Where to Begin: Iain Banks

With M is the same bloke, right?

I have got, but not read, Dead Air.

Espedair Street
The Crow Road
The Wasp Factory
The Bridge

Destroy:

Dead Air
Complicity
Canal Dreams

The Bridge, is something I've lived... (let alone the fact that one of the characters in it is called "Steven Grout"!)

Complicity is fine, mr xposter... Canal Dreams is a book.

My favourite non-M books are Crow Road, Espedair Street and Whit, which seems to be a non-typical selection given what other people have said in this thread. The Bridge is fairly good, too. I couldn't get into Song Of Stone. The Business sounded like a promising idea, but turned out to be a bit rubbish in the end.

'Dead Air' may as well have been written by Tony Parsons.

'The Business' is a nothing of a book, leaves you wondering why you bothered.

'Complicity', 'The Wasp Factory', 'Espedair Street' and (in particular) 'The Bridge' are all essential reads.

Of the Sci-Fi stuff I'd recommend, well, all of it that I've read. 'Feersum Endjinn' is a bit of an acquired taste I suppose. 'Consider Phlebas' and 'Player of Games' are both excellent and most of the others aren't far behind.

M:
Start with 'Player of Games', then 'Consider Phlebas', then 'Look to Windward'. 'Feersum Enjinn' is absolutely extrodinary, but takes patience. Ah, fuck it, they're all good.

Non M:
Walking on Glass, The Bridge, Song of Stone.
The Wasp Factory, Complicity and The Crow Road are all overrated.

I'd love to get into his SF stuff. Consider Phelbas has sat, half-completed, in my bookcase since 1991. I think it might finally be time to have another crack at it.

Yeah, The Bridge is very good. I didn't mention that before.

I'm in the minority who liked Dead Air, but anyone around that time who bagged the shit out of Bush automatically got my vote.

Espedair Street, The Crow Road, Walking On Glass (if this is the one with the three different stories that kind of connect in a semi-sci-fi way at the end) are pretty good.

The Wasp Factory is overrated, but has a good twist at the end.

Whit was a load of shite.

I haven't read any of the sci-fi ones. I started to read another one about a woman who belonged to a secret one world government (or something) but it was utterly crap - just loads of descriptions of fast cars, and helicopters and stuff. Sometimes he comes across as an ugly, geeky, middle-aged man, with a car obsession, who keeps trying to be down with the kids and getting it painfully wrong.

I hate that opening line. It's so "Woo! Ha ha crazy first line you've got to read on!"

I don't think Iain Banks is very good.

"Then Papa deflated and we had to patch him up using a bicycle inner tube repair kit. As if that wasn't enough, Uncle Rampak melted and Aunt Widdle drowned in the resulting puddle."

I like your latest photos, Alba. I have no other way of communicating this fact at the moment, being emailless.

This is very true, but he gets away with it because he's funny and usually original.

Forgot to mention: Culture Ship Names! 'Fate Amenable To Change', 'Attitude Adjuster', 'Size Isn't Everything', 'Prosthetic Conscience', 'I Blame Your Mother', 'Unfortunate Conflict Of Evidence', etc.

I've never tried his scifi stuff which may be better.

Yup. The Business

Is it really as bad as stated upthread?

I'm surprised I didn't write more on this thread first time round. Whit was the first one I read, and I liked it, even though it feels like an easy read without that much content. I loved The Bridge and Espedair Street, but couldn't get into Song Of Stone (despite it being the one where the BDSM leanings I'm sure he has are most visible). The Business is rubbish, but enjoyable nevertheless - when I read the synopsis I thought that a very good book could have been made from it, but The Business isn't it.

As for the sci-fi, the first one I read was Player Of Games, and - as someone who isn't a big sci-fi reader - I thought it was very good indeed. To be honest I can't remember which of the sci-fi books I have and haven't read - Feersum Endjinn, definitely, and the one with the giant flying whale creatures (Use Of Weapons?). Apart from Player Of Games, their names seem to blend into one.

it started a bit like a Belle and Sebastian song in prose

Pointless trivia moment: when Radio 4 adapted Espedair Street, back around 1997-8, the vocalist they used for Frozen Gold's songs was Monica Queen, B&S's guest vocalist on Lazy Line Painter Jane.

> I think he's only publishes The Algebraist (sci-fi) since Dead Air, which is typically full of great crazy ideas, but a little leaden in pace.

have just read the algebraist (and have just restarted ...Dark Background, signed and dated copy, watford 1995). after 4 or so years of thinking that alastair reynolds writes a bit like iain m banks i now think that iain m banks writes a bit like alastair reynolds (AR is big on the acceleration / deceleration required for space travel, huge space travel epics, a lot like the algebraist)

(there's also been a small book on whisky since dead air, but that's it, i think. that, dead air and the business are the only things i haven't read)

first line of wasp factory is about checking the sacrifice poles.

rip ian.

i loved your stories.

fuck cancer.

RIP, fuckin hell.

RIP

Such a shame.

dug out my copy of The Bridge and as well as the usual receipt (Tewkesbury Bookshop 13-09-89 £4.99) it contained a postcard of the Forth Bridge and the train tickets my one trip to scotland. haven't read it since 1997, which i must remedy. the SF books get re-read at the rate of about one or two a year, every year.

