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Title details for The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks - Wait list

The Algebraist

by Iain M. Banks
Peter Kenny
Audiobook
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Wait time: About 10 weeks
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0 of 1 copy available
Wait time: About 10 weeks
As complex, turbulent and spectacular as the gas giant on which it is set, this novel from Iain M. Banks is space opera on a truly epic scale.
"An enormously enjoyable book, full of wonderful aliens, a sense of wonder and subtle political commentary on current events." –Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)
It is 4034 AD. Humanity has made it to the stars. Fassin Taak, a Slow Seer at the Court of the Nasqueron Dwellers, will be fortunate if he makes it to the end of the year.
The Nasqueron Dwellers inhabit a gas giant on the outskirts of the galaxy, in a system awaiting its wormhole connection to the rest of civilization. In the meantime, they are dismissed as decadents living in a state of highly developed barbarism, hoarding data without order, hunting their own young and fighting pointless formal wars.
Seconded to a military-religious order he's barely heard of - part of the baroque hierarchy of the Mercatoria, the latest galactic hegemony - Fassin Taak has to travel again amongst the Dwellers. He is in search of a secret hidden for half a billion years. But with each day that passes a war draws closer - a war that threatens to overwhelm everything and everyone he's ever known.

"Banks is a phenomenon...writing pure science fiction of a peculiarly gnarly energy and elegance." –William Gibson

"Banks writes with a sophistication that will surprise anyone unfamiliar with modern science fiction." –The New York Times

For More from Iain M. Banks, check out:
The Culture series:
Consider Phlebas
The Player of Games
Use of Weapons
The State of the Art
Excession
Inversions
Look to Windward
Matter
Surface Detail
The Hydrogen Sonata

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    May 14, 2024

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781668633090
      • File size: 557445 KB
      • Duration: 19:21:20

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Humans think in terms of time as it relates to them, but for other beings, like the Dwellers in the universe, who have a much longer life span, time is not quite the same. And with that long perspective on time, the Dwellers may have more than one secret that would be of use to humans. Geoffrey Amis manages this complex and long book with dexterity. He delivers lengthy and sometimes rambling exposition with a light touch that keeps the strands of the plot moving. His agility with pace also draws out humor, particularly in dialogue with artificial intelligence (computers). His subtle touch with the characters and sense of engagement with the action are infectious. J.E.M. (c) AudioFile 2006, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from August 22, 2005
      Banks (Look to Windward
      ) pulls out all the stops in this gloriously over-the-top, state-of-the-art space opera, a Hugo nominee in its British edition. In a galaxy teeming with intelligent life-forms and dominated by the intensely hierarchical society known as the Mercatoria, the Ulubis system has been cut off from the rest of civilization for over a century as its citizens impatiently await the arrival of a starship carrying an artificial wormhole to replace one destroyed in a previous war. Fassin Taak is a Slow Seer, an anthropologist who studies the Dwellers, the ancient, enigmatic species that inhabits gas giants throughout the galaxy, including Nasqueron in the Ulubis system. Fassin's research contains clues to the existence of a secret wormhole network, one operated by the Dwellers and free from the repressive control of the Mercatoria. Unfortunately, the monstrous ruler of a nearby star system has also learned of this discovery, as has the Mercatoria itself. Now two enormous battle fleets converge on Ulubis, and Fassin must undertake a quest deep into Nasqueron to uncover the Dwellers' secret. This is an enormously enjoyable book, full of wonderful aliens, a sense of wonder and subtle political commentary on current events. Agent, Mic Cheetham
      .

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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