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newnumber6Apparently it's a Banksapalooza!
Finished: The State of the Art, by Iain M. Banks (short story collection)
Thoughts in the cut, not especially spoilery.
It's a short story collection, so as usual, there are some decent stories, and some not so good. The title story, actually more of a novella, deals with a Culture ship and its agents visiting and evaluating Earth (circa the 1970s), deciding on whether to contact them or not. It's perhaps the most direct questioning of the Culture that I've read in Banks own work, dealing with people who think Earth might be better off without it, but it's still rather mixed. It's interesting, but not great. Among the other stories, most were too short to really get into or interested in, one seemed like the author using a story as a cheap attempt to frame a polemic against what he sees wrong with certain types of thinking (even if that's not the intent, that it feels that way is still a problem), and there were a couple that were not bad. Really though, only the Culture-related ones interested (of which there are I believe about 3 or 4) me all that much.
Apparently Paul Cornell (Doctor Who writer and writer of the excellent but now cancelled Captain Britain and MI13 comic) did a radio adaptation of the title story. I might have to track it down just to see what he did with it.
Started and Finished: Feersum Endjinn, by Iain M. Banks.
Started: Inversions, by Iain M. Banks
Minor plot-outline related spoilers beyond the cuts, but nothing extensive. The story deals with Earth of the far future, which has fallen somewhat technologically and sociallyeven though life is sustained through legacy systems. There's a planetary computer network and data-backups which give everybody multiple lives, VR immersions, etc. The major problem (aside from a general fear of AIs, despite needing them to function), though is that there's no longer any spaceflight, and a big problem is approaching - a big interstellar cloud of dust is going to blot out the sun in the near future. Various characters each get their own thread of the story as forces conspire to try and solve the problem, and other forces conspire to stop them for their own reasons.
Those of you who've read some Banks may have noticed a particular tendency of his. He likes to construct elaborate, creative methods of execution and/or torture. For those of you who wonder if this is reflective of a certain sadistic streak of Banks himself may find their best evidence here.
For, not only is one of the 'threads' of the story written entirely phonetically (narrated by a character who has trouble writing in any other way), but at one point in that thread, the character encounters a character with a lisp! That has to be an attempt to inflict deliberate torture on a reader.
Those aspects of the story are painful, but the core of the rest of the tale is interesting. I think I would have liked it more if he didn't use the phonetic-trick though.
Finished: The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks
Started: Against a Dark Background, by Iain M. Banks
Again, plot-outline-style spoilers behind cut. Short version: Bored at times, maybe a bit overlong, but some interesting ideas. Not my favorite of his, but worth a read if you like his other stuff.
The Algebraist is not a Culture book, but many themes are similar, themes Banks seems to return to a lot, and, of course, they're themes I enjoy particularly myself. They appeared in Feersum Endjinn, too, and I think in particular reading them at the same time made them seem rather similar.
Anyway, the main thrust of the plot involves a distant star system, isolated from the rest of 'civilization' when their wormhole was destroyed, and expecting an attack. The main character, a scholar who researches an ancient, very laid-back species of gas-giant Dwellers billions of years old who've already explored the whole galaxy, is sent on a mission to find something that may be a hoax - a key to a long-rumored list of wormholes the Dwellers themselves have.
Again, there are some interesting ideas (the 'Universal religion' that is the standard in the empire, even if I can see a major flaw in its reasoning, certain alien types and life cycles, and Banks pet themes), the story fails a little in two areas. One, the Dwellers themselves, and the mystery involving them. For all that he talks a good game in setting up how fundamentally different the Dwellers are and think, whenever one interacts with them (one particularly amusing scene where a despot attempts to threaten some aside), they seem just like average people, albeit with a big alien form. As to the mystery of the list itself, I figured it out quite early in the story, or at least most of it (the specifics eluded me), so I have a hard time believing it could have escaped billions of people looking for it. The other problem is that it is, at times, a little long and dull. It's a hefty book, about 700 pages I think, and there were a number of times I found myself skimming. These were usually parts set in the gas giant itself so it may be my problem that I have trouble visualizing how everything works and so get board with long journeys within it.
