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To celebrate the release of Iain M. Banks' novel Matter, we've put together this handy primer for you on the Culture, the pan-galactic civilization whose members and ex-members are the subjects of so many Banks novels, including Matter. Not only do we have a rundown of every single Culture novel, but we've also got some important excerpts from an obscure essay Banks wrote in 1994 about the ideas behind the Culture universe. Get ready to enter a world where ships are sentient, humans live for half a millennium, and living on a planet is probably the most backward thing you can do. More »
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With Iain M. Banks' new Culture novel, Matter, coming out in February, it's a good time to revisit one of his lesser-known Culture novels, Inversions. One of the reasons why this book may not be as instantly-recognizable in the Culture pantheon as his space operas Consider Phlebas and Look to Windward is that it's not set in outer space. In fact, it's set entirely on a semi-Medieval planet where a Culture agent has been sent to study the natives — and has gone native herself. More »
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