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Oh, so many to choose from. I have only read The Wasp Factory from his real world stuff.
From the Sci-Fi stuff [i]The Algabrist[/i] is a great book with good pace but lots of detail. [i]Matter[/i] was a great start and end (if hurried) with lots of nothing in the middle filled up with unnecissary species and travel arrangements. I will re-read it at some point but not my fave.
[i]Consider...[/i] is a great book with amazing scope and quite an accomplishment for a first book in a style. [i]Player...[/i] and [i]Look to Windward[/i] are both great and interesting.
The outstanding ones have to be [i]Excession[/i] and [i]Use Of Weapons[/i]. Excession for all its high tech stuff and ships minds (including the ammusing bit where a Mind starts trolling a private "web forum" discussion!) has a lot of human story. Same for "...Weapons" which had me crying at the end. Probably the book the wife will end up reading as its most like a regular fiction book.
Ok choose 1? Use of Weapons for a Culture novel and The Algebrist for another universe.
I.m.B fans might like this [url=
film[/url] too, shame it was not developed further.
SSP
Not really that into the non sci-fi ones personally. I love Excession, Consider Phlebas and The Player of Games. I agree about the ending of Matter - bit disappointing.
I really like the Culture novels - I find the concepts really interesting. Some of the ones that are a bit more fantasy than sci-fi I wasn't really that into.
Read a couple of Alistair Reynolds novels which were interesting but not in the same league imo.
singlespeed punk: love the movie.
I also thought that Matter was a let-down at the end. I really enjoyed Excession, and also 'Inversions', with the guessing game of whether or not it is a Culture novel, but 'Use of Weapons' absolutely blew me away, not just the story, but the way that the narrative structure enhanced the story. Every time I read it, I notice something new. But I'm really enjoying 'Transitions' and think it's the best thing he's done for some time.
has anyone read dan simmonds hyperion/ endymion also epic mind boggling stuff but Ilium is my fave of his - its homers iliad with robots shakespearean monsters and the odd dinosaur
grumm wrote, "Read a couple of Alistair Reynolds novels which were interesting but not in the same league imo."
Reynolds can't pace a novel to save his life, he's got some good ideas and he can write but some bits just dribble on and on... The lighthugger chase scene in, er, Absolution Gap, is it? With Clavain and the pigs chasing the conjoiner... Goes on for about a hundred pages and all it says is "The ships keep going faster and faster, occasionally fighting a bit, then one of them breaks".
Others to check out for the Banks fans might be Michael Marshall Smith, and Kim Stanley Robinson.
Just finished the Algebraist again, brilliant. TBH I much prefer his Sci Fi stuff tough I read everything he writes.
Harry_the_Spider - Member
Not read any of his sci-fi stuff (I don't work in IT), but his other stuff is very good.
Over the years I've met so many people who don't read sci-fi [i]because[/i] it is sci-fi. But they'll read general fiction - which is made up anyway.
So you'll read one version of make believe but not another.
You like one set of books by an author, but because you've got preconceived ideas about a particular genre, you won't read his other novels? Is that plain weird or just narrow minded?
You are missing out on a huge number of excellent books if you limit yourself that way.
Oh, and to return to subject, I've always loved IB. He can be a bit variable but he is always readable, whatever the subject. I'm looking forward to reading Transition next week, buying it on Monday.
Be easier to list the ones I don't like - Whit, A Song of Stone.
Thought they were a bit rubbish but loved pretty much everything else.
Espedair street by far the most re-read.