by Iain M. Banks
‘The State of the Art’ is an interesting collection of short stories, all of which differ greatly from each other. I enjoyed them all except ‘Scratch,’ which descended into the arrogant nonsensical writing Banks displayed in Excession. I liked the Culture novella, which the collection takes its na...
bookshelves: fraudio, sci-fi Read in March, 2009 BBC Radio 4 Afternoon Play - The State of the ArtPaul Cornell's dramatisation of the science-fiction novel by Iain M Banks. A spaceship from The Culture arrives on Earth in 1977 and finds a planet obsessed with alien concepts like 'property' and '...
This was my favourite Iain M Banks book. The title story/novella tries to address the romanticisation of the way we live on Earth, with benign spies from the much more advanced utopian Culture civilisation created by Banks 'going native', and committees struggling to decide whether to make contact w...
Sort of in the Culture series, sort of not quite. This is the (first?) collection of [a:Iain M. Banks|5807106|Iain M. Banks|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1352410520p2/5807106.jpg] short stories, paired with a Culture novella which gives the book its title. Taking up half the book The...
Gah. Me find new author. Me read all books now.
The first two stories are OK, but nothing special.The third one is quite funny. I can't count the number of times I've seen a hapless spaceman get rent limb from limb by a bug-eyed monster. But what's the monster's motivation? Banks comes up with a lovely answer.#4 is also a nice perspective flip in...
BBC Radio 4 Afternoon Play - The State of the ArtPaul Cornell's dramatisation of the science-fiction novel by Iain M Banks. A spaceship from The Culture arrives on Earth in 1977 and finds a planet obsessed with alien concepts like 'property' and 'money' and on the edge of self destruction. When Agen...
One story I quite liked. The rest were mediocre. The novella (of which the book is named after) was generally quite dull and predictable in it's mysanthropic analysis. What should have been an interesting premise (the Culture finally discovers Earth) leaves the reader quite unsatisfied. This (and th...
Iain Banks explores his love of gimmick over narrative in this collection of stories. The novella is interesting.A few years later, the only thing I can remember aside from the general plot of the novella is a short story that contemplates the difficulty of masturbating in a space suit.
A unique short-story venture from Banks...most of these pieces seemed either a little odd and unfinished or preachy rants. Only a few of these stories are actually part of the Culture world. The title story is the largest and best thought out piece, and as a voracious reader of the Culture serie...
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