Aw man, he had no time left at all. RIP. And fuck cancer.

How sad, and fuck cancer in the teeth.

this looks good - http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b02xf70k

Iain Banks is one of Scotland's most popular and critically acclaimed novelists. In April 2013, he revealed he has terminal cancer, and is unlikely to live beyond a year. In this exclusive television interview, he talks in depth to Kirsty Wark about his career, life and facing up to death.

(Wednesday 21:00 for an hour)

bbc scotland only... (although iplayer too i guess)

RIP :(

RIP

fuck

probably not the place for this, but i am over seeing tyrannical pieces of shit live well into their 80s/90s and by-all-accounts good people lose their lives so very early

Only ever read 'The Crow Road', but what a book it is. Can still recall how I visualised passages of it now, a few years later. I have another of his books waiting to be read ('Aspedaire St'? I'm not by the bookcase just now), struggle to find a reason why I haven't already read it and more other than laziness. I did worry after 'The Crow Road' that I wouldn't like any of his other books as much.

Anyway, it's sad to hear of his passing.

Read a lot of his stuff during standard grades/highers/csys and loved them, especially The Crow Road and Complicity. He seemed like a really nice, down to earth fella too. RIP.

Was wandering up by the actual real Espedair Street on Friday afternoon and wondered how he was getting on :-(

fuck cancer

one of the greatest sf authors of all time

As somebody said yesterday, all of his books are different ..

Easily my favorite author, and I still have some of his to catch up with.

My new favorite is Transition, previously it was, ooh, probably each time I read a new one..

Fuck. RIP banks, RIP the culture.

RIP. Loved his stuff as a teen.

I hope some other talented SF writers get permission from his estate to write more Culture books, it's a concept that would lend itself very well to a shared universe. Maybe Ken McLeod could give it a bash.

One of the constant comforts during my entire adult life has been the knowledge that there was always a new Iain/Iain M. Banks novel underway.
RIP. And fuck cancer.

that scottish bbc2 thing isn't showing up on iplayer. surely it has appeal this side of hadrian's wall.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b02xf70k/Iain_Banks_Raw_Spirit/

wasn't there this morning. honest.

ordered the last two M books the other day and they've already arrived. both weighty hardbacks, £18 for the pair.

Watched this today, sad to say that the sections from The Quarry sound tiresome and ranty, imo. The ascension of this style is when I got off the bus (Dead Air iirc)

I read Stonemouth over a weekend last month, and that was breezy fun where you just basically hang out with this character as he reconnects with old friends and gets into scrapes. It's lightweight but it's an enjoyable read.
I need to read more M. novels.

M>>>>non-M imo.

Have non-M. novels traditionally outsold M. novels?

yes, he quoted 5 to 1 ratio in a recent post (which it's now, of course, impossible to find)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transition_(novel)

On the cusp of "M", some countries had it, some did not.

My favourite one of recent vint.

not impossible

http://friends.banksophilia.com/28-2/

20 May 2013
...
"I think I’ll only comment on any of the posts if there’s something factually wrong mentioned in them, and so far the only point I can remember is one where an ex-neighbour of ours recalled (in an otherwise entirely kind and welcome comment) me telling him, years ago, that my SF novels effectively subsidised the mainstream works. I think he’s just misremembered, as this has never been the case. Until the last few years or so, when the SF novels started to achieve something approaching parity in sales, the mainstream always out-sold the SF – on average, if my memory isn’t letting me down, by a ratio of about three or four to one. I think a lot of people have assumed that the SF was the trashy but high-selling stuff I had to churn out in order to keep a roof over my head while I wrote the important, serious, non-genre literary novels. Never been the case"
...

A last interview.

there's a review show special which appears to be culled from the bbc2 scotland interview but which is only half an hour long.

watched said bbc2 scotland thing and the heart-breaking thing is that he looks fine, a bit whiter than i remember him, beard and hair-wise, but otherwise fine. he also plays some of his music. he makes it for his own amusement and if anyone else likes it then it's a bonus (which, in this case, is fortunate)

http://minorplanetcenter.net/blog/sci-fi-author-iain-m-banks-gets-asteroid-named-after-him/

close, but no cigar. should've had the m in the name imo.

also

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0074t1q

Crow Road repeats on BBC4 start wednesday.

http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=176060&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=2333693

!!!

Dennis Kelly could be a good fit for this. Fingers crossed.

much Banks talk lately on the yearly polls. watch this bump die a death...

Feersum Endjinn, i have re-read ever, but i remember being impressed at the level of detail he squeezed into the 'dialect' this race of things lisps, this one thing additionally has a cold and you can hear the difference. fun, but hard work at times.

I guess now I should check my read
/unread list against the recommendations here...

Are the final two Culture novels worth reading? I found Matter a bit of a slog.

I gave up after Inversions, but The Algebraist is worth a try for a non-Culture SF novel. Shame he never followed up with more books in the same universe.

I gave up after Inversions

Just before Look to Windward, which is cracking.

I have a grudge against Look to Windward for betraying the ideals of the culture. Only read Matter once I think but I recall it as a cracking read, it's high on my list for a reread.

Hydrogen sonata is, remarkably for a culture novel, a snooze fest.

Crow Road documentary and repeat of the series starts tonight on bbc4