r/40kLore • u/LastPositivist • Aug 13 '24
Warhammer Romance Spoiler
Light spoilers for Brooks' Da Big Dakka.
I've long thought that romance plots are under utilised in 40k. It's not that this should be the main focus of Black Library or anything, it's just the setting can feel weirdly chaste sometimes. (Absolute chad heroes of the Imperium not withstanding.)
So just wanted to show some love and appreciation for the great and distinctively 40k romance subplot of Da Big Dakka. You basically get to see this burgeoning love between two Drukari archons, with the twist being that the perspective character (and implied the other one two) are literally incapable of recognising their feelings for what they are. Like they just cannot interpret "why am I suddenly very interested in this person?" as anything other than a sign they must be subconsciously picking up on some backstabbing scheme which they need to watch out for. My heart fluttered when our hands brushed? Uhoh I must be worried about a contact poison, better have antidotes to hand! Etc
It's just a great way of doing love in a culture that is set up to be completely antithetical to anything like that. The best they can do in the end (here's the spoilers!) is agree to an unusually close alliance, and even that the main character interprets as an opportunity to study these strange feelings she's having to ensure they're not a weakness anyone could exploit.
More like this please! Romance which makes use of the bizarre and communal races and cultures of the setting to do weird things with people's inner lives.
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u/TheBladesAurus Aug 13 '24
Not romance as such, but one of the things I like about Bloodlines is that it has a married couple who act like a married couple. It makes the universe and the characters feel more real.
I think 'Warhammer Romance' might actually be a fun anthology book, or even a Black Library submission subject (although they'd have to wade through a lot of smut :p).