First and Only

First and Only is the novel that founded Warhammer 40K's military fiction tradition. It introduces Colonel-Commissar Ibram Gaunt and the Tanith First-and-Only: a regiment of ghosts in two senses — soldiers whose homeworld was destroyed before they could return, and scouts whose woodland skills make them near-invisible in battle. The opening pages establish both the regiment's unique grief and its exceptional competence.

The story drops the reader into the Astra Militarum at its least flattering — not the grinding heroism of a siege, but the political machinery behind it. Gaunt must navigate generals who resent his authority, officers who want him dead, and a mystery tied to an ancient artefact that someone in the high command is desperate to suppress. Abnett structures it as a thriller running beneath the war.

What separates this from standard military fiction is the economy of character work. Gaunt is defined not by his capabilities but by the choices he makes: what he protects, what he refuses to sacrifice, where his loyalty ends. The Tanith soldiers around him — Rawne, Mkoll, Larkin — are sketched in a handful of scenes yet feel fully inhabited.

First and Only is the natural entry point for the series and requires no prior knowledge of the setting. It stands alone as a complete story while opening a world worth inhabiting for twenty more books.