Awesome read!!
This book really embodies the inhumanity of the Mechanicum, and their complete disregard for life (and safe working conditions) in their pursuit of knowledge.
Just finished the book, and heading out to get the second one when I am done with this post.


I do have a couple questions, though, so:
*****************************SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS****************************************** ************************************************** *****************
Page 218, towards the bottom: "His footwork was that of the great swordsmen of Cheoms..." Um, in M42, wouldn't Chemos (the home of the Emperor's Children, iirc) have been expunged from all records after the Heresy? If the records have been redacted, then this would imply the Mechanicum has easily accessible records on pre-heresy legion homeworlds, specifically the Emperor's Children. This little nod is also supported by Lucius, who I believe has been portrayed as THE best swordsman amongst all of the legions.

Page 391: The Speranza (A Mechanicum world-ship in all but name) mentioned to Kotov that it had once been known by many other names, including Kaban. The Kaban machine was a Dark Mechanicum short story detailing the growing self-awareness of a synthetic conscience (which is mucho verboeten, at the time) inside a death machine, that wiling goes to work for the Dark Mechanicum in the beginning of the heresy. Had the Kaban machine consciousness been installed in the Speranza, perhaps? The same page mentions that the Speranza was built by the Men of Gold, which vastly predates the heresy, so, there's all sorts of confusion here. At least for me.

Page 404: last line of the story is: "Second star on the right, and straight till morning." <--- Isn't this a Captain Kirk quote????? Side note, I am a computer wonk, and I am most likely reading in to this, but a 404 error implies the internet resources queried by the browser have not been found. At the end of the first book, have yet to find what they are looking for. Nice techie nod there.