Rise of the Horde

Rise of the Horde is the second World of Warcraft novel, set on Draenor before the orcish Horde's corruption, tracing how a people of relative peace were forged by Burning Legion manipulation into an instrument of war and genocide. Christie Golden depicts the noble qualities of the orc culture that were systematically destroyed — the clan bonds, the shamanic spirituality, the relationship with the draenei — giving players of the game a tragedy rather than a simple origin story. The novel makes the Horde's fall genuinely devastating.

Golden reads her own book, bringing an intimacy and conviction to the lore that an outside narrator might not achieve. At eleven hours she provides the necessary weight for a story about how a civilization loses itself. Her performance suits the novel's elegiac register — this is a book about endings, and she narrates it accordingly.