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A review by theaurochs
The State of the Art by Iain M. Banks
4.0
The Great Banks Re-Read! Book #4.
Completely the opposite to Use of Weapons, I actually enjoyed this one more than I remembered! The stories have a good range, although there's precious few in the collection.
The State of The Art, novella contained within, is really quite poignant and shows off some of the best Culture antics we've seen to date, plus some of the heavier philosophical dives where Banks's wit and wisdom really shine through. It is packed full with arguments for and against the human race; this time tackling the problem of us head-on rather than couched in metaphor like the majority of the Culture stories- here we are directly visited by these higher beings, and judged for better or worse.
The shorter tales are mostly intriguing- Road of Skulls paints a great vignette of an interesting world; Odd Attachment really is just an amusing idea; Cleaning up is a fantastic piece of cold war satirical fiction; and Descendent is deeply haunting tale of loneliness and losing hope- probably my favourite of the bunch.
Honestly had a genuine wobble after UoW when I thought there was a chance that some weren't as good as I had recalled, but after this I'm feeling much better and very optimistic about Excession, which is up next.
Completely the opposite to Use of Weapons, I actually enjoyed this one more than I remembered! The stories have a good range, although there's precious few in the collection.
The State of The Art, novella contained within, is really quite poignant and shows off some of the best Culture antics we've seen to date, plus some of the heavier philosophical dives where Banks's wit and wisdom really shine through. It is packed full with arguments for and against the human race; this time tackling the problem of us head-on rather than couched in metaphor like the majority of the Culture stories- here we are directly visited by these higher beings, and judged for better or worse.
The shorter tales are mostly intriguing- Road of Skulls paints a great vignette of an interesting world; Odd Attachment really is just an amusing idea; Cleaning up is a fantastic piece of cold war satirical fiction; and Descendent is deeply haunting tale of loneliness and losing hope- probably my favourite of the bunch.
Honestly had a genuine wobble after UoW when I thought there was a chance that some weren't as good as I had recalled, but after this I'm feeling much better and very optimistic about Excession, which is up next.