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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > No Gravitas Allowed -- The Iain [M.] Banks thread
 
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Verloc
Feb 15, 2001

Note to self: Posting 'lulz' is not a good idea.

JgPz posted:

I just finished after putting it down for a couple weeks, more out of ocd than genuine interest. The ending was cool, I didn't care a lick for Zakalwe so I was just like 'hehe twisty'. Reading it as a comedy definitely helped, the part where Zakalwe fights the voiceless guy was funny.

Oh and to correct that list that was posted earlier, chronologically the prologue and epilogue most likely happen last. It's the only place where bald Zakalwe makes sense.
I feel better knowing that I'm not the only one who wasn't floored by the ending of Use of Weapons. It felt like that Robot Chicken sketch, all it needed was a puppet M. Night Shamalan popping into frame shouting 'What a twist!'. The only character in the book I really liked was Skaffen-Amitskaw, and I think that's mostly due to the fact that it spent basically the whole book playing the snarky straight man (drone?). The drone still had it's comedic moments though. The scene where the drone gives Zakalwe a hat as a gift had me in stitches.

Verloc fucked around with this message at 17:35 on May 27, 2009

* # ¿ May 27, 2009 17:33
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# ¿ May 3, 2024 13:50
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Verloc
Feb 15, 2001

Note to self: Posting 'lulz' is not a good idea.

Entropic posted:

Thoroughly enjoyed The Algebraist though. I love the Dwellers. He's tried a few times to do aliens with weird psychology that humans find baffling or repellent, and I think the Dwellers succeed a lot better in that role than the Affront or the Oct.
I think a large part of why the Dwellers work so well is because of the Luseferous story arc. There's a huge amount of effort spent building him up as this very human stereotype of moustache-twisting villainy, all the human characters/factions are frantically preparing for the dramatic final showdown in true SF trope fashion and then *WHAM* Luseferous runs smack into a wall of alien psychology and technology. The point of the character and his arc was to be ultimately pointless because he tries to deal with the Dwellers like he would humans or at least other Quick species, and winds up getting absolutely nowhere because of how completely different they are.

* # ¿ Oct 13, 2010 19:08
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The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > The Book Barn > No Gravitas Allowed -- The Iain [M.] Banks thread