The plot of the novel centers around the titular Excession, an inexplicable alien entity from another universe that’s even more advanced than the Culture. (Banks is also a fan of Significant Capitalizations, if you haven’t noticed). Not only do we see things from the perspective of the Minds, but the novel also features the Affront, a race of bug eyed floating tentacle-monsters with a typical sci-fi ‘warrior culture’ schtick going on. One of Banks’ strengths as a sci-fi writer is his ability to create truly alien worlds, and populate them with appropriately bizarre creatures. All of this is done under the guidance and stewardship of the Minds, hyperintelligent, mostly-benevolent AI’s. They have The Culture has replicators, unlimited energy, teleporters, faster than light travel, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and more- and they use all of it. The Culture is a spacefaring civilization of trillions of people, who can do pretty much anything they want to. Basically, think Star Trek, only Turned Up To Eleven (and without that pesky Prime Directive business). It’s a fitting title, given this is a Culture novel.īanks wrote most of his sci-fi novels in “The Culture” setting it’s fairly unique, in that it’s a transhumanist, post-scarcity, liberal/anarchist utopia, that works. “Excession” is a term used in the novel for something that’s ludicrously overpowered- like an aircraft carrier sailing up to a tropical island that’s still in the stone age. It’s also worth noting that Banks has mentioned that his literary works outsell (and effectively subsidize) the sci-fi ones. And so, Banks is kind of a ‘crossover’ author, in that his novels can be considered respectably literary, even if they’re about aliens and spaceships and stuff.

After he wrote three critically acclaimed literary novels, he convinced his publisher to publish his science fiction work, under the name Ian M. You can tell this is a “literary” sci-fi novel, because it has a spaceship on the front that’s not shooting lasers.īanks is an interesting writer, in that he got his start writing “real people literature,” as Ian Banks.

The culture excession