A review by outcolder
Use of Weapons by Iain M. Banks

4.0

The psychic war Zakalwe fights against himself in the flashbacks was far more interesting than the mission that takes up half of the book. Also, I would have liked to read more of the Culture justifying not only it's a grey-area morality but also the hierarchy the machines live under. Lastly, although the author acknowledged and excused it, the different societies the Culture meddles with are all fairly similar. The galaxy is filled with places just like Earth in various points along a fairly standard 'progress' based version of world history, and sooner or later these places will give up war and capitalism and join the Culture. It's like Banks is trying to take the Earth to a kind of AA meeting where recovering capitalist societies tell about hitting bottom in apocalyptic wars before becoming hedonistic utopias ruled by hyper-intelligent machines. That is a worthy project, but after the first two books, I know he can make his aliens more alien and less like equally matched blocks in some kind of historical-pastiche miniature war game.