The Hydrogen Sonata

By: Iain M. Banks

Narrated by: Peter Kenny

The New York Times bestselling Culture novel. . .

The Scavenger species are circling. It is, truly, provably, the End Days for the Gzilt civilization.

An ancient people, organized on military principles and yet almost perversely peaceful, the Gzilt helped set up the Culture ten thousand years earlier and were very nearly one of its founding societies, deciding not to join only at the last moment. Now they've made the collective decision to follow the well-trodden path of millions of other civilizations; they are going to Sublime, elevating themselves to a new and almost infinitely more rich and complex existence.

Amid preparations though, the Regimental High Command is destroyed. Lieutenant Commander (reserve) Vyr Cossont appears to have been involved, and she is now wanted -- dead, not alive. Aided only by an ancient, reconditioned android and a suspicious Culture avatar, Cossont must complete her last mission given to her by the High Command. She must find the oldest person in the Culture, a man over nine thousand years old, who might have some idea what really happened all that time ago.

It seems that the final days of the Gzilt civilization are likely to prove its most perilous.

Intrigue at the End of Civilization

What did you like best about this story?

It was an interesting story about the whole subliming business that civilizations keep doing in Sci-Fi novels. There was a lot of intrigue about the secret past of this civilization and trying to determine if it's true, and what it could mean if this was made public. And of course, Culture minds sticking their metaphoric noses in everyone else's business.

Excellent

The best of The Culture series. like all the rest, you don't need to have consumed previous titles. I strongly recommend this story.

Fantastical

Like most of Bank's books it is out there. Science Fiction to the extreme with AI's, giant ships and far out alien races. it is fast paced. Need to pay attention

excellent introduction to the culture

I've read several other books about the culture and said in the same universe. there are oblique references to terms like subliming and indications of what shipmind intelligence is capable of. this is a great introduction to both the history of the founding of the culture as well as how it operates within the current universe. the story itself is full of action some of it predictable some of it not so much. overall I really enjoyed the story although the ending is somewhat predictable and somewhat flat. I would definitely recommend this, but with the caveat that it's more of an exploration of the culture than it is a riveting story.

Tooooo Long

Liked the world building, cool and varied characters, unfortunately for me, this story was way too verbose. It could easily have been ⅓ shorter and not have lost anything worthwhile.