Reviewed by Richard Saar
This review has taken me a while to write, I read the book more than twelve months ago now. It’s certainly not the book that’s stopped me writing this review, rather it’s me. You see this was Iain M. Banks last novel before his untimely passing in 2013. Iain M Banks was quite simply my favorite sci-fi author, his Culture universe is the future utopia that I’d most like to end up in, the place I’d happily work the rest of my days to create here on Earth.
So it is with great
sadness that I finally review The Hydrogen Sonata, his last Culture novel.
For those who aren’t
familiar with the Culture; it’s a post-scarcity society where technology has
evolved to such a degree that no member of the Culture wants for anything… ever.
In fact Culture resident’s holidays consist of staying at home for a month each
year, taking a break from their constant travel, partying and adventures. It’s
vast, old, unbelievably powerful and advanced, and is made up of thousands of sentient
races both organic and digital; in the Culture Artificial Intelligences of all
kinds are equal rights citizens.
However, as awesome
as the Culture is, it’s actually kind of anarchic; there are no leaders or a government
of any real kind… perhaps the Minds, super intelligent AI’s that run the ships,
orbitals and habitats come closest, but only when they can be bothered.
It’s in this
universe that we focus on the Gzilt, a civilisation that thought about joining
the Culture about 10,000 years prior to events in the Hydrogen Sonata, but didn’t
as their whole civilisation is organised in a fairly strict military structure.
Kind of the opposite of the Culture, where you basically do what you want as
long as it doesn’t harm others.
So the Culture and
the Gzilt have remained friendly all this time, but now the Gzilt want to
Sublime; that is ascend to a new plane of existence and leave behind the physical
realm. In the Culture universe this is not uncommon as civilisations that reach
their zenith in the physical realm, often as a whole, seek new levels of existence.
The Culture, by the way steadfastly haven’t sublimed when they quite frankly
could have long ago, they like the physical universe.
However, the
Subliming of the Gzilt is not going at all smoothly, there’s remnants of the
Zilhdren civilsation who’ve already sublimed, who as it turns out hold some
really big secrets about the Gzilt, and have been meddling in their affairs for
some time.
Then there are the
Scavenger civilisations who are circling the Gzilt wanting to scoop in and claim
what they leave behind, except that the Culture wants to make sure the technology
is not captured by anyone that could seriously unbalance the Universe.
And lastly there’s
the whole Sublime thing itself, it’s a one way trip and no-one who’s sublimed
has ever bothered communicating with those left behind. So, there’s a scramble
to get any kind of information about what actually happens to a civilisation
when they Sublime, from those joining in and those watching.
This is Space Opera
writ large.
There’s a
breathtaking host of characters, human, alien, AI. There’s an abundance of
quite frankly awesome Sci-Fi tech, there’s plot and sub-plot, and quite frankly
sometimes it was hard to keep up. That was not a complaint.
The writing is so
assured that you can’t help but be swept up in the grand scale and drama of the
story, I can’t fault it in anyway.
However as always,
for me at least, the stars of the story are the Minds. The massively powerful
AI’s are either slightly mad, or completely off the scale and these god-like
entities bring humour, hubris and a bit of willful deceit in a way that only
Banks can do.
It’s just such a
pity that it’s the last installment; I’ll console myself re-reading all the other
culture novels and savouring them again.
I personally would
like the believe that Iain M. banks was actually a Culture Special
Circumstances agent just living here on Earth for a short time and that he’s
now back on his home GCU or Orbital partying his time away ready for his next
adventure.
Source: The best
kind… gift!
IBR Rating:
★★★★★
Recommendation: I could not more highly recommend this book for
sci-fi fans of all types, it’s an outstanding example of a universe spanning
Space opera and you won’t read better.
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