The Culture of Iain M Banks

[wibity]

I really enjoy his books and the interesting universe he creates. Especially the A.I's sardonic take on life. I love the tech ideas his universe is filled with such as the ability to self-gland any drug required for a situation. Its not your normal crash,bang,wallop type of stories and they are actually character driven. Still saying that when one of the ships/minds needs to take action, I'd not want to be around to be on the end of it.

I've just recently finished reading Surface Detail and the abominator-class " Falling Outside The Normal Moral Constraints" is fantastic as is the ships avatar Demeisen. I find the names carry plenty of gravitas.

I wonder what others think to the books/universe that Banks creates? Alas there will be no more books from him in the future but he still wrote probably the best book I have ever read... "use of weapons" with an ending so shocking the I wanted to through the book at the wall while cursing and shouting "no way!... no ******* way!!!" ..... It was that shocking.

Anyone else a fan of Banks's culture novels?

[Wyrminarrd]

I've read a bunch of them and so far found all of them to be good. My favorites would be "Consider phelpas" and "Player of games".

[wibity]

its been a while since I read player pf games... I remember it as being very good and giving a real feel for culture tech and the culture universe.

Consider Phelpas was fab for a great story and a look at the culture from another civilizations perspective.

for full out sci-fi tech though, the abominatior class ship in surface detail along with the rest of the tech shown in the book and excession with the minds getting busy and upto all sorts of tricks are probably best.

for a crazy story though feersum ennjin was lots of fun. I didn't find the phonetic writing too much of a problem either. I jut started by sounding it out and after a couple of pages it seemed to flow easy enough.

[Wyrminarrd]

I think I have "Surface detail" sitting in my to read pile. I was a bit disappointed with "Excession" since the book wasn't really about what I expected.

[wibity]

Give it a go. It takes a little while to warm up and then it is excellent. you'll need a bit of a strong stomach when reading the description of the hells ( no give away as it mentions the hells on the back of the book). After finishing I instantly re-read it again to get the extra details and see how everything linked together. It was straight-forward on the first read, but the 2nd read added an extra level I think (although you lose the shocks of the twists of the first read).

Give it a go and I think you'll find it right up there with the other culture novels.