Love the Imperial Guard books and especially the Gaunt's Ghosts series. This is Dan Abnett at his best. ( )

Gaunt's Ghosts - The founding, is both a wonderful perspective of the everyday, "human" kind of solider within the holy Imperium of mankind, and the beginning to the powerful writings of Dan Abnett, that will later become one of the more well known writers of the Black Library.

Dan Abnett is famous for such book series as "Eisenhorn" and other famed Warhammer 40k novels. The Gaunt's Ghost series allows the reader to really witness how Dan Abnett's writing style grows and even improves as he enters the Warhammer 40k "genre". That being said he was by no means a poor writer to begin with, I still find his initial book within this compilation of three works "First and Only" as breath taking-ly awesome as his later works.

The first book begins long after the true founding of Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt's division of Imperial soilders,The Ghosts of Tanth. Through the use of often painful flashbacks, Dan Abnett reveals to his audience the reason why Gaunt's ghost really are the "first and only". As the stage is set for a blood bath in this painful future 40,000 years in the future, only the leadership of the non-Tanth Commissar can save his precious Ghost's and turn the tide of the raging war in the Sabbat World campaigns.

No one can build a truly human experience out of the in-human realities of the Imperium so far in the future like Dan Abnett can. This book is well worth the read for any fan of Warhammer 40k novels or war stories in general. The book will leave you lusting and dreading the next page. ( )

If the space marines in all their glory are too much you to handle due to their intensity then picking up any of the Imerial guard novels is a good way to intoduce you to the world of Warhammer 40K. The Founding is a combination of the first 3 books in the Guant's Ghosts series that is still going stong. ( )

I read this book not as a warhammer fan, but as a spouse to one. Keep that in mind as you read this review.

Gaunt's Ghosts, for those unfamiliar is about a regiment of Imperial Guard, led by a colonel commissar. What makes this band special is that the night they were commissioned, their commander saved them from the destruction of their homeworld. Viewed as homeless, barbaric and useless, this band is the underdog, striving through each war to win a new planet for themselves, usually undercut by dirty handed politics.

The first book had a good plot, but characterization was weak. Abnett developed rivalries that lasted through the entire omnibus, and I assume into the following ones. The history of the Ghosts was hinted at, briefly explained, but characterization was weak.

The second book brought the characterization deeply needed in the first book, but was composed mainly of flashbacks, finally detailing the death of Tanith, and the major 8 or 9 characters got their own chapters detailing their strengths and weaknesses. However, once the flashbacks ended, it took a couple of pages to realize there was a present tense to the story in the last few chapters.

The third book had a good mesh of characterization and plot, though suffered from starting 30 pages too early. While not spoiling anything, Abnett gave five or six secondary characters two chapters to be introduced, while explaining their planet was under attack.

The ending story was a nice way to end the book, with a remembrance for the characters, so rarely thanked for their work. ( )

I started reading Gaunt's Ghosts from the novel Honour Guard onwards and was enthralled. I held off reading the latest installment, “The Armour of Contempt,” on purpose, waiting for the release of “The Founding.” This omnibus collects the first three hard-to-find Gaunt’s Ghosts novels into one large juicy edition and includes a short story. I’m very happy I waited. “The Founding” is everything I expected and more. Here lays the foundation to Tanith’s First and Only. It is full of blood, sweat, tears, life, death, action, suspense, love, honour and character. Even if you know nothing about Warhammer 40,000, the Imperial Guard, sci-fi or military endeavors, I highly recommend. ( )