A previously unpublished interview with Iain M. Banks

Strange Horizons have published a previously unreleased interview with the late Iain M. Banks. The interview was conducted in 2010 and focuses on the Culture, the signature SF setting of so many of Banks's novels. It was carried out by former student Jude Roberts as part of her PhD.

A brief extract:

The way the Culture came about initially was as—I thought at the time—a single-use solution to a particular problem. I was getting ready to write Use of Weapons and I knew that Zakalwe was this sort of ultimate warrior guy, just very martially able, but I wanted him to be on the side of the good guys somehow. Squaring that circle was the problem, so I came up with the idea of the Culture as his ultimate employers: a society basically on the side of the angels but willing to use people like Zakalwe (utopia spawning few warriors, as the later-written poem says) to do its dirty but justified work. The "justified" bit always having something to do with statistics; from the beginning the Culture had to be able to prove—rather than simply assert—that it was generally doing the right thing, even when it interfered without permission in other societies. That was it, initially, but then the Culture proved to be the nucleus around which all my other until then rather nebulous ideas started to cluster and take shape, and it just developed—naturally, it felt—by itself, from there.

The full interview is very much worth reading for any fan of Banks, space opera or SF in general.

New cover art

Some upcoming cover art, courtesy of Jussi at Westeros.org once more:

First up, the American cover for Blood of Dragons, the fourth volume in The Rain Wild Chronicles by Robin Hobb. This book is due for publication in the UK and USA in April 2013:

Next up is the American cover for Great North Road, Peter F. Hamilton's new massive SF epic. This book will be out in the USA in December this year (and September in the UK):

The final UK cover art for Iain M. Banks's The Hydrogen Sonata, the latest excursion to The Culture. This book will be out in the UK and USA in September this year:

Rounding things off is the UK artwork for The Dirty Streets of Heaven, the first in Tad Williams's new urban fantasy series. This book will be out in both the UK and USA in September as well:

New cover art: Abercrombie, Sanderson, Banks, Sapkowski

A host of cover art for forthcoming books.

First up is The Emperor's Soul by Brandon Sanderson. This 30,000-word novella is a limited edition from Tachyon Press and sees a young woman use her forbidden magical skills to save the life of a dying emperor. The book appears to be set in Sanderson's unified Cosmere super-setting, but not on one of his established worlds. The book is due in December.

Next up is the American cover art for The Hydrogen Sonata by Iain M. Banks, his ninth novel in The Culture setting. This book is due in October.

The American audience is also getting new covers for the Witcher books by Andrzej Sapkowski. The Last Wish and Blood of Elves are being rejacketed and should be available soon, and will later in 2012 be by The Time of Contempt, which is finally hitting the stands after years of delays due to rights issues.

Finally, there's the American cover art for Joe Abercrombie's Red Country (dropping the 'A', at least on this early version of the cover). Aidan has more info on the cover art here. The book is currently being revised and edited and will be out in late 2012 or early 2013.

New Iain M. Banks Culture novel on its way

Iain M. Banks is returning to The Culture setting in his new novel, The Hydrogen Sonata. It will be published on 4 October this year in the UK by Orbit Books.