33 replies to this topic

[Marcus Cicero]

The book's still a long way off (October release), but the title still deserves its own thread. I nabbed these details from the 'Books of the Apocalypse thread.' The following link was kindly posted by Jussi.

Plot summary from: http://edelweiss-ass...3_WATERMRKD.pdf

Quote

It is, truly, provably, the End Days for the Gzilt civilization.

An ancient people, they helped set up the Culture ten thousand years earlier and were very nearly one of its founding societies, deciding not to join only at the last moment. Now they’ve made the collective decision to follow the well-trodden path of millions of other civilizations; they are going to Sublime, elevating themselves to a new and almost infinitely more rich and complex existence.

Amidst preparations though, the Regimental High Command is destroyed and Cossont is blamed. Wanted dead — not alive. Now, aided only by an ancient, reconditioned android and a suspicious Culture avatar, Cossont must complete her last mission given to her by the High Command — find the oldest person in the Culture, a man over nine thousand years old, who might have some idea what really happened all that time ago. Cossont must discover the truth before she’s exiled from her people and her civilization forever — or just plain killed.

I quite like the plot description. The idea of 'the oldest person in the Culture' has a lot of potential, and it sounds like Banks may be pulling back the curtain on the Culture's early days.

Learning more about subliming could be good or bad. As is, I like that it remains so mysterious to even the Culture's top minds. I doubt this will change, but the book's subject matter does seem to demand that we find out something more about it.

I've heard some people express the view that Banks should kill off the series, but I thought that Surface Detail was his best since Excession. I liked Matter but it had a weak ending and just wasn't up to his previous standards.

[MinDonner]

Yeah, his SF books have had an uptick of late, though still not as good as the early days. This one sounds kinda promising; Big Ideas and dark skulduggery is what I want from a Culture novel. I am still a bit too wary to shell out for a hardback, but having a Kindle there is now no need!

[williamjm]

Quote

I've heard some people express the view that Banks should kill off the series, but I thought that Surface Detail was his best since Excession. I liked Matter but it had a weak ending and just wasn't up to his previous standards.

I agree - I also thought Surface Detail was his best book since the 90s and showed there's still more things that can be done with the Culture universe. I wouldn't necessarily mind him doing non-Culture SF instead, but there is a risk that a new setting just isn't as interesting - I thought Transition suffered from this, although some of his older non-Culture SF has been as good as the Culture novels, particularly Feersum Endjinn.

[Marcus Cicero]

williamjm, on 10 May 2012 - 05:49 PM, said:

I agree - I also thought Surface Detail was his best book since the 90s and showed there's still more things that can be done with the Culture universe. I wouldn't necessarily mind him doing non-Culture SF instead, but there is a risk that a new setting just isn't as interesting - I thought Transition suffered from this, although some of his older non-Culture SF has been as good as the Culture novels, particularly Feersum Endjinn.

I still haven't read Transition or Feersum Endjinn. I discovered him back in December and proceeded to read 12 of his books in a row, then decided that I needed to read some other authors. I'll get back to him soon though. As for non-culture SF, I thought that Against a Dark Background was filled to the brim with potential but came out pretty rough around the edges.

[polishgenius]

williamjm, on 10 May 2012 - 05:49 PM, said:

I agree - I also thought Surface Detail was his best book since the 90s and showed there's still more things that can be done with the Culture universe.

Given the sudden massive dropoff between (imo) Look to Windward in 2001 and what followed, I've always inclined to wonder if Banks wasn't sent into a mental tailspin by September 11th. He isn't of course American and I don't know that he knew anyone involved in it, but something about the way his tone changed - he lost touch with the playful undercurrent that leavened his darker excesses, and the works seemed to become more spiteful to the characters and with less hope - seemed to suggest that to me even before I found out that his first book out after then was directly an exploration of that day.

Pure, probably unfounded, possibly unfair speculation of course. But whatever the cause was he did rediscover that humour in Surface Detail and I'm looking forward to this next book.

Edited by polishgenius, 10 May 2012 - 08:56 PM.

[Sci-2]

Quote

but something about the way his tone changed - he lost touch with the playful undercurrent that leavened his darker excesses

See also: Toby Keith.

[Nukelavee]

I like his other stuff, too - the not SF stuff.

The guy always keeps me interested in the next page.

I wasn't sure about the ending of Matter at first, but, well, I like it now.

Spoiler

I mean, seriously, it's a fairly unusual ending - that's why we don't get a lot of longish stories with sad endings- it sucks, lol.  For those characters, it was the worst possible loss they could achieve.  He can only really do that once, and he did it well.  Right up until i realized she was nothing but a chunk of skull and brain, I still expected them to get most of a win out of it.

[polishgenius]

Matter spoilers:

Spoiler

I don't mind a sad ending, but I do mind when the ending seems to make the whole endeavour pointless, which was the feeling I got from that book. It didn't help though that I'd found the rest of the book unrelentingly miserable and more than a tad boring, which didn't exactly put me in the frame of mind to look at the ending in a less critical light.

[Marcus Cicero]

Nukelavee, on 10 May 2012 - 08:47 PM, said:

I like his other stuff, too - the not SF stuff.

The guy always keeps me interested in the next page.

I wasn't sure about the ending of Matter at first, but, well, I like it now.

