Even if The Hydrogen Sonata suffers a little because there aren't any strong and very interesting human/alien characters in it, this novel is still a great addition to The Culture series. And instead of interesting humans, we have very interesting Minds, lots and lots of Minds.

I love the Culture series.

So, the most fun thing about the world that Iain M. Banks has created is the ship mind. Minds are hyper-intelligent AIs, only they don't want to kill us, they want to just zip around doing things that interest them (which may be sitting around staring into stars, the ship equivalent of staring into a fire) and helping us out. (They also have awesome names.) In The Hydrogen Sonata there are a BUNCH of ships and they all, like, hang around talking to each other! Trying to figure stuff out! If you haven't read any Banks before that might not sound awesome, but trust me, it is. The most cleverest minds in the galaxy, shooting the shit? Come on!!

I enjoy reading these books so much that I'm tempted to give this one five stars, but it's just FUN and never makes my heart hurt, really, you know? So just 4.5.

By the way, a month or two ago Mr. Banks let us know that he is dying of cancer and probably won't live out the year. (That makes my heart hurt.) This is incredibly sad, and I hope that when he goes he leaves to us, his readers, his long master list of ship names. Because you just KNOW he has one squirreled away somewhere.

[Oh wait, I forgot to review the narrator!] Peter Kenny does all of the Banks audiobooks to which I've listened, and I think he's great. He uses different (actual, existing) accents for different alien species, which works well. He makes me think of ships as male instead of . . . neutral, but he's a dude so I guess that's not his fault. Also his "American" accent isn't quite right (in an effort to pronounce all of his R's, he adds some in at the end of words, like my mom does) but it tickles me rather than annoys me.

Listening to Banks books can be a little confusing, however. If I were reading them in print I'd be flipping back every once in a while, and I can't really do that with an audiobook. This was less of a problem here than it was with Transition though, and I think it'll be good in the long run because then I can re-listen to stuff and still be interested. (Especially important now that we know that there are probably no more Culture novels coming.) Also one interesting thing about an audiobook, which came to light a few times here: there were several chapters/sections that began with just dialogue. So, if you're reading the book, you have to look for clues to figure out who's speaking; but if you're listening to the audiobook, you can just recognize the speakers' voices. Neat.

Another enjoyable read in the CULTURE series, also fairly straightforward rather than meandering as some of the CULTURE books tend towards. I think focusing so much on a Subliming culture was a mistake on the author's part, gave away too much of the mystique. Banks has no trouble conjuring up cosmic scenes of wonder and realistic Aliens members of Galactic society but the focuses on a Pan-Human race that despite having evolved to the level that the whole society it is about to Sublime itself into an elevated plane of consciousness, they're still a bunch of squabbling, backstabbing jackasses with cool tech. Beyond that though it was a pretty good yarn about the lengths those in power will go to conceal truths and the equally ridiculous & destructive lengths others will go to oppose them, even when the particular truth isn't really worthy of the effort.

And now I've run out of CULTURE books, their author having spent some time as an Eccentric before himself Subliming. He'll be missed, and this series is a worthy Scifi legacy.
Except "Surface Detail".

3.5 rounded up. A fun jaunt by way of Culture ships and Gzilt humans and a MacGuffin. I don't mind that kind of thing, a flimsy premise for an adventure is fine by me if the adventure is fun. And this one is. I read a thing recently about how worldbuilding sucks and nobody should pretend they like it and scifi readers don't really enjoy it. Well, I disagree. There's plenty to muse on about religion, AI, society in general, the purpose of life, and other things of that nature, and they come from the worldbuilding. It's a very nice world to spend time in.

A fitting end to the series, and kind of bittersweet that it explicitly ends with a ship heading off to another adventure. We must imagine that there are many more Culture tales happening that never had a chance to be written. Vale Mr Banks, you will be missed.

The final instalment (sob), although despite its often elegiac feel, I don't think it was meant to be. I believe Banks wrote this before his diagnosis.
All the usual features are here; vast sweep, sudden violence, moral conundrums, weird supporting characters and vivid prose.
It only gets 4 stars for me as I didn't think it deserved its length, and would have benefited from an edit. The Gzilt society was a bit underwhelming for an advanced civ close to par with the Culture.

Spoiler

...Oh, there's a character that a reviewer somewhere described as 'dodickahedonist', which is a zinger I can't resist sharing.

So sad to read the last page and know that there will be no more Culture novels. I must admit to not enjoying this as much as other Banks books but he was still a master at creating visions of civilisations and technology far beyond most peoples imaginations. The best thing about this book, as with many of the Culture novels are the Mind interactions. I couldn't quite see the point of many of the plots running through this book but I am glad I read it. He will be sorely missed.

In have enjoyed each of Iain's Culture books. A shame that he passed away relatively young. The whole concept of funny named spaceships with distinct AI personalities is great.

I decided to relisten to this one because I was pretty zoned out when I first listened to it a few years ago. This time, paying more attention, I quite liked it, though the first three of the series are still my favorites of the ones I've read so far.

Pretty boring......