"Good source for WH40K backstory?" Topic

My son (currently a military academy cadet) wants to read about the origins and backstory of the Space Marines. I'm a historicals gamer so my info is sparse. Any recommendations?

The Horus Heresy series?

Community wikis have most of the information:
link
and
link

The spacemarines series was launched in the 80s and since than increased in price and decreased in material quality.

:)

Starship Troopers by Robert Heinlein:
link

Other than that, not knowing anything about the "official" background puts him in a better position than having to read each edition and codex in fear or hope that some part of information has been changed or even erased… But for your/his needs, this place is more than enough (as Gameorpaint already said): link

I second VonTed. There's no better introduction to the backstory of the space marines than the Horus Heresy series of novels. To appreciate the oft-panned grimdark and tragic nature of the current 40k timeline, you need to see the beginning of the story.

Though pricey, the Horus Heresy rulebooks from Forgeworld are a great read – they're written as psuedo history books and they're largely free of the hyperbole filling the regular books.

There's a story?

I thought the "story" was a bunch of grunting noises, the word "grimdark" and some crude drawings of skulls.

Seriously, the models are nice, the artwork and painting is top notch… but I've NEVER heard of someone citing the "rich and deep 'lore' of the 40k world"

BigNickR, 40k like any established game system, has tons of lore of highly inconsistent quality and much of it is pure crap.

However, true fans focus on what they think is the good stuff and pretend the crap doesn't exist. To outsiders, we appear very silly indeed.

For a cheap entry, buy some OLD rulesets – the big harcover ones. They usually contain some 50-100 pages of background for the various factions of the Imperium, including the Space Marines in this context. The obsolete Softcover Codizes for Space Marine should also contain some information.

Old rulebooks should be plenty, do not pay more then 10$ for these. The current edition is the 8th. The actual editions are only worth it if you want to play, but then they are essential (and pricey).

Black Library has (had) some art editions with Space Marine iconography, some background and of course plenty of books on different aspects, most prominent the Horus Heresy line.

The wikis will yield a lot of information, too (and for free).

For better informed replies, you could try the forums at DakkaDakka or Warseer, who are dedicated to 40k and contain a good deal of long time players and GW fans (not necessarily the same group).

Everything you need to know about the back story in a minute (and a bit):

YouTube link

Everything you need to know about Space hulk (with bad language):

YouTube link

You want to get him the Horus Heresy books. They detail the origins of the Space Marines. Closing on 30 books at the moment all about 400 pages. Links to the first three on Amazon:

link

link

link

W40K Rogue Trader, original book.
Everything else is heresy.

Thanks everyone