iain m banks

I have read all of Iain Banks novels and I read Whit first of all when it was first published in 1986. I re-read it over the weekend to write this review. Whit is a very whimsical story, and is a great escape. It is set in the lowlands of Scotland, this time close to Sterling where in an old...

I have read all of Iain Banks books, and this book the Steep Approach to Garbadale returns to some of his favourite themes, board games, excessive wealth, and scotland. The hero of this story is Alban who was born into wealth as part of the Wopuld clan, but has turned his back on a world he...

I have read all of Iain M Banks Books and this one Matter #8 in the Culture series is a good strong tale of familial strife set against the background of impossible planet sized structure. To recap The ten books of the Culture are: Consider Phlebas, 1987; The Player of Games,1988; Use of...

The Song of Stone is Iain Banks 9th novel published in 1997, but he had already written another 8 Science Fiction novels under the name Iain M Banks, so a consistent output of almost two book a year at least over ten years. As with most of the non-Science Fiction this book is fairly political...

This is completeness sake. ISBN 0316225088 (ISBN13: 9780316225083) I have read all of Iain M Banks books, and this boxset brings together the first three books in The Culture series. It is interesting to speculate that when Iain M Banks wrote these story he definitely was not thinking about...

I have read all of Iain M Banks books, and I read Use of Weapons the month it was published in 1990. I have a signed hardback edition which Iain signed for me in the famous Nostalgia and Comics in Birmingham. I then covered the book with sticky back plastic to preserve it and of course ruined it...

I have read all of Iain M Banks books, and I read Look to Windward the year it was first published in paperback in 2001. This is a Culture book. In fact more than that it is the fifth Culture book. To recap The ten books of the Culture are: Consider Phlebas, 1987; The Player of...

Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks My rating: 5 of 5 stars I have read all of Iain M Banks books, and I read Consider Phlebas the year after it was first published in 1988, and it has stayed with me ever since. This is a Culture book. In fact more than that it is the first Culture book. It...

I have read all of Iain Banks novels and this one is one of my favourites. The Business from where the book gets its name is a centuries old concern, at one point in the novel it is suggested that its history stretches back as far as the Roman Empire, but the story postulates the compelling...

I have read all of Iain Banks Books, and unusually perhaps this one I have always enjoyed. Canal Dreams tells the story of Hisako Onoda a Japanese Cello super star prodigy who when invited to play the major capitals of Europe refuses to fly, and instead chooses to take a ship from Japan. She...

Readers of SF&F nearly always have one book they reread every year. The book most frequently quoted as being the one which is reread every year is the Lord of the Rings. Famously Christopher Lee liked to reread Lord of the Rings. It is true I have read and re-read Lord of the Rings, but the...

I was wondering what you all think of the Culture's propensity to meddle in affairs (via their Special Circumstances section) of other civilsations/cultures that doesn't directly concern them. I always got the impression that the Culture Minds went out of their way to 'fix' problems in...

I've just read Look to Windward, and I have a question. WARNING - spoiler: What was the point of the storyline regarding the monkey man in the airsphere? It seems to me that the Mind was warned about the plot against the hub by the double agent in the assassins head. So the monkey man had...

23rd October 2009 04:20 AM David Allen The Culture has been a theme running through the works of Iain Banks, from as early as 1987 when it first appeared in “Consider Phlebas” to many fans of Banks the Culture is many different things and that is probably what makes for a good legend. The...

19th August 2009 04:23 AM David Allen The latest work by Iain Banks will be simultaneously released as an abridged podcast, allowing readers to read the work in twenty four easy to manage pieces. Transition marks the 25th anniversary since the publication of Iain Bank’s first novel The Wasp...

The State of the Art by Iain M Banks (2/5 stars) I was rather disappointed by this book. I think that the short story wasn’t really Banks’ strongest format (sad that I have to keep remembering to use the past tense). I found the short stories either so cryptic I didn’t understand them or...

The first Culture book i read was Excession, then Consider Phlebas. I was planning on reading The Player of Games next, then going in publication order from there. But does it really make a difference? Because, for some reason, 'Matter' has always intrigued me. I'v read up on the book and i...

Here's a link to info. Iain Banks's Blog - Asteroid Named After Iain Banks - July 04, 2013 05:04

The sad news surfaced that Iain lost his battle with cancer today. He was a great writer and his legagy lives on. I hope his journey into the next life is a safe one. God bless...

Twenty years ago a very good friend of mine, George Cairns (now a noted 3D and computer artist), made a short film about the book launch of Complicity by Iain Banks. With the recent sad news about Iain I thought I’d revisit it. Having transferred the video to a computer file, and with a little...