A good price for Matter

[Bascule]

Hi all,

I'm looking forward to the big day next year when I can get stuck in again to a Culture novel. 7 years is far too long!

I just pre-ordered my copy of Matter from Waterstones. Seemed like good value so I thought I'd mention it here. Currently £12.59 delivered but I got it for £10.70 using one of those codes available from the VoucherCodes web site.

 

[easygoingman]

Hi there
I love the Culture stories/universe as well (but do have some issues)
Sounds like a good price, but it's hard to fit a hardback in my bag.
What if Iain kills off most of the Culture in this story?

 

[easygoingman]

I didn't even know Matter was now out until I saw it on Amazon


Has anyone here read it yet?

 

[Rane Longfox]

Not out till the 7th of Feb here in the UK, I don't think. Amazon might be shipping already though I suppose, they often get things a bit early.

There's an extract of the prologue here though, which looks encouraging

 

[easygoingman]

Why thanks Rane! The extract looks promising indeed. I might just have to order it this week I love 9/10 of Iain's Sci Fi

 

[Mad Tam McC]

I've just read the prologue and I heard or read an interview some years back from Iain Banks that said he wanted exactly that scenario as the opening of a book.

 

[Lucien21]

Not out till the 7th of Feb here in the UK, I don't think. Amazon might be shipping already though I suppose, they often get things a bit early.

There's an extract of the prologue here though, which looks encouraging

Actually I bought Matter today.

It seems to be out.

I got it for Half Price (£9.49) in Waterstones Edinburgh.

 

[Rane Longfox]

Half price even before the official release date? Ouch

 

[Tillane]

Amazon also have it in stock, for £10.99. No surprise that they're undercutting the RRP already, but I'm surprised that Waterstones are.

 

[clovis-man]

Amazon in the U.S.A. will have it available on Feb. 27th for $17.00 if you pre-order.

Jim

 

[Tillane]

Okay, so I picked up a copy at Waterstones Newcastle today, for £9.49 as Lucien said. And asked the girl behind the counter how come it was out earlier than slated - and why they were selling it so cheap.

Apparently, the release date was brought forward so the book would be in contention for awards it would otherwise have missed. Sounds...vaguely plausible, I guess, though she couldn't tell me which ones. She did say that Stephen King's latest has also been brought forward slightly for the same reason.

As for the price, well I did at least get an honest answer: "because we can afford to sell it for that price and be sure that we'll shift enough copies to make our profit target." How wonderfully capitalist of them...

 

[Rane Longfox]

You would have thought Banks is a high-seller, so they could afford to keep their prices up, really. Ah well.

 

[Strife]

when I asked about Matter, my sister told me she had subscribed to Orbit newsletter (on their website)

i guess the Culture novels are another must read... something I should get acquainted with....

 

[Rane Longfox]

Absolutely! Love the Culture novels, they're a cut above the rest, they really are

I can't even work out which is my favourite, I'd probably have 3 or 4 in my top 10 books at least!!

 

[Lord Soth]

I'm about half way through Matter now, and I must admit i'm not overly impressed.

Its been a long time since I have a read a culture novel, and I suppose I was expecting more 'sci-fi' and less quasi-fantasy. I'm also not too enamoured by (probably petty I know) the silly names character names the linguistic background depth of said names - even some of the prose started to annoy me

/sighs

Ahh well - perhaps my tastes have changed since I last read Culture novels, I think I'll dig out some of the old ones from my loft and see if mt current expectations were not overly 'rose tinted'

On a different note I just finished Gridlinked which i mostly enjoyed, not sure about the ending and the reasoning behing the second plotline though - needed fleshing out a little. However I am very happy that I can look forward to another 6+ books in the same universe. Already have The Line of Polity on my shelf (next to the Dragon Master Omnibus by Chris Bunch - that any good?).

For me I hope Matter improves in the second half!

 

[Rane Longfox]

I'm about half way through Matter now, and I must admit i'm not overly impressed.

Its been a long time since I have a read a culture novel, and I suppose I was expecting more 'sci-fi' and less quasi-fantasy. I'm also not too enamoured by (probably petty I know) the silly names character names the linguistic background depth of said names - even some of the prose started to annoy me

/sighs

Ahh well - perhaps my tastes have changed since I last read Culture novels, I think I'll dig out some of the old ones from my loft and see if mt current expectations were not overly 'rose tinted'

On a different note I just finished Gridlinked which i mostly enjoyed, not sure about the ending and the reasoning behing the second plotline though - needed fleshing out a little. However I am very happy that I can look forward to another 6+ books in the same universe. Already have The Line of Polity on my shelf (next to the Dragon Master Omnibus by Chris Bunch - that any good?).

For me I hope Matter improves in the second half!

That's a shame. Banks does sometimes get a bit too immersed in his worlds without keeping notice of the fact he's writing sci-fi, that's true. Inversions comes to mind.

Glad you're enjoying Asher. I think he's Banks' natural heir In The Skinner and Brass Man, he's got two of the best sci-fi novels I've ever read

 

[iansales]

But wasn't Inversions deliberately written to not resemble a sf novel? Why else would Banks include clues that point to it being a Culture novel?

 

[Lord Soth]

That's a shame. Banks does sometimes get a bit too immersed in his worlds without keeping notice of the fact he's writing sci-fi, that's true. Inversions comes to mind.

Glad you're enjoying Asher. I think he's Banks' natural heir In The Skinner and Brass Man, he's got two of the best sci-fi novels I've ever read

Yeah thanks to that other thread im looking forward to the (mostly) undiscovered Polity universe

So, what does everyone else think of Matter? Am I alone?

 

[iansales]

I've not picked up a copy yet, although I've heard a lot of good things about it.

 

[gully_foyle]

Is it available over there already? Second week in Feb is all I could get from Minotaur in Melbourne. Should I interpret that as between the 4th & 8th (when I will be in Melbourne). Or the 11th and 15th (when I won't).

p.s. apologies for the edits, trying to get used to the peesy little keyboard on my new stinkpad.