Best Banks Book?

DeVore

been reading Iain (M) Banks for some time now and I love most of his stuff. Its occasionally hit-'n'-miss but when he hits he really hits!

Personal favourites are:
Excession, Player Of Games, The Wasp Factory

Least favourite:
The Bridge (bit too long winded and weird)
Consider Phleabas (just didnt do it for me, though other people I know thought it was brilliant!)

I havent read everything by him yet so I was wondering which of his other stuff people enjoyed?

DeV.

yellum

The Wasp Factory has to be in the tops list. What a debut.

Use of Weapons is my fav Sci Fi. By Banks.

Nevyn

I prefer his Sci/fi to his pure fiction.

Best culture book it is very hard to choose between
Use of Weapons and Player of Games.

I still cant finish Feersum Endjinn, the phonetics hurt my brain after a page or two.

But I really enjoyed Against a Dark Background
for Iain Banks females chars are wonderfully 3d and as guts and glory as the guys.

DapperGent

If you stick with Feersum Endjin you start getting used to the phonetics and it's a pleasure to read, just like Trainspotting I guess. Hard work at the start though.

For his Sci-Fi stuff I'm torn between Excession and Use of Weapons for a favourite. I think I'd go with the latter, Excession is a pure joy to read but Use of Weapons is dark and affecting. Almost as much so as The Wasp Factory.

Reading Inversions and "getting it" is hugely rewarding too.

On the non-scifi side besides The Wasp Factory only The Crow Road and Walking on Glass have really grabbed me. Walking on Glass is wonderful, only Banks could have written it.

Best Banks: Use of Weapons.

It's a credit to him that the choice is so hard.

Krusty_Clown

Without a shadow of a doubt, The Wasp Factory is my favourite Banks book..

Thought 'Consider Phlebas' was worthy of a mention too though.. 'Look to Windward' wasn't quite as entertaining..

'Whit' was superb and very funny - highly recommended..

Reading 'Excession' at the moment, and it could be a contender for my personal favourite..

dudara

There's no doubt that the Wasp Factory is an outstanding book.

As for his sicence fiction, "The Player of Games", and "Consider Phlebas" are genre-defining. "The Use of Weapons" is another great one.

However, he does seem to have some duds, ones that while being good, just don't live up to his previous excellent works. He had a book a while back called "Inversion" that I wasn't too much a fan of.

echomadman

Favourites
Iain M Banks: Use of weapons.

Iain Banks: Whit or The wasp factory.

I liked The Bridge aswell. I fail to see how anything the man writes can be classified as "too wierd"

I've yet to read one i didn't like, but i did find a song of stone to be hard work, most likely due to my mental state at the time rather than the book itself.

eske

Couldn't agree more about Ian Banks in regard to when he hits he REALLY hits hard.

I like the bloke even more since the article in the Sunday Times last week that said
1. He makes ridiculous lists ( he had a list in his pocket at the time he was interviewed of his entire CD collection)
and 2. he had to throw out his copy of civilization III since he found himself up at 4am playing.

It also said his latest book is non fiction - a collection of drinking stories somewhat autobiographical.
It sounded good.

DapperGent

Originally posted by eske
1. He makes ridiculous lists ( he had a list in his pocket at the time he was interviewed of his entire CD collection)
and 2. he had to throw out his copy of civilization III since he found himself up at 4am playing.

Read that too, the bit about Civ3 was hilarious.

Sometimes I wish he'd just concentrate on writing the Scifi stuff, I'm looking forward to his new book, though I hope he counts it as a non-scifi book which would make the next one "M"ed.

I just love his scifi.

plastic membrane

Love all banks book. I try and base my life around The Crow Road. and i usually fail miserably.

tba

I found all his books great, with the exception of "Against A Dark Backgroud" which I could just not finish.

catspring

i read the wasp factory over the summer and really enjoyed it.
it was the first of bank's books that i'd read.
it's a bit disturbing in places :eek: but i think it adds to the book.
i think the crow road is knocking about the house somewhere, must dig it out one of these days.

CuLT

Slightly long (apologies),

I have to say that I'm not a big fan of Banks currently, but I've only read a couple of his books.

The first book of his that I read was excession which I was told is a bad starting point, but the blurb intrigued me .

Not as difficult as I had anticipated to get into, I found the main problem was that I thought the story wasn't balanced out properly, the end came too quickly and it felt kind of sqeezed in.

The next book I *attempted* to read was "The Bridge" but within a couple of pages my worst fear had been confirmed;
the whole thing was going to be written in the bloody present tense and I *DETEST* that style of writing.
The only thing I can read is first or third person past participle ( I think that's what it's called) and I'm sometimes reluctant on first person, unless it's necessary (detective-type genre for instance).

I read "The Business" quite happily, avidly in fact, but I was immensely disappointed at being copped out of any sort of conclusion.

My favourite writer of sci-fi, perhaps of all, is Peter F. Hamilton.
I have the Night's Dawn trilogy and the short story collection based in the same universe.
Have to say, the most amazing piece of writing I have ever read.
He deals with every aspect that I could have hoped him to deal with, somehow. The influence and evolution of religions and various idealogies, the expansion of humanity into space with ethnic streaming for ease of colonization, radically differing ways of life;
Combined with an extraordinarily intricate plot, detailed characters and races (The introduction of only a small number of species is a much welcome relief from the mutitudes of Star Wars and Star Trek);
And of course all the techie stuff I could ever want .

Currently reading through them again while working through the short stories.

I'd like not to lose faith in Iain Banks as I must be missing out on something due to his extremely apparent popularity.
The books of his that I've read just... lack many of the aspects that I find in Hamiltons work.

Enlighten me.

echomadman

Use of weapons was the first Iain M Banks book I read, and it remains my favourite.

After reading it i went out and bought pretty much every Banks book I saw.
Excession as you've found out is not an easy read unless you're quasi-familiar with the "culture's" history and general attitudes. Consider Phlebas and The Player of Games are also good introductory reads.


As for the Iain banks novels try Whit, my sides ached from laughing when i was reading it.

tba

Originally posted by echomadman

...Excession as you've found out is not an easy read unless you're quasi-familiar with the "culture's" history and general attitudes...

I dont know about that, Excession was the first book I read by banks and it hooked me.