"Then it is dark; a night where kings in golden suits ride elephants over the mountains." - John Cheever

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Waterstone's window, George Street

8 comments:

Col said...

£25! So that he can flog his new book to you! Come on Mr Banks. I hope you get a copy thrown in with the ticket price.

By the way, does this mean you've set up a photo blog thingy to go with Fitz then?

John said...

It's being publicised as a bit of a return to form though...

No Fitz photoblog thingy as yet.

Tom said...

Join "the prolific author"? It's hardly one of the great literary endorsements. I hope his legacy proves to be greater than this - it makes him sound like the Barbara Cartland of Scottish literature.

Col said...

I read that whisky book of his - an odd affair, which he kind of admits he did for the money when his publisher suggested it. It shows. He spends more time going on about his seemingly vast collection of cars than whisky, and about how he likes driving them along 'great wee roads' in the highlands. He's clearly loaded, probably from all those sci-fi books he's sold. Seems like a reasonable guy, but he went down in my estimation a bit after that. It's better if these author types remain a bit mysterious. Still, one of his books (Whit, I think) features both the Dunblane cathedral organ (I was always getting press-ganged into fund-raising affairs for this as a kid) and the idea of haggis samosas, so I'll let him off.

John said...

He's great on "the sense of place" is Iain Banks. I read Whit when I'd just moved up to Bridge of Allan, and had a slightly euphoric sense of discovering the area through living in it and reading fiction about it at the same time.

I do think he's lost his mojo somewhat in recent years. The early Culture sci-fi books such as Consider Phlebas and Player of Games are *really* good.

Col said...

Yeah, I read Phlebas years ago and enjoyed it. Possibly on your recommendation

Tom said...

Yes, I read his sci-fi stuff years ago and thought it was great, really original. He does seem to have lost his verve a bit, but he always comes across as a genuine guy who, despite his wealth, is still pretty rooted.

Col said...

I read in the paper this morning that Banks recently sold his collection of classic cars due to environmental guilt, so good on him.