Pleasing, But Dense As Maths

Iain M. Banks is an author whose works seemed to crop up in interesting places during my stay in London, so upon my return to the States and a state-wide library borrowing system, I looked him up - I was intrigued to learn that he is a prolific writer of both speculative and novel fiction, dropping the M.iddle initial when writing regular prose. He seems to have picked up quite a number of accolades in both literary subworlds, and the synopses and reviews of his works piqued my interest. I began with one of his prose works as Iain Banks, The Steep Approach to Garbadale, and very much enjoyed it; being a Bay Area-bred Silicon Valley boy that I am, I decided to try his science fiction next. As one of my favourite places in Cleveland to read and have a drink is the Algebra Teahouse in Little Italy, I happened to pick Hugo-nominated The Algebaist.
The choice was, I have to admit, not entirely satisfying. Banks has a curious non-linear approach to narrative, eschewing long-winded formal exposition in favour of dodging about in short, immersive "scenes". This keeps you thinking and guessing and forces the reader to read actively, and it's certainly interesting, but the terminology, history, indeed the entire World of the Algebraist is so dense, so complicated, that I'm sorry Mr. Banks, but you really can't spin character for three chapters off of backgrounds rooted in Wars that you won't explain for another eighteen chapters. It's fantastically immersive and dense, a work that you can easily lose yourself in; however, you are also in danger of losing the work itself, as well. Too much goes on, it all happens rather too grandly, and at each major point throughout the book, I found myself thinking, well this is very well-written, and that's very funny, but why on Earth or Nasqueron or 'glantine am I still reading this? Selling itself as Space Opera, I was instead confronted, in the characters, with more of a... Space Urban-Noir feel. There were a lot of colourful yet dingy characters, frustrated and jaded by anticlimactic fights and fruitless searches, a great sense of loneliness and time and being lost in an empty search for meaning. In time, the story picks up speed, especially once you pick up some damn wheels a hundred pages after you start rolling, and it develops interestingly. I was rewarded for playing Banks' logic games, and for scrupulously keeping up with his unrolling timeline, snarled as it was. In the end, however, I was left wanting more - what closure I received was rushed and erratic, and even with an Epilogue, I felt that while the book had had definite threads, it had failed to achieve an arc. Interesting, thought-provoking, and certainly a good book to dive into; not, however, a story I will cherish through the ages.
Rating: 3.5 / 5