Although it is not a Culture books, there are some winks to Banks' preferred technologies. Here he takes the well used subject of humankind on earth at the end of time and gives it a spin. I thought I saw a couple of winks to Gene Wolfe, but may be it is in my eyes. We all have reasons to love Feersum Endjinn, reasons that are often very personal and very subjective. My own is: dyslexia for the win! (... In case anyone wonders, yes, it's a very personal and very subjective reason) Feersum Endjinn is the only scifi novel I have ever read with a dyslexic main character. Bascule writes as a dyslexic person without complexes writes. Oh yes, it makes for a challenging read (particularly if English isn't your first language and/or if you have yourself some dyslexia symptoms), on the other hand it will feel so liberating to any dyslexic person. But, it is also very daring and only a writer as confident and established as Banks could try something like that. Nonetheless it's more than just a writing exercise: it makes Bascule's voice truly his own. Feersum Endjinn is told from four alternating perspectives, and much of the pleasure of this book is slowly piecing together who the narrators are, what situations they face, a slow reveal of the very strange and complex world that surrounds them, and finally the ways in which they are connected, which all gets elegantly tied together at the end. One pet peeve of mine is that even the best written books sometimes have disappointing endings, so I was relieved to see the story resolved to my satisfaction. This is even more important for stand-alone novels. The characters are some of the finest Banks as ever written, and if you have never read any book by him, let me tell you that there is some competition! Banks had a remarkable gift: he made us care about each and any of them by making them incredibly relatable and so very human, even those you slightly despise, even those whose actions seem at first completely incoherent. All of them seem as complex as any real person.

Iain Banks, Feersum Endjinn - Review - THE MIDDLE SHELF - A Iain Banks, Feersum Endjinn - Review - THE MIDDLE SHELF - A

The book is set on a far future Earth where the uploading of mindstates into a world-spanning computer network (known as "Cryptosphere", "the Data Corpus", or simply "Crypt") is commonplace, allowing the dead to be easily reincarnated, a set number of times, first physically and then virtually within the crypt. The crypt has become increasingly chaotic, causing much concern within society. Much of the story takes place within a giant, decaying megastructure known as the "Fastness" or "Serehfa" built to resemble a medieval castle, in which each "room" spans several kilometers horizontally and vertically, and the king's palace occupies one room's chandelier. The structure used to be a space elevator, left behind by the ancestors of those who remained on Earth, with the circuitry of the crypt built into its structure. The world is in crisis as the Solar System is slowly drifting into an interstellar molecular cloud ("the Encroachment"), which will eventually dim and then destroy the Sun, ending life on Earth. Set on an almost unrecognizable far future Earth, this book is Iain. M. Banks' second non-Culture SF endevour. Earth is past it's golden hour, and technology has fallen into the realm of mysticism and ritual. The story follows four different people living in the remains of what can only be described as an disproportionately scaled super-city as they are reluctantly dragged into a plot involving a threat against the entire Earth. They face a conspiracy of powerful individuals with their own agenda, not necessarily interested in averting the looming threat. And you,’ Gadfium whispered. Then she took the other woman’s hands and gazed urgently into her eyes. ‘Now; old friend […]’ Anyway, this doesn't sound quite as strange as it actually is. The point of view for each chapter changes from character to character, and one young lad, Bascule, who turns out to be central to the plot is writing his experiences down in a journal. Turns out this fellow is somehow inherently unable to learn to spell. He 1/2 2 put down evryfing zactly as it sownds. If u fink reeding dis paragraf is iritating, tri reeding hole chaptirs uv it. Its hard on yor brane. & den, jist wen u fink ur geting thi hang uv it, he meets an uther charactir wif a lisp!!

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This is good. It is as intelligent as the more contemporary 'The Bridge' (which so far is still my favorite novel coming from Iain Banks that I have yet read - I am still wading through his books), it is not set in the Culture series, but as a stand alone sci-fi novel with a very unique aspect about it, just as all his novels contain. However, my main misgiving (which also stopped me reading the book the first time I attempted it several years ago) was the phonetically written sections by a character called Bascule. However, this attempt of re-reading was a success, and whilst most would be put off from the 'text-speech' at first, it does become easier as the book progresses and you get used to it. It took me a while mind, but the character who speaks in this manner also has a comedic value too. Give it time and you get used to it, but it does make the novel slower to read. The story is told by the weaving of four almost concurrent narratives, including an "infamous" pseudo-phonetic writing. It is made harder by the intercalation of the text within normal texts, as it is not so hard when you get used to it. This is a serious work of the imagination. It doesn't really fit in the Culture novels, but it's definitely some Hard-SF with a beautiful vision of a far old Earth filled with so many Big Ideas. We've got everything from allotted resurrections, ghosts solving their own murders, enormous and layered virtual realities, virus-ridden fantasy realms, and a Chaos filled with AIs. If that isn't enough, the Earth is going through some major changes. You know... like destruction. Even more physical Big Ideas keep flowing in and I reveled in it all. :) I’ve had Riddley Walker sitting on my TBR shelf since 1985 when I saw it was listed in David Pringle’s SF: The 100 Best Novels. Sometimes I hear it grumbling… Reply Readers who’ve read Russell Hoban’s classic post-apocalyptic tale Riddley Walker will find this literary technique familiar, and it will either draw you in over time or turn you off completely. He seems to be speaking in a Scottish (or North London?) accent, and it’s very distinctive and charming if you can understand it.

FEERSUM ENDJINN | Kirkus Reviews

First of all, I'm a big Iain Banks fan. Keep that in mind when I tell you that this book is unreadable.

Feersum Endjinn? Really? C., you do realise I read it when it was first published and that I still love it as much as on the first day?" The novel takes place in 4034. With the assistance of other species, humans have spread across the galaxy, Man, this book was hard to get through... about a third of it is written from the point of view of young Bascule, who uses an idiosyncratic orthography that is part cellphone text and l33tspeak, and part Charlie Gordon in his pre-savant phase. In its way, this is quite a sustained achievement, but having to sound out the narrative for those parts word by word does rather interrupt the flow.