The Algebraist by Iain M. Banks
In The Algebraist Iain M. Banks does the things a science fiction writer should do well. If you’re looking for amazing action adventure with a future twist, then here is definitely a good place to start.
First of all, Banks thinks big. Well, not just big, bigger than big; as big as you can probably get really. In this novel the reader is transported over almost inconceivable distances. That’s often standard fare for a work of fiction like this, so it was the way Banks deals with time that I thought was really good. The period it takes for people to cross these vast distances can stretch from days to eons, depending on the technology involved. Indeed, most of the novel is spent waiting for two cataclysmic events to happen that have been in the making for decades. This is the ultimate slow-motion train wreck.
Secondly, Banks imagines some extremely interesting technology and this is no mean feat in today’s world. In my younger days I avidly ate up anything by science fiction writers. Alas, the pace of technological change in the early twenty-first century has left me jaded. These days I mostly find science fiction relies on notions that are plainly ridiculous in the light of modern science. The singularity is, after all, very near. I felt this way a little with Banks’s book. The idea that beings will be able to navigate the universe without the use of artificial intelligence is I’m afraid, a little difficult to credit. Hats off to him though, for imagining some truly unusual environments for the action to take place in. Kudos should also be given for the amount of different characters that belong to alien species in this novel. It’s always good to see a writer eschewing that awful Star Trek human chauvinism.
Thirdly, Banks tries to create some believable and interesting societies. These are both based on what we could recognise as the future of our race but also the worlds of utterly different species. This, for me is one of the added bonuses of the genre. Imagining what it must be like to fit into these places. What would you be doing if you existed there?
Unfortunately, in The Algebraist, Banks doesn’t do well the things that a good novelist should do well. If you are unable or unwilling to be wowed and wooed by his sci-fi pyrotechnics then I am sure that there are a few things that annoy and disappoint.
To begin with his characters are utterly one-dimensional. The central character Fassin Taak is a cardboard cut out with whom it is virtually impossible to sympathise. This is amazing considering what happens to Fassin during the course of the story. At the opposite end of this character range is the Archinmandrite Luseferous, who is a pantomime villain if ever there was one. In the first chapter he is deliciously amusing but Banks is unable to keep this up over hundreds of pages. Luseferous ends up resembling something rather similar to a toddler having a tantrum.
Given the book’s length, the lack of character development is surprising, but herein we have the story’s second fault. It is just too long. I reckon that at least two hundred pages could be lopped off without any discernable loss. The Algebraist takes what feels like one of the life spans of its Dweller species to get going. The first one hundred pages confusingly meander between two places in time. As a reader I was willing to let Banks lead me down this path, but he never justified it by tying it all together with a satisfying payoff.
There are a lot of dead end narratives here. Banks employs flashbacks that neither seem to propel the action forward or reveal more about the characters. One all too obvious flashback involving a certain futuristic habitation is obviously only there earlier in the book so that we can witness it’s destruction towards the end. This destruction is Bank’s way of imagining the chaos visited on a solar system by an attack from space, but it rings hollow because the person through whom we witness it only appears at this point. In the end The Algebraist relies too much on set piece battles and destruction to keep things rolling along.
There are stylistic problems with the book. Banks uses far too much jargon which is difficult to keep a track of, especially when he is unprepared to explain what it means. Also the amount of swearing in the book starts to annoy. I’m quite happy to read a book with plenty of four letter words if it seems in character. Unfortunately I have problems imagining an alien creature, without human sexual organs, using the word fuck in quite the same sense that we on Planet Earth do.
A big problem that I have though, is why are artificially intelligent beings outlawed and hunted down in this universe? Banks takes a great deal of effort to explain the history of so much of his world but never bothers with this question.
I think that good science fiction should feel like an episode of Star Trek fro the 1960’s which always paid of with a revelation,; an “Ah hah” moment. There is one here but you take so long getting to it that it isn’t really that dramatic at all.
To sum up then, this is a novel that consists of some amazing high points and some terrible faults. I can’t help it, I like science fiction and so despite the faults I enjoyed Mr. Banks telling me a tall story. If you like Sci-Fi, I guess you will too.
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