Product Description

In a world renowned even within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one brother it means a desperate flight, and a search for the one - maybe two - people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, even without knowing the full truth, it means returning to a place she d thought abandoned forever.

Only the sister is not what she once was; Djan Seriy Anaplian has changed almost beyond recognition to become an agent of the Culture s Special Circumstances section, charged with high-level interference in civilisations throughout the greater galaxy.

Concealing her new identity - and her particular set of abilities - might be a dangerous strategy, however. In the world to which Anaplian returns, nothing is quite as it seems; and determining the appropriate level of interference in someone else's war is never a simple matter.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #691 in Books
• Published on: 2008-01-31
• Binding: Hardcover
• 544 pages

Synopsis
In a world renowned within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one brother it means a desperate flight, and a search for the one - maybe two - people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, it means returning to a place she'd thought abandoned forever. Only the sister is not what she once was; Djan Seriy Anaplian has become an agent of the Culture's Special Circumstances section, charged with high-level interference in civilisations throughout the greater galaxy. Concealing her new identity - and her particular set of abilities - might be a dangerous strategy. In the world to which Anaplian returns, nothing is quite as it seems; and determining the appropriate level of interference in someone else's war is never a simple matter.

Customer Reviews

Anti Climax
I can keep this review fairly short. Matter is 450-ish pages of very good story telling in Bank's magnificent Culture universe let down by a 50 page rushed, anti climactic and sometimes downright bad conclusion. If you're interested in the Culture books, try one of the earlier ones.

Solid addition to the Culture canon
I've been a Banks fan for a long time and he has certainly produced some disappointing books recently. At his best, he is truly brilliant, but sometimes the books just don't work.
It took me a while to get into this book, because the plot is multi-layered, and the layers are only revealed as the book progresses. As a result, what seems like a relatively simple plot at the beginning becomes much more complex and wide-ranging by the end.
I grew more and more interested and impressed by the book as it went on, and really liked the latter parts. There are many very different and varied characters from the different races and societies, as well as a fascinating and novel physical environment. Lots of imagination, and I always like Banks' writing style.
It's not his best book, but it was very enjoyable, and a worthy addition to the Culture canon. I hesitate between four and five stars - for Banks it's a four-star effort; for anyone else it might have scored five.

The last Ian M. Banks novel I'll ever read
Another of Bank's "Culture" novels, Matter has finally convinced me I should skip his offering on the bookshelves from now on (and I'd stress I've only bought 2, and borrowed others from a friend). Grand in scope and ideas, Matter rehashes familiar (and now very irritating) plot and stylistic themes in the Culture series.

-For some unexplained reason, there's a load of humans in the Culture universe who are at the technological level of either a rural 16th or 17th Century or living a fascist-type state in the 1940s era, and who are seperate from the Culture themselves. Consequently, everyone (including some aliens) from these places tends to speak as if they're a saucy character from The Life and Times of Tristram Shandy. (The Algebraist takes this to new heights, where even the aliens sound as if they were creations of PG Wodehouse.). This is incredibly predictable and very tiresome in the final analysis.

-As with Excession, the pacing in this novel is utterly dreadful. Literally the first 350 pages are mere scene-setting, while the last 50 pages or so are like a speeded-up film from the 1920s. Ultimately, the characters of Ferbin, Oramen, Holse and Tyl Loesp are all, incredibly, completely throwaway. They have very little impact on the outcome and are simply vehicles to get the plot to a certain point - which ends very very abruptly in a "I couldn't think of anything else" kind of way. I realise that you could say the same for any character in any novel, but it's especially pronounced in Matter. The characters' actions and revelations are all completely moot.

Stay far, far away. Banks' concepts are wasted on his execution here.