black Library authors write the same way, Dan Abnett among them. I have to admit my preference is for authors that are able to leave the four-color world and dig deep in to shades of grey: having characters...protagonists that are human, fallible, make mistakes, do the wrong thing and learn from it (or not). It gives them character. Makes them easier to relate to.
4. Aside from the earlier parts of the story I never really worried about who was going to "win". There were very few surprises in the plot.
Again, I want to stress that the author is clearly a good writer, he can craft a scene, describe action nicely and all that. I just feel like this novel fell a bit short. I don't expect a batter to hit a home run every time at bat.
Rating:
It was somewhat enjoyable although a bit of a chore to finish. I kept hoping for more depth all the way to the end.
2 of 5 Stars.
October 12, 2017
First English novel which I finished , I pretty fond of writer’s writing style .
March 28, 2026
Let me start by saying I never review books, but I feel like this books 3.58 rating is unfairly harsh. This book was fantastic and I am very very picky when it comes to books.
Scanlon really has a deep grasp of both the Empire and Orcs and Goblin factions and while the plot was simple the characters had a lot of depth and didn't feel flat or cookie cutter at all.
Normally I hate it when books are overfilled with battle scenes but Scanlon really does a great job of making them feel punchy and unique and I found myself thoroughly gripped by each one! Highly recommend this book if you want a fun, refreshing romp about some salt of the Earth Hochland infantrymen with some genuine laugh out loud moments as well as some dark and gritty flavour.
Scanlon really has a deep grasp of both the Empire and Orcs and Goblin factions and while the plot was simple the characters had a lot of depth and didn't feel flat or cookie cutter at all.
Normally I hate it when books are overfilled with battle scenes but Scanlon really does a great job of making them feel punchy and unique and I found myself thoroughly gripped by each one! Highly recommend this book if you want a fun, refreshing romp about some salt of the Earth Hochland infantrymen with some genuine laugh out loud moments as well as some dark and gritty flavour.
October 31, 2024
Has some of the nitty gritty, down and dirty of grunt warfare. Doesn't follow around just officers and leaders, but a platoon-sized unit of infantry as they fight in the front lines against beastmen and goblins and the like. It was a little refreshing and I liked it.
April 10, 2025
To Battle!
A simple, but great read from beginning to end, the tale of an up and coming soldier through his first trials of real combat. Nothing fancy, but solid plot, characters, settings, and development! Well done!
A simple, but great read from beginning to end, the tale of an up and coming soldier through his first trials of real combat. Nothing fancy, but solid plot, characters, settings, and development! Well done!
September 9, 2024
Mild! Good not bad but not WOW!
August 2, 2020
CAUTION HERE MAY BE SPOILERS!!!
Not much to say about this one, it's a great instalment in the Empire series and it follows the life and day to day activity of a new recruit into the Scarlets. great insight into how they live their day to day lives and the battle within himself to do what is right by his own code of honour and following his orders.
Not often I come across a Warhammer book that takes this perspective and I thought it was pretty good 🤷🏼♂️🙌🏻🙏🏻
Not much to say about this one, it's a great instalment in the Empire series and it follows the life and day to day activity of a new recruit into the Scarlets. great insight into how they live their day to day lives and the battle within himself to do what is right by his own code of honour and following his orders.
Not often I come across a Warhammer book that takes this perspective and I thought it was pretty good 🤷🏼♂️🙌🏻🙏🏻
July 11, 2013
My 2-star rating of this book is a little misleading, so I'll clarify: for the most part, I enjoyed this book, it's just the writing style was a bit of a pain for me to read.
It took me until half-way through the book to remember why the name Mitchel Scanlon sounded familiar to me... he's the man who wrote the only book I've ever literally thrown across a room in my life. Descent of Angels from the Horus Heresy series. I was SO frustrated with it that I simply couldn't continue reading it. It suffered from the same problem as this book, only to a far greater degree.
I don't know if anyone else has spotted this, but Scanlon feels the need to say the same thing in multiple ways in close proximity to each other. I don't know if he thinks this adds emphasis or gravitas, but it just makes it very irritating to read, and the reader ends up feeling like they've received half the amount of story they could have.
The characters in this book are great, I really warmed to them and hope to read more about them (just, myabe, by a different author....?) I'm sorely tempted to paint up a unit of Empire swordsmen as the Scarlets to add in as a supporting unit for my army!
It took me until half-way through the book to remember why the name Mitchel Scanlon sounded familiar to me... he's the man who wrote the only book I've ever literally thrown across a room in my life. Descent of Angels from the Horus Heresy series. I was SO frustrated with it that I simply couldn't continue reading it. It suffered from the same problem as this book, only to a far greater degree.
I don't know if anyone else has spotted this, but Scanlon feels the need to say the same thing in multiple ways in close proximity to each other. I don't know if he thinks this adds emphasis or gravitas, but it just makes it very irritating to read, and the reader ends up feeling like they've received half the amount of story they could have.
The characters in this book are great, I really warmed to them and hope to read more about them (just, myabe, by a different author....?) I'm sorely tempted to paint up a unit of Empire swordsmen as the Scarlets to add in as a supporting unit for my army!
March 13, 2016
As a long time fantasy fan, and in particular empire series novels, I found this book to be 'enjoyable enough'. I felt compared to the other Empire Series warhammer novels this one lacked anything overly unique about it. This is just the story of a young man who wants to fight for a slightly distinguished infantry brigade. He does nothing wrong and everyone win's. It just lacked anything special or unique.
That being sad it still had everything that I love about these books. Many fight scenes, lots of big battles and in the end the good guys win like they should. So if you like fantasy you probably will still like this but just don't expect anything earth shattering.
That being sad it still had everything that I love about these books. Many fight scenes, lots of big battles and in the end the good guys win like they should. So if you like fantasy you probably will still like this but just don't expect anything earth shattering.
November 8, 2016
Sadly this is the only Mitchel Scanlon I haven't thoroughly enjoyed so far. What I like most about him is his characters' navel-gazing & the atmosphere he brings to his writing. This felt like just one more "kid enters the army, fights beastmen" tale. Maybe something more fun happened after I dropped out of the book (a little under a quarter of the way through). I hope so. Nothing bad, but just not something that interests me.
March 21, 2019
Could not finish this one. Feel bad admitting that, as I really enjoyed Scanlon's Descent of Angels (I am largely alone here, oh well) as well as 15 Hours. This one just fell really flat for me.
The main character, an 18 year old kid with little training, is essentially a super swordsman and outshines the veterans who are far and away better characters.
So beyond the pale for me it dragged me out of the story and I couldn't carry on.
The main character, an 18 year old kid with little training, is essentially a super swordsman and outshines the veterans who are far and away better characters.
So beyond the pale for me it dragged me out of the story and I couldn't carry on.
May 28, 2012
The book wasn't terrible, it was entertaining enough and did what it set out to do. Unfortunately it didn't set out to do all that much. It was all rather formulaic. The characters were completely flat and one dimensional. Orcs fighting humans and not much else.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews