Sci-fi Book Group - Iain M Banks & The Culture

A regular book group night to discuss sci-fi and expand our reading horizons! It's very informal, you don't even have to have read a book - just as long as you enjoy talking sci-fi and having a glass of wine (or coffee!)

This month we're reading Iain M Banks's world of The Culture.

The Culture is a post-scarcity, egalitarian society which has overcome most of the physical constraints of life and created a stable society without the use of unnecessary force or compulsion. That being said, some citizens, including the extremely powerful artificial intelligences, Minds, sometimes engage in the manipulation of others. This includes influencing or controlling the development of alien societies through the group known as Contact.

There are a list of all the books on wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture#List_of_books_describing_the_Culture

Most people will opt to read Consider Phlebas, the first book in the series.

However, I'd recommend starting with book #5 Excession, it's fairly stand alone, but throws you right into the middle of the action. It's a lot of fun, with some big ideas and characters.

Inversions, the sixth book, is much more relaxed, it's more of a Game of Thrones/medieval story with small hints about the larger world.

The fourth book, The State of the Art, might be more suitable for some who don't want to commit to a big space opera book - its a collection of short stories.

In short, I think you can read them in any order and still get a full appreciation of the worlds and characters, so pick whatever one appeals most and we'll chat about it on the night!

Join us to discuss what you've read, what you'd like to read and help us decide on some topics for the rest of 2026.

The topic for our next book group might be a specific book, author or general topic like first encounters, robots, etc - we'll decide on the night depending on people's interests. Feel free to submit a suggestion in the comments below.

As always, you can join our chat room on matrix at #bookgroup:glasgow.social (if you don't already have access to matrix, you can sign up at https://glasgow.social/matrix).

This meeting will be held in The Gamer Club - there'll be free tea, coffee and wine, but feel free to BYOB too! There are some directions to the venue here: https://www.thegamerclub.co.uk/gettinghere