2 Books Like The Bell of Treason

First things first; this is a Culture novel. Discussion on this centres on so-called hints about whether two characters are from the Culture. As far as I am concerned, the hints are obvious to a hedgehog on a galloping horse and to pretend otherwise is to invent an irrelevant and trivial debate. It's a Culture novel and it sits in that context in Banks' work.
The setting of this book is relatively unusual for Banks in general and the Culture series in particular, in that the society in which the story is set is at a level of technology equivalent to late medieval Europe or to India of the Mughals. Thus we are going to get to see an un-contacted planet which the Culture is on the verge of meddling with. Because our perspective is that of the people on this planet, it is never named, a clever piece of… show more.

This is the first book in the Helliconia trilogy, among the most engrossing and evocative books I have ever read in any genre. It made an enormous impact on me the first time I read it as a 16/17 year old. On this recent re-read, I had an underlay of remembering the experience of the first read and how I perceived it then, as I formed new impressions of it on this fourth or fifth read. This was a strange and charming sensation, like standing in a building whose smell reminds you of childhood experiences.

Brian Aldiss is one of the greats of science fiction, perhaps not mentioned as frequently as the ‘golden age writers’ (who cannot hold a candle to his writing skills) or even other greats such as Ursula Le Guin, Samuel Delaney or Ray Bradbury, rightly known for their wonderful writing. He contributed enormously to SF both… show more.