Hell's Last
Minka Lesk
Black Library
March 8, 2025
Limited Edition
But not the last book, it seems.
So hey, I got to this book in the Minka Lesk series, Hell’s Last by Justin D. Hill, much more quickly than I did the last one! That affords me some brownie points, right? I’ve had this one less than a year, so kudos to me. I did start it not long after finishing Shadow of the Eighth, and that’s most likely why this one took me months. It was so very hard for me to care what Minka Lesk and the Cadian 101st are up to anymore. The end of the book strongly suggests her story isn’t over, but I’m not sure I’ll be here for the next one. (And other lies I tell myself.)
The 101st is still hunting down the Thrice-Bound cultists, but this time they’re on a jungle planet. Do they bring in a regiment from the Catachans to help out? Well that would just be silly. Lord Militant Warmund is still pissy with Lord General Bendikt after all these years. It doesn’t matter how many battles the man wins for him; he clearly still wants him to die in a nasty way all alone so that Warmund can install a more pliant Cadian at the helm. Perhaps one who won’t take offense at another general mocking their lost planet.
To make things even more fun, the Thrice-Bound have created bestial hybrids that would give Dr. Moreau nightmares.
How will the 101st get out of this one alive? Will Lesk get promoted yet again?
Spoiler Warning
I nearly stopped reading the book after Bendikt’s death. Did he die a hero? Absolutely. Throwing himself against the Beastmen to save the rest of his company was undoubtedly a Bendikt way to go. But it happened halfway through the book. It happened right as Lesk arrived to hear his brilliant plan for following Warmund’s nearly impossible orders. So of course we don’t know what he planned. His second didn’t know, for some reason, and his adjutant didn’t know. So all that is left is for Lesk, with the remnants of First Company, to do the original plan and take Obsidian Ridge.
Naturally, of course, they’re now trapped there with no help coming against thousands of cultists and their Beastmen.
Okay fine, this is how Lesk’s story ends, I guess. But no.
It’s Hell’s Last, Not the Hell’s Last Last Stand
The above gif is exactly what I thought of when Lesk was saved. Bendikt is gone, he gave her his power sword he got from the Richstars and not Mere, and most of the Thrice-Bound has been wiped out. Again. But like how Batman never kills Joker, the Cadian 101st didn’t cut off the head of the snake, and therefore Malic is able to fester in the jungle and rise again. Of course a sixth book is inevitable at this point.
So while that could be what the sixth book is about, chasing the leader somewhere else, I have a feeling it will be about the particular alien infestation they found on the planet. Or maybe it will be both. Will Lesk get Bendikt’s title and his sword?
I honestly wish that Hill had closed Lesk’s story after Traitor Rock. That was such a perfect way to close her journey leaving Cadia, learning what it means to be Cadian in the post-Cadia era, and how she and the last regiment from Cadia will carry on. The fact that the cultists at Traitor Rock escaped to wreak havoc somewhere else in the segmentum is just a Tuesday in the world of WH40k. There is always the idea that the war never ends (it’s in the preamble of every book), and they’re just moving from one battlefront to the next. We don’t really need to know exactly what they’re up to. This is why we never got (and should never get) a sequel to Full Metal Jacket.
Both Shadow of the Eighth and Hell’s Last are okay stories, not terrible in the least. However, I can’t help but feel that the continuation of this series is going to be what keeps Minka Lesk’s story from being as great as should be. Sometimes, one trilogy is enough.
I’m looking at you, Ahriman.
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