Excession By Iain M Banks Book Review
It is no secret that Iain M. Banks is my all-time favorite science fiction writer. I often exclaim, to anyone too slow to run away, how the Culture series is severely underrated and needs to be at the front of the zeitgeist when it comes to greatest sci-fi books and series. Even in front of Dune or the Robot books or Hyperion. The shining star of this series is Use of Weapons, which came out in the 80’s, but is still a near perfect story that holds up even to modern times. (If you want to hear more about that book, check out my podcast, Kendall Bookworms).
Excession is the 5th book in this series. When I put this book in line for rereading, I remembered almost nothing about it. It hadn’t stuck with my like many of the other books in this series. That said, even not being at the top of the cream, it still out competes most other books you will find in this genre. It is just so well written and plotted and paced that you will have a hard time putting it down.
The Culture books are written in a way that you can read them out of order. But this book is one where it should not be your first foray into the Culture Universe. You will need some background context to understand what is going on and why some of the dialog or motivations are as genius as they are.
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The plot of this book amounts to a spy versus spy type thriller. But it doesn’t come off that way for much of the book. We are in the heads of a variety of different “humans” that have motivations that have little to nothing to do with what the ship Minds are trying to put into play when an unknown super-intelligence suddenly appears in a deserted part of the galaxy.
Multiple civilizations are all rushing towards this “Excession” even as the initial ships that encounter it are obliterated or disappeared. This tension starts off a minor war where you get the extreme abstraction that these Minds live in when they look at the millions of people enslaved or killed as a minor factor of war. These god-like beings that are basically how we, in current times, are a logical, benevolent way of our current AI programs turning out. And they have become the Culture’s “ruling class” that make decisions and plot at the rest of the civilizations expense. You get a real feeling of how those machinations of behind the throne powers work in today’s society. Except we are told that it is, for the most part, for the actual good of the many.
As I read deeper into the story, much of what I had forgotten came back to me. The perpetually pregnant woman, a scorned lover, who is unable to move past the transgression from her beloved living in isolation for 40 years. The lover that scorned this poor woman living his best life as a horny bachelor. A real “man’s man” who likes to play at politics but in actuality is more of a playboy who wastes his days away in new sensations. You have the snobby youth that thinks her shit don’t stink until she finds out how out of depth she really is when called upon by shady organizations. You have the hermit that just wants to live a life of isolation but becomes the first casualty in a pointless war.
Then there are the myriad of ship Minds that we follow. In most of the Culture novels, the Minds and drones are some of the more interesting characters. They typically have humorous names, especially the war ships. In this book, they are a much larger focus than in other novels. This, I think, is what hurts the novel the most. It is often hard to keep track of all the ships that are real players. And many of the ships have multiple names, making even hard to know who is who. The longer exposure also takes away much of the mystery and perceived genius that is associated with them. Instead, they come off as more mundane in their motivations and desires. Egos rule the day. Which, in some aspects, is a great depiction of those in power. But with all the confusion as to who is who, I often found myself confused as to what importance was being said and what was mere satire or blustering.
As I said, if this is your first foray into the Culture series, maybe find one of the other books first. I recommend Use of Weapons or Player of Games. Those are going to be much easier to get into. That said, this is still a fantastic book. There is a lot going on that really makes you think. There are some boring bits and some confusing times, but overall the payoff at the end is excellent and has a lot to say. While I don’t think any of these books could ever be made into a powerful screen adaptation, thus limiting the audience, I do believe Iain M. Banks should be in the top lists of anyone that reads science fiction or wants to talk about the great writers of the last 40 years. Basically, I can’t stop gushing about this author (just as I do for Terry Pratchett) and I think everyone should read his books. All of them.
