The Player of Games (Culture)
by Iain M. Banks
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Book Summary Information
Author: Iain M. BanksEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2008-03-26
ISBN: 0316005401
Number of pages: 416
Publisher: Orbit
Book Reviews of The Player of Games (Culture)
Book Review: An Absorbing, Exciting, Science Fictional Exploration of Gamesmanship from Iain M. Banks
Summary: 5 Stars
"The Player of Games" remains one of the best in distinguished British author Iain M. Banks's highly literate, quite sophisticated, "Culture" space opera series of novels. It is also among the earliest in the series, and one that is certainly most notable for its engrossingly in-depth study into the character of Gurgeh, the Culture's premier master of every game - especially those devoted to strategy - known to this long-lived space-faring human civilization. At the very pinnacle of his success, Gurgeh is bored and restless, until he accepts the seemingly impossible challenge of mastering Azad, the very game of life played by the ruling elite of the relatively primitive, autocratic, almost totalitarian, Empire of Azad, located in one of the distant Magellanic Clouds. It is a game that is rich not only in its intricate strategy, but also, in elaborate deception; an intense game whose very outcome may mean life or death for anyone playing it, especially Gurgeh. Told in incandescent, quite pyrotechnic, prose, Banks' novel comes across as a futuristic Graham Greene thriller set amidst more conventional - if elaborately descriptive - space opera settings. A splendid science fiction novel that is not merely a major landmark of Anglo-American science fiction, but one which ought to be reckoned as high literary art written by one of the foremost writers of fiction - in any genre - in the English language.
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