I finished Xenos today and it was ridiculously hard to stop listening to (decided to go for an audiobook version just in case I found it hard to get into the world building ).
I'm still semi-new to the 40k universe, I'm still kind of getting to grips with a lot of the finer details - admittedly I did take a few breaks to look deeper into things I wasn't sure about like what exactly Ordo Xenos was, thankfully the information I needed wasn't much and I just needed to do a quick wiki search. I genuinely think that if you're new/newish this is an ideal choice to dip your toes into the 40k universe without being overwhelmed. I'm so excited to read the next part of the story.
General spoilers about Xenos:
So yeah, I went in basically blind about the plot outside of it being about an inquistior names Eisenhorn and that he was going after a heretic called Eyeclone - little did I know that this would be barely a drop of what happens in this book as in the span of the first two chapters there is a ton of defrosting/dying nobles (12,142 of them for that matter), one of Einsenhorn's fondest Acolytes is killed by Eyeclone's men, Eisenhorn kills Eyeclone as revenge and everything goes to hell on a frozen planet called Hubris. What follows is Gregor Eisenhorn's investigation into why Eyeclone's final movements had him kill so many and what the hell is even a Pontius.
Gregor Eisenhorn is the man, I can't wait to read more about him. From his perspective, there's a lot that can be told from him but from the outside it must be impossible to tell what this man is about - Following the interrogation by Locke about half-way through this book, he even loses much of his ability to emote well. His personality holds no softness in regards to anything outside of his Inquisitional duties. That does not mean that he lacks personality - he's shown to be sardonic, intelligent and overall the best kind of MC to fit this action packed tale. He's a man unafraid to do what is difficult to enable the greater good . Even if it means taking actions that his fellow inquisitors might deem heretical.
Special mention goes to his Acolytes/recruits - Alizebeth Bequin starts this tale as a pleasure girl but after Einsenhorn (a psyker) realizes that after a lifetime of misfortune, it's because she has the inherent ability to nullify psychic effects so OFF SHE GOES. And she takes to the life in the Inquisiton like a duck to water while using her less physical skills in acting to help Eisenhorn out multiple times in this .
The plot was easy to follow - even as we made our way to THE Pontius - Pontius Glaw and his failed resurrection, the Necroteuch and met the assumedly titular Xenos 'the Saruthi' and how the Necroteuch doomed them all. I'm so excited for the next part of this series.