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Description edit
Iain M. Banks, the international bestselling author of The Player of Games and Consider Phlebas, is a true original, a literary visionary whose brilliant speculative fiction has transported us into worlds of unbounded imagination. Now, in his acclaimed new novel, Banks presents an... read more
Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit
Characters edit
- Perrund: One of the top concubines of King Quience
- Oelph: A faithful assistant to the Doctor and a spy for someone high in the ranks.
- DeWar: The bodyguard of the Protector
- King Quience: The King of Haspidus and one of the main characters in the story of Oelph and the Doctor.
- Doctor Vosill aka the Doctor: The personal doctor of the King. She is a foreigner from a land called Drezen.
- Lattens: The Protector's only son.
- Sechroom: One of the characters of a fictional land called Lavishia. When mentioned, always has a feeling that this person may be DeWar's own self in the story.
- Hilti: The second character from the fictional land of Lavishia. Is portrayed as Sechroom's cousin.
- Adlain: The second-in-command of King Quience
- Duke Walen: Add a description of this character.
- Duke Quettil
- Polchiek
- Skelim
- Duke Ormin
- Munnosh
- Berridge
- Duke Ulresile
- Wiester
- Feulecharo
- Nolieti
- Master Ralinge
- Ralboute
- Ruleuin
Quotes edit
-
“Truth, I have learned, differs for everybody. Just as no two people ever see a rainbow in exactly the same place -- and yet both most certain see it, while the person seemingly standing right underneath it does not see it at all -- so truth is a question of where one stands, and the direction one is looking in at the time.”
The Narrator -
“I frowned at her, an expression such a graceful, gentle face did not deserve to have directed at it. Did the Doctor really imagine that everybody went around believing different things? One believed what one was told to believe, what it made sense to believe. Unless one was a foreigner, of course, or a philosopher.”
Oelph -
“Each <girl> was clothed in a cream-coloured dress edged with red piping and ruffled with lace, which, if not exactly what a rustic shepherdess might wear, was perhaps what a famously handsome and well-endowed actress might have worn if she was taking part in an expensively produced Romantic Play which featured rustic shepherdesses.”
Oelph -
“General Ralboute had himself nearly been killed or captured in a daring night raid which had issued from the besieged city of Zhirt. Only luck and some desperate hand-to-hand fighting had prevented disaster. The general himself had had to draw sword and was within one defending aide of having the join the fray.”
The Narrator
Setting & Locations edit
- Providence
- Ladenscion
- Haspide
- Tassasen
- Lavishia: A fabled land made up by DeWar in his tales that he told to Lattens, the Protector's son.
- Yvenir
- Unoure
- Circuition
First Sentence edit
The only sin is selfishness.
Series & Lists edit
This is book 6 of 9 in The Culture. (standard series)
Preceded by Excession, and followed by Look to Windward.
Authors & Contributors edit
- Iain Banks (Author)
First Edition edit
Original Language: English
Publisher: Orbit Books
Country: United Kingdom
Publication Date: 1998
ISBN: 1-85723-763-3
Page Count: 393
Publisher: Orbit Books
Country: United Kingdom
Publication Date: 1998
ISBN: 1-85723-763-3
Page Count: 393
Awards edit
- BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) (Finalist, 1998)
Classification edit
- Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
- Dewey: 828'.914
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