Spoiler

I mean, seriously, it's a fairly unusual ending - that's why we don't get a lot of longish stories with sad endings- it sucks, lol.  For those characters, it was the worst possible loss they could achieve.  He can only really do that once, and he did it well.  Right up until i realized she was nothing but a chunk of skull and brain, I still expected them to get most of a win out of it.

Spoiler

I didn't care that Matter had a bleak ending. I just that it was a structural betrayal. Banks spends much of the book building up the Oramen/Tyl Loesp plot, but then he just kills both before anything can be resolved. The Iln completely takes over the plot, which felt like a cheap attempt at heightening the tension (the world will be destroyed!). I'd liked that the book had this epic scale, highlighting great civilations and greater civilizatons behind them, while at the same time devoting page space to a relatively small and focused drama occurring in a relatively small and insignificant society. It was a good juxtaposition, ruined when Banks decided that he had to elevate the Sursaman plot to world-breaking proportions.

[Eejit]

polishgenius, on 10 May 2012 - 08:45 PM, said:

Given the sudden massive dropoff between (imo) Look to Windward in 2001 and what followed, I've always inclined to wonder if Banks wasn't sent into a mental tailspin by September 11th. He isn't of course American and I don't know that he knew anyone involved in it, but something about the way his tone changed - he lost touch with the playful undercurrent that leavened his darker excesses, and the works seemed to become more spiteful to the characters and with less hope - seemed to suggest that to me even before I found out that his first book out after then was directly an exploration of that day.

Pure, probably unfounded, possibly unfair speculation of course. But whatever the cause was he did rediscover that humour in Surface Detail and I'm looking forward to this next book.

I don't see it. I find Against a Dark Background (1993) to be much darker than any of his post-2001 books. Some of his earlier fiction stories are very grim too, like Wasp Factory.

Edited by Eejit, 11 May 2012 - 03:47 AM.

[MinDonner]

I have zero interest now in reading any of his new non-SF books, after the travesty that was Garbadale (and the review of his most recent one sound like it's more of the same). No, we really don't need any more dysfunctional upper-class Scottish families with Sekrit Incest subplots and lazy political soundbites thanks muchly.

[Horza]

I guess I should get around to reading his recent Culture stuff again, since most people seem not to hate it. But I am wary.

As one of Banks' heroes once said: "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — [pauses] — shame on you. Fool me — [pauses] — You can't get fooled again."

Edited by Horza, 11 May 2012 - 03:54 AM.

[Marcus Cicero]

Horza, on 11 May 2012 - 03:54 AM, said:

I guess I should get around to reading his recent Culture stuff again, since most people seem not to hate it. But I am wary.

As one of Banks' heroes once said: "There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — [pauses] — shame on you. Fool me — [pauses] — You can't get fooled again."

Which of his SF books did you object to?

[JayDubya]

Excession is probably my favorite as well, but generally I've liked them all, except maybe Use of Weapons, which I did not care for.

I think I liked Matter a bit more than Surface Detail.    Yeah, the ending was a bit discontinuous from the main plot, but I still thought it was potent.

[williamjm]

Marcus Cicero, on 10 May 2012 - 07:45 PM, said:

I still haven't read Transition or Feersum Endjinn. I discovered him back in December and proceeded to read 12 of his books in a row, then decided that I needed to read some other authors. I'll get back to him soon though. As for non-culture SF, I thought that Against a Dark Background was filled to the brim with potential but came out pretty rough around the edges.

I agree that AaDB could have been better, I'd probably say it was comparable in quality to some of the weaker Culture novels (Consider Phlebas, for example). I think one of the problems with it was that I found it difficult to care much about most of the characters, which I think is often the problem with his weaker novels, I liked the characters in Feersum Endjinn more which I think is one of the reasons I preferred it. Transition also had characters that weren't as interesting as they should have been, also the world-building was disappointing - you'd think that in a story about visiting multiple parallel universes at least one of them might be interesting, but apparently not.

Quote

Given the sudden massive dropoff between (imo) Look to Windward in 2001 and what followed, I've always inclined to wonder if Banks wasn't sent into a mental tailspin by September 11th. He isn't of course American and I don't know that he knew anyone involved in it, but something about the way his tone changed - he lost touch with the playful undercurrent that leavened his darker excesses, and the works seemed to become more spiteful to the characters and with less hope - seemed to suggest that to me even before I found out that his first book out after then was directly an exploration of that day.

He obviously felt strongly about some of the political events around that time, he famously cut up his passport and sent it to Tony Blair as a protest against the Iraq invasion, so there might be something to your theory.

[Calibandar]

First chapter has been posted.

http://io9.com/59440...ag=book-excerpt

I also note Amazon is saying they will have it in stock as of Tuesday the 25th of September.

[Galactus]

I didn't mind Matter. But then again, I never had particularly high expectations. He writes OK stuff, but hardly amazing.

[Werthead]

Reviews of The Hydrogen Sonata have been positive. Particularly interesting is the fact that it delves into the founding of the Culture (and why one race instrumental in that founding chose not to join it) and also the fact that it sounds like it's much lighter than Matter, with more of a sense of humour.

[Marcus Cicero]

Calibandar, on 22 September 2012 - 12:43 PM, said:

First chapter has been posted.

http://io9.com/59440...ag=book-excerpt

I also note Amazon is saying they will have it in stock as of Tuesday the 25th of September.

I loved this. Classic Banks humor.

[Lexicon Devil]

sciborg2, on 10 May 2012 - 08:47 PM, said:

See also: Toby Keith.

No thank you