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Book Details

Excession

50% complete
1996
2013
1 time
See 14
Prologue
1 - Outside Context Problem
2 - Not Invented Here
3 - Uninvited Guests
4 - Dependency Principle
5 - Kiss the Blade
6 - Pittance
7 - Tier
8 - Killing Time
9 - Unacceptable Bhavior
10 - Heavy Messing
11 - Regarding Gravious
12 - Faring Weel
Epilogue
Book Cover
Has a genre Has comments Has a year read Has a rating In my library In a series 
1446
 Culture Series*
#5 of 10
Culture Series*   See series as if on a bookshelf
A loosly related series of science fiction books that all take place in the same universe.  Written by Iain M Banks.

1) Consider Phlebas
2) The Player of Games
3) Use of Weapons
4) The State of the Art
5) Excession
6) Inversions
7) Look to Windward
8) Matter
9) Surface Detail
10) The Hydrogen Sonata
Copyright  1996
To the memory of Joan Woods
A little more than one hundred days into the fortieth year of her confinement, Dajeil Gelian was visited in her lonely tower overlooking the sea by an avatar of the great ship that was her home.
May contain spoilers
'Oh, I could give it a try,' the avatar said.
Comments may contain spoilers
Another culture book.  Read this just after Dispatches from a Bitter America and while reading The Sign of the Four.
Synopsis not on file
Extract not on file

 

Added: 31-Jan-2015
Last Updated: 29-Jan-2023

Publications

 02-Feb-1998
Bantam Books
Mass Market Paperback
In my libraryI read this editionOrder from amazon.comHas a cover imageBook Edition Cover
Date Issued:
02-Feb-1998
Format:
Mass Market Paperback
Cover Price:
$7.99
Pages*:
499
Read:
Once
Reading(s):
1)   9 Jan 2013 - 6 Mar 2013
Cover Link(s):
Internal ID:
1491
Publisher:
ISBN:
0-553-57537-6
ISBN-13:
978-0-553-57537-8
Printing:
9
Country:
United States
Language:
English
Credits:
Paul Youll  - Cover Artist
Iain M. Banks's brilliant speculative fiction has transported us into worlds of unbounded imagination.  Now he takes us on the ultimate trip - to the heart of a cosmic puzzle....

Diplomat Byr Genar-Hofoen has been selected by the Cuture to undertake a delicate and dangerous mission.  The Department of Special Circumstances - the Culture's espianage and dirty tricks section - has sent him off to investigate a 2,500-year-old mystery: the sudden disappearance of a star fifty times older than the universe itself.  But in seeking the secret of the lost sun, Byr risks losing himself.  There is only one way to break the silence of millenia: steal the soul of the long-dead starship captain who first encountered the star, and convince her to be reborn.  And in accepting this mission, Byr will be swept into a vast conspiracy that could lead the universe into and age of peace... or to the brink of annihilation.
Cover:
Book CoverBook Back CoverBook Spine
Notes and Comments:
Orbit edition published in Great Britain / 1996
Bantam trade edition / February 1997
Bantam mass market edition / February 1998
Ninth printing based on the number line

All Covers for this edition of the series

 01-Jan-2011
Orbit
Trade Paperback
In my libraryOrder from amazon.comHas a cover imageBook Edition Cover
Date Issued:
Cir 01-Jan-2011
Format:
Trade Paperback
Cover Price:
£9.99
Pages*:
455
Cover Link(s):
Internal ID:
2476
Publisher:
ISBN:
1-857-23457-X
ISBN-13:
978-1-857-23457-2
Country:
United Kingdom
Language:
English
Two and a half millenia ago, the artifact appeared in a remote corner of space, beside a trillion year-old dying sun from a different universe.  It was a perfect black-body sphere, and it did nothing.  Then it disappeared.

Now it is back.

'Banks is a phenomenon... wildly successful, fearlessly creative' - William Gibson

'Thrilling, affecting and comic... probably the finest scienc fiction he has written to date'  NEW SCIENTIST

'Banks has rewritten the libretto for the whole space-opera genre'  THE TIMES

'Gripping, touching and funny' TLS

'The story is vital and urgent and has a brilliantly subtle resolution... wildly enjoyable'  INTERZONE

'A dizzying adventure'  DAILY MAIL

'Explosive but tender'  SUNDAY TIMES
Cover:
Book CoverBook Back CoverBook Spine
Notes and Comments:

Related

Author(s)

Iain M Banks  
Birth: 16 Feb 1959 Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland, UK
Death: 09 Jun 2013 Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland, UK

Awards

1996British Science Fiction AssociationBest Novel Winner
1997Britsh Fantasy SocietyAugust Derleth Award Nominee
*
  • I try to maintain page numbers for audiobooks even though obviously there aren't any. I do this to keep track of pages read and I try to use the Kindle version page numbers for this.
  • Synopses marked with an asterisk (*) were generated by an AI. There aren't a lot since this is an iffy way to do it - AI seems to make stuff up.
  • When specific publication dates are unknown (ie prefixed with a "Cir"), I try to get the publication date that is closest to the specific printing that I can.
  • When listing chapters, I only list chapters relevant to the story. I will usually leave off Author Notes, Indices, Acknowledgements, etc unless they are relevant to the story or the book is non-fiction.
  • Page numbers on this site are for the end of the main story. I normally do not include appendices, extra material, and other miscellaneous stuff at the end of the book in the page count.






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Presented: 29-Mar-2024 09:01:18

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