I've always found the Culture a fascinating and refreshing alternative to the extremely played-out and commonplace dystopic visions of AI as exist in virtually all other science fiction. It's also interesting to think about how a post-scarcity society would function, particular as our society moves (ever so slowly) toward at least the full automation of labor, if not post-scarcity itself.
Very true. Indeed several of the books are about the culture dealing with some kind of (generally not serious) crisis. Most enlightening: the Culture was created initially as a setting for Use of Weapons
"They are mostly not about the Culture itself. Because it's boooooring."
This is why if we had the technology for a post-scarcity society on Earth there would be sets of people who would use this level of technology to do things like try to colonize Mars -- to the abject horror of the latte-sippers who would pen endless screeds about how foolish it is as they sit and sip latte.
I think the funniest thing about the books are the names of the ships. Things like: The 'Probably Not a Good Idea' dropped into orbit around the fourth planet.
It's also worth trying his contemporary fiction which is just as good. Most people are aware of "The Wasp Factory" which can probably also be classed as science fiction (although not SciFi). He also wrote the excellent "Crow Road" which has probably one of the greatest opening lines in any book I've ever read.
IMHO Banks manages to do his best opening in Espedair Street:
Two days ago I decided to kill myself. I would walk and hitch and sail away from this dark city to the bright spaces of the wet west coast, and there throw myself into the tall, glittering seas beyond Iona (with its cargo of mouldering kings) to let the gulls and seals and tides have their way with my remains, and in my dying moments look forward to an encounter with Staffa’s six-sided columns and Fingal’s cave; or I might head south to Corryvrecken, to be spun inside the whirlpool and listen with my waterlogged deaf ears to its mile-wide voice ringing over the wave-race; or be borne north, to where the white sands sing and coral hides, pink-fingered and hard-soft, beneath the ocean swell, and the rampart cliffs climb thousand-foot above the seething acres of milky foam, rainbow-buttressed.
Last night I changed my mind and decided to stay alive. Everything that follows is . . . just to try and explain.
"Song of Stone" was written in an interesting style to me. It is some sort of post-apocalyptic The Stand kind of situation.
He alternates between normal modern prose and some very dense poetry-prose. I would have to read and re-read those passages to get the meaning, but it was enjoyable.
