The Iron Code: Stories In Honour Of David Gemmell edited by Ian Whates (book review).
This anthology is published to mark twenty years since the death of fantasy author David Gemmell, whose most famous character was Druss the Legend. I confess that I haven’t read Legend, the novel in which Druss first appeared, but I did read a graphic novel adaptation by Stan Nicholls and Fangorn years ago and liked it. I also wish I’d kept it because second-hand copies now cost around £80. Oh well.
The Iron Code appears just before the introduction by editor Ian Whates:
The Iron Code of Druss the Legend:
‘Never violate a woman, nor harm a child.
Do not lie, cheat or steal. These things are for lesser men.
Protect the weak against the evil strong and never allow thoughts of gain to lead you into the pursuit of evil.’
There are twenty-one stories in the book. Here are some that made an impression.
The Other by Dan Abnett sees a captain relieved of duty by the company’s barber-surgeon. He rides south to warmer lands and stays at an inn run by another old soldier. Whereas the captain has been stationed in the bitterly cold north, the innkeeper served in the hot south. Eventually, the captain tells his story of fighting the Outsiders, and there is plenty of gory action.
Candles by Adrian Tchaikovsky is set in his Palleseen world. Irwen Gravenhand and Eliz Gosch raise the long-dead warlord Urtsewyn Gravenhand, who died five hundred years earlier, to help them fight the tyrants who have taken over his old town. Told from the viewpoint of a revived corpse, this has many amusing moments and plenty of action at the end.
Everyone knows soldiers should train hard and fight easy, but the Muranai tribe in Shadow Of The Ice Cross by R.J. Barker takes this to extremes. ‘They beat the children with switches, and those that cried they beat more.’ The children soon learn not to cry.
Guiden, our hero, believes completely in the harsh warrior code fostered in his frozen homeland and rises through the ranks, although odd incidents and characters begin to create doubts. One day, he may even join the Vireer, the exalted shock troops who seem not to fear death at all. They don’t. By the end of the story, he finds out why.
The Apothecary by Stephen Deas features a new cult in town called the Magalor. They break into Shur’s shop looking for his assistant, Corto, a foreigner. In order to make things great again, as they supposedly used to be, lazy people, foreigners and criminals must be dealt with by those who work hard and share a unity of purpose. There was something vaguely familiar about this theme, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Shur does his best to cope.
Stan Nicholls helped to found the David Gemmell Awards and compiled previous anthologies in honour of the late writer. He also wrote the aforementioned graphic novel adaptation of Legend, so it’s fitting that he has a story here.
The Calaker is an old-fashioned adventure about two brothers, Taskas and Bord, who arrive in Morvender seeking a special treasure and fall in with the resistance. Morvender is ruled by the evil Mazoch Tiel, known as the Puppeteer. Many stories in this collection have an anti-war tone, that being the modern way, but Taskas and Bord slaughter their enemies as cheerfully as Conan. This could have appeared in Weird Tales.
The Code by Mark Lawrence actually quotes the Iron Code and considers how words can be interpreted differently when life is viewed in shades of grey rather than black and white. Olaf Ivarson, out to make a reputation for himself, tries to pick a fight with Snorri Ver Snagason, a renowned warrior aged forty-three. The story was worth reading for one good joke alone.
The young buck taking on the old warrior is a theme familiar from many westerns, and Anne Nicholls’ Bloodhorn is practically a western, goddarn it. Kira, her family and a few hired hands are driving a herd of razorhorns to market. It has all gone badly wrong. Her pa is dead, as is Lemayer, a trusted old hand. Carver has vanished. He was a troublesome bully, but at least he was competent.
Kira must now get the herd to town with only a few men left, while direwolves plague them along the way. There is magic towards the end of the tale, but it still reads like a western. That’s not a complaint because I liked it very much.
The Binding by John Gwynne begins with Alcyon, chieftain of the Kurgan clan of giants, returning home with a band of warriors after raiding another tribe. Alcyon has a wife and son, but a surprising turn of events leads to a major crisis.
This reads like a prologue and probably is one. John Gwynne is the author of the Banished Lands fantasy books, in which Alcyon is a key character, and this story provides an introduction to that series. I liked it well enough.
In The Hiring Fayre, writer Ian Whates’ heroine Kaytine leads her band of fighters to a hiring fayre in search of work. She has a grey-white stripe running from front to back through her auburn hair and is known and feared as the Badger.
She recently toppled a gang of sorcerous tyrants known as the Storm Kings, but two of them escaped and are now seeking revenge, so she is trying to keep a low profile. It’s a solid adventure yarn.
Most of the stories place the Iron Code within a fantasy setting, but Gavin Smith takes a different approach in Know When To Walk Away. Davey is pulled underwater in the Serpentine in Hyde Park by another child, Jamie Prentice. When Davey’s mother intervenes, Mr Prentice slaps her for daring to touch his son.
She returns home and tells Jack, Davey’s stepfather, begging him not to get into trouble. But the Iron Code says: ‘Never violate a woman, nor harm a child.’ This is a touching story with hints of fantasy drawn from Davey’s imaginings about a vampire in his wardrobe.
The Iron Code is a solid collection that honours David Gemmell rather well. Like all anthologies, it provides a chance to sample the work of different writers and may lead readers towards their longer fiction. They won’t mind.
Worth a look for fans of sword and sorcery.
Eamonn Murphy
July 2026
(pub: NewCon Press, 2026. 314-page enlarged paperback. Price: £14.99 (UK). ISBN: 978-1-917735-28-5. Ebook: £4.99 (UK))
check out websites: www.newconpress.co.uk and www.newconpress.co.uk/info/book.asp?id=280&referer=Hp
