Consider Phlebas by Iain M. Banks
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Book Reviews of Consider Phlebas
Book Review: The Blockbuster Syndrome
Summary: 1 Stars
Several of the negative reviewers have remarked that "nothing happens" in this book. Actually, although I can understand why they feel this way, the fact is that this book is about nothing more than "things happening." However, it feels subjectively as though nothing is happening because the characters have no depth. Horza is a lab-rat responding to stimuli. Is he actually a person with thoughts and feelings? Nothing above the most superficial. The author himself is focused on nothing but the externals: impressive technologies, fight scenes, war, social concepts, and torture. At the end, it seems as though "nothing has happened" because no actual person seems to have deeply experienced anything or learned from anything. Banks' writing style, mechanically speaking, is not bad, but his vision is completely superficial. It reminds me of the current trend for big, garish, special-effects blockbuster movies to take over the cineplexes and crowd out anything thoughtful. Will science fiction writing suffer the same idiotic fate? I hope not!Book Review: Wow..
Summary: 1 Stars
Usually when I find a book to be "bad" I sort of figure it out in the first chapter or so, and while I admit I put this book down a few times it finally drew me in.. but when the book started dropping plot-lines, and then when it finally got to the "end", I was so freaking upset I literally trashed the book... I mean, I would be embarrassed to suggest this book for anyone else to read.
I LOVE reading, but the very fact that this book ends with nothing having happened in the entire story-line makes me feel like my mind was taken advantage of, my time wasted and I feel dumber for just having read it. If I could rate a book lower than one stars, well, I would do so.
I have read a few other books in the culture since then, at the pressure of some friends, and it is like they are written by different authors.
How did this book get published?
Book Review: Unpleasant and uninteresting
Summary: 1 Stars
I'd heard really good things about this series, but I hated this book. The main character is an unlikeable jerk who keeps casually killing people. There's a really nauseating and pointless interlude with cultists who only eat things that are both disgusting and not actually food. The story takes forever to get where it's going. The author really wants to show off his world-building, but the world is kind of awful. I managed to make it through about half the book only because I was stuck with nothing else to read and no English-language bookstores.
Maybe the other Culture books are better, but this one thoroughly turned me off to the series. I won't trust an author who crammed so many unpleasant things into half a novel not to do it again.
Book Review: Doesn't appeal to all sci-fi fans
Summary: 1 Stars
I bought this book based on the reviews here, and I got halfway through but couldn't finish it. I understand many people enjoy it, but for me it was poorly written both at the detail level and the overall story level. I didn't care about any of the characters, I didn't find most of the situations to be believable by sci-fi standards, and I didn't find any new ideas in it. I do like sci fi, especially classics: Azimov's Foundation Trilogy, Heinlein's Starship Troopers, and Vinge's The Witling. Good sci fi makes me want to visit the universe they describe and learn more about the alien races and technology. This book didn't inspire any of that curiosity in me.Book Review: Very Disappointing
Summary: 1 Stars
I know we all have our own tastes, but I really can't understand all the glowing reviews. Did we read the same book?
Nothing happens in this book. And while I can appreciate a "slice of the story" tale, this book isn't that. Aside from being told how important the missing Mind is, we're never really told why it's important, and it's retrieval is tedious and boring.
I won't rehash all the other low-star reviews, just do yourself a favor and skip this book. I personally can't get enough of Peter F. Hamilton, but there are many more exciting reads out there.