I really like Iain M. Banks’ (or Iain Banks’, I can never figure out when he uses his middle initial and when he doesn’t, although apparently it indicates when he’s writing “sci-fi” or something) writing. He is best known for this series of related novels and short stories set in a universe called simply “The Culture”, where machine life is the dominant (and most human) fom of life.
This is a separate story, complex and baroque in its telling and plotting. We have a universe where every rock it seems is inhabited and claimed by some form of intelligent life. Humans are lately arrived on the scene, and space travel is mostly accomplished by a network of wormholes. The dominant form of life are the Dwellers, who inhabit the atmospheres of gas giants, can live for millions if not billions of years, and when not consuming various narcotics or engaging in pointless, formal wars regard their most recent set of companion species with a sort of detached amusement.
The main tension of the novel is driven by two events: the accidental discovery of a clue to the locations of a vast wormhole network, constructed (and forgotten!) long ago by the Dwellers, and the unprovoked aggressive war by a particularly nasty “bad guy” character. While the novel starts slowly, the pace builds quickly. Banks plotting is tight, characters well-drawn, and his ideas are first-rate. This is also a rather funny book, with laugh out loud moments (guaranteed to puzzle your bed-partner since most sci-fi is rarely amusing).
Sci-fi books like this rarely sound very good in summary. This is a big, geeky, complicated space opera, and a lot of fun. If you’re intruigued by Banks’ books, this is a great place to start. I’d also recommend “Excession”, which in my mind is the most entertaining of the Culture books.
Banks reminds me a bit of Alastair Reynolds, another Scot sci-fi writer. Both write these big, smart, audacious books that I like very much. But Banks is funnier, and I think would be more fun to share a pint with.