627 pages
English language
Published Sept. 3, 2010
Surface Detail (Culture #9)
5 stars
(2 reviews)
It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters.
It begins with a murder.
And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself.
Lededje Y'breq is one of the Intagliated, her marked body bearing witness to a family shame, her life belonging to a man whose lust for power is without limit. Prepared to risk everything for her freedom, her release, when it comes, is at a price, and to put things right she will need the help of the Culture.
Benevolent, enlightened and almost infinitely resourceful though it may be, the Culture can only do so much for any individual. With the assistance of one of its most powerful - and arguably deranged - warships, Lededje finds herself heading into a combat zone not even sure which side the Culture is really on. A war - brutal, far-reaching - is …
It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters.
It begins with a murder.
And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself.
Lededje Y'breq is one of the Intagliated, her marked body bearing witness to a family shame, her life belonging to a man whose lust for power is without limit. Prepared to risk everything for her freedom, her release, when it comes, is at a price, and to put things right she will need the help of the Culture.
Benevolent, enlightened and almost infinitely resourceful though it may be, the Culture can only do so much for any individual. With the assistance of one of its most powerful - and arguably deranged - warships, Lededje finds herself heading into a combat zone not even sure which side the Culture is really on. A war - brutal, far-reaching - is already raging within the digital realms that store the souls of the dead, and it's about to erupt into reality.
It started in the realm of the Real and that is where it will end. It will touch countless lives and affect entire civilizations, but at the center of it all is a young woman whose need for revenge masks another motive altogether.
SURFACE DETAIL is Iain M. Banks' new Culture novel, a breathtaking achievement from a writer whose body of work is without parallel in the modern history of science fiction.
Sami Sundell reviewed Surface detail by Iain M. Banks
Review of 'Surface detail' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Another installment in the loose Culture series, and one of the better ones at that - not that any of them are bad.
Surface Detail is a story about the dead, on various fronts. As usual, there are multiple storylines which, at first, seem to have nothing in common. Slowly, though, they inch themselves towards each other, until in the end, everything's clear.
Well, as clear as everything can be, this being Culture and all.
As with other Culture novels, Surface Detail has its share of awesome technology, ethics and lack of such, alien races and cryptic encounters. There's plenty of action, but at certain points, also some lull, and some sections are even positively boring. Having said that, this is one of the recently read books that has really glued me to my seat.