Finished: The State of the Art, by Iain M. Banks (short story collection)
Thoughts in the cut, not especially spoilery.
It's a short story collection, so as usual, there are some decent stories, and some not so good. The title story, actually more of a novella, deals with a Culture ship and its agents visiting and evaluating Earth (circa the 1970s), deciding on whether to contact them or not. It's perhaps the most direct questioning of the Culture that I've read in Banks own work, dealing with people who think Earth might be better off without it, but it's still rather mixed. It's interesting, but not great. Among the other stories, most were too short to really get into or interested in, one seemed like the author using a story as a cheap attempt to frame a polemic against what he sees wrong with certain types of thinking (even if that's not the intent, that it feels that way is still a problem), and there were a couple that were not bad. Really though, only the Culture-related ones interested (of which there are I believe about 3 or 4) me all that much.
Apparently Paul Cornell (Doctor Who writer and writer of the excellent but now cancelled Captain Britain and MI13 comic) did a radio adaptation of the title story. I might have to track it down just to see what he did with it.
Started and Finished: Feersum Endjinn, by Iain M. Banks.
Started: Inversions, by Iain M. Banks
Minor plot-outline related spoilers beyond the cuts, but nothing extensive. The story deals with Earth of the far future, which has fallen somewhat technologically and sociallyeven though life is sustained through legacy systems. There's a planetary computer network and data-backups which give everybody multiple lives, VR immersions, etc. The major problem (aside from a general fear of AIs, despite needing them to function), though is that there's no longer any spaceflight, and a big problem is approaching - a big interstellar cloud of dust is going to blot out the sun in the near future. Various characters each get their own thread of the story as forces conspire to try and solve the problem, and other forces conspire to stop them for their own reasons.
Those of you who've read some Banks may have noticed a particular tendency of his. He likes to construct elaborate, creative methods of execution and/or torture. For those of you who wonder if this is reflective of a certain sadistic streak of Banks himself may find their best evidence here.
For, not only is one of the 'threads' of the story written entirely phonetically (narrated by a character who has trouble writing in any other way), but at one point in that thread, the character encounters a character with a lisp! That has to be an attempt to inflict deliberate torture on a reader.
Those aspects of the story are painful, but the core of the rest of the tale is interesting. I think I would have liked it more if he didn't use the phonetic-trick though.
Finished: The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks
Started: Against a Dark Background, by Iain M. Banks
Again, plot-outline-style spoilers behind cut. Short version: Bored at times, maybe a bit overlong, but some interesting ideas. Not my favorite of his, but worth a read if you like his other stuff.
The Algebraist is not a Culture book, but many themes are similar, themes Banks seems to return to a lot, and, of course, they're themes I enjoy particularly myself. They appeared in Feersum Endjinn, too, and I think in particular reading them at the same time made them seem rather similar.
Anyway, the main thrust of the plot involves a distant star system, isolated from the rest of 'civilization' when their wormhole was destroyed, and expecting an attack. The main character, a scholar who researches an ancient, very laid-back species of gas-giant Dwellers billions of years old who've already explored the whole galaxy, is sent on a mission to find something that may be a hoax - a key to a long-rumored list of wormholes the Dwellers themselves have.
Again, there are some interesting ideas (the 'Universal religion' that is the standard in the empire, even if I can see a major flaw in its reasoning, certain alien types and life cycles, and Banks pet themes), the story fails a little in two areas. One, the Dwellers themselves, and the mystery involving them. For all that he talks a good game in setting up how fundamentally different the Dwellers are and think, whenever one interacts with them (one particularly amusing scene where a despot attempts to threaten some aside), they seem just like average people, albeit with a big alien form. As to the mystery of the list itself, I figured it out quite early in the story, or at least most of it (the specifics eluded me), so I have a hard time believing it could have escaped billions of people looking for it. The other problem is that it is, at times, a little long and dull. It's a hefty book, about 700 pages I think, and there were a number of times I found myself skimming. These were usually parts set in the gas giant itself so it may be my problem that I have trouble visualizing how everything works and so get board with long journeys within it.
