Surface Detail

Surface Detail PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316180483
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 606

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Book Description
Surface Detail is among Iain M. Banks' Culture novels, a breathtaking achievement from a writer whose body of work is without parallel in the modern history of science fiction. It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters. It begins with a murder. And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself. Lededje Y'breq is one of the Intagliated, her marked body bearing witness to a family shame, her life belonging to a man whose lust for power is without limit. Prepared to risk everything for her freedom, her release, when it comes, is at a price, and to put things right she will need the help of the Culture. Benevolent, enlightened and almost infinitely resourceful though it may be, the Culture can only do so much for any individual. With the assistance of one of its most powerful -- and arguably deranged -- warships, Lededje finds herself heading into a combat zone not even sure which side the Culture is really on. A war -- brutal, far-reaching -- is already raging within the digital realms that store the souls of the dead, and it's about to erupt into reality. It started in the realm of the Real and that is where it will end. It will touch countless lives and affect entire civilizations, but at the center of it all is a young woman whose need for revenge masks another motive altogether. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

Surface Detail

Surface Detail PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316180483
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 606

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Book Description
Surface Detail is among Iain M. Banks' Culture novels, a breathtaking achievement from a writer whose body of work is without parallel in the modern history of science fiction. It begins in the realm of the Real, where matter still matters. It begins with a murder. And it will not end until the Culture has gone to war with death itself. Lededje Y'breq is one of the Intagliated, her marked body bearing witness to a family shame, her life belonging to a man whose lust for power is without limit. Prepared to risk everything for her freedom, her release, when it comes, is at a price, and to put things right she will need the help of the Culture. Benevolent, enlightened and almost infinitely resourceful though it may be, the Culture can only do so much for any individual. With the assistance of one of its most powerful -- and arguably deranged -- warships, Lededje finds herself heading into a combat zone not even sure which side the Culture is really on. A war -- brutal, far-reaching -- is already raging within the digital realms that store the souls of the dead, and it's about to erupt into reality. It started in the realm of the Real and that is where it will end. It will touch countless lives and affect entire civilizations, but at the center of it all is a young woman whose need for revenge masks another motive altogether. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

Use of Weapons

Use of Weapons PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316068799
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
The man known as Cheradenine Zakalwe was one of Special Circumstances' foremost agents, changing the destiny of planets to suit the Culture through intrigue, dirty tricks and military action. The woman known as Diziet Sma had plucked him from obscurity and pushed him towards his present eminence, but despite all their dealings she did not know him as well as she thought. The drone known as Skaffen-Amtiskaw knew both of these people. It had once saved the woman's life by massacring her attackers in a particularly bloody manner. It believed the man to be a lost cause. But not even its machine could see the horrors in his past. Ferociously intelligent, both witty and horrific, Use of Weapons is a masterpiece of science fiction. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

Matter

Matter PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 031604072X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 415

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Book Description
A novel of dazzling wit and serious purpose. An extraordinary feat of storytelling and breathtaking invention on a grand scale, it is a tour de force from a writer who has turned science fiction on its head. "Unexpectedly savage, emotionally powerful, and impossible to forget." —The Times In a world renowned even within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one brother it means a desperate flight, and a search for the one — maybe two — people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, even without knowing the full truth, it means returning to a place she'd thought abandoned forever. Only the sister is not what she once was; Djan Seriy Anaplian has changed almost beyond recognition to become an agent of the Culture's Special Circumstances section, charged with high-level interference in civilizations throughout the greater galaxy. Concealing her new identity — and her particular set of abilities — might be a dangerous strategy, however. In the world to which Anaplian returns, nothing is quite as it seems; and determining the appropriate level of interference in someone else's war is never a simple matter. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

The Hydrogen Sonata

The Hydrogen Sonata PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316212385
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 383

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Book Description
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. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

Inversions

Inversions PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416583785
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
Originally published: London: Orbit, 1998.

Look to Windward

Look to Windward PDF Author: Iain Banks
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0743421922
Category : Caste
Languages : en
Pages : 500

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Book Description
Eight hundred years after the most horrific battle of the Idiran war, light from its world-destroying detonations is about to reach the Masaq Orbital, home to the Culture. Major Quilan has supposedly come to take the exiled Composer Ziller back to their war-ravaged home world, Chel. But despite the major's civilized veneer, his true mission may be the death and destruction of an entire civilization.

Surface Design for Ceramics

Surface Design for Ceramics PDF Author: Maureen Mills
Publisher: Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.
ISBN: 1579908446
Category : Ceramics
Languages : en
Pages : 148

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Book Description
This studio reference captures all the popular techniques available for embellishing clay, as well as a wealth of practical information and detailed images that lead readers through every phase of the design and decorating process.

The Surface Designer's Handbook

The Surface Designer's Handbook PDF Author: Holly Brackmann
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 162033240X
Category : Crafts & Hobbies
Languages : en
Pages : 347

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Book Description
Beginning with studio practices and safety rules, this information-packed handbook is appropriate for both newcomers and experienced dyers but assumes that readers have a serious interest in textile design. An overview of dyeing starts with fibers and fabrics and discusses all aspects of the dyes favored by textile studios--fiber reactive, acid, vat, and disperse--before explaining discharging, screen printing, monoprinting, stamping, stenciling, resist dyeing, devore, and painting. Would-be fabric artists are advised along the way to identify a personal approach to dyeing--free spirit? rule-follower?--and color photographs of work by today's top fiber artists elucidate prevailing styles. Recipes and techniques are accompanied by step-by-step instructions with photographs, and a concealed spiral binding allows the book to lie flat. Ten appendices include a worksheet for recording chemicals, procedures, and costs for all projects; a guide to washing fabric; descriptions of stock solutions, thickeners, and steaming; a metric conversion table; and a guide to water temperatures.

In the Orbit of Sirens

In the Orbit of Sirens PDF Author: T. A. Bruno
Publisher: Song of Kamaria
ISBN: 9781734647006
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 514

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Book Description
Nightmarish machines have driven humanity into the depths of space. The survivors are forced to adapt to a planet filled with monsters.

Against a Dark Background

Against a Dark Background PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316075949
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 443

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Book Description
From science fiction master Iain M. Banks comes a standalone adventure of one woman on the run in an isolated galaxy. Sharrow was once the leader of a personality-attuned combat team in one of the sporadic little commercial wars in the civilization based around the planet Golter. Now she is hunted by the Huhsz, a religious cult which believes that she is the last obstacle before the faith's apotheosis, and her only hope of escape is to find the last of the apocalyptically powerful Lazy Guns before the Huhsz find her. Her journey through the exotic Golterian system is a destructive and savage odyssey into her past, and that of her family and of the system itself.