The Algebraist

When I picked up Iain M. Banks’ book The Algebraist, I thought I was starting a Culture novel overlooked until now. (The way Amazon listed the book encouraged this belief.) However, while it is space opera on a grand scale similar to a typical Culture novel, it takes place in a different fictional universe, one where the technologies are a bit more grounded, but with very rich worldbuilding.

Two thousand years in the future, humanity has reached the stars, and joined an ancient multi-species civilization known as the Mercatoria. The Mercatoria is an empire. The populations seem fairly prosperous, but the empire brutally represses dissent. It also attacks those who live outside of it, including a group known as the Beyonders, who respond by periodically attacking Mercatorian military installations. And about seven thousand years before the story, there was a machine war, which resulted in the eradication of most AI in the Mercatoria. The Mercatoria now ban and hunt down any remaining AI. There is also a religion based on the simulation hypothesis.

In this universe, faster than light travel only happens via wormhole, both ends of which have to be constructed together and one end transported to another system at sublight speeds. Which means that systems that have their wormhole portal destroyed can become isolated from the overall galactic civilization, at least until a replacement can be brought in, which usually takes centuries. There are entire regions which are disconnected due to wormhole destruction.

One system that has its wormhole destroyed a couple of centuries before the story is Ulubis. A new wormhole is on the way, but isn’t expected to arrive for decades. In the Ulubis system is a substantial human population, but also a number of other species, all ruled by the local Mercatorian government.

In Ulubis is a Slow Seer community, humans who “delve” to study the Dwellers, aliens who live in the atmosphere of gas giant planets. The Dwellers exist in most gas giants in the galaxy and have a culture that is billions of years old. And individual Dwellers can live millions or even billions of years. Living outside of Mercatorian control, they seem to have a boisterous anarchistic society that doesn’t seem particularly high tech, although they are rumored to have devastating weapons at their disposal.

Fissan Taak is an experienced Seer, destined to become the Chief Seer of his Sept. Centuries earlier he went on a delve in the local gas giant and received a book which he published in scholarly circles. In the wider interstellar community it was realized the book contained information about a possible secret wormhole network of the Dwellers, one much more pervasive than the Mercatorian wormholes, the legendary “Dweller list”. However, a key volume of the book is missing, the one telling how to find the Dweller wormholes.

As the significance of finding the missing volume becomes understood, the Beyonders attack and destroy the Ulubine wormhole to prevent Mercatoria from getting the information. The Beyonders ally with a group called the Starveling Cult, led by a sadistic warlord named Luseferous. Luseferous, understanding the prize at stake, launches a fleet toward Ulubis in a decades long journey. Mercatoria also launches a fleet toward Ulubis, but the Starveling Cult will arrive first.

As the book opens, Taak finds himself torn from his scholarly life, drafted into the military, and included in a briefing transmitted from the distant Mercatoria fleet, warning Ulubis of the situation. Taak is sent on a mission to go on a new delve with the Dwellers. His mission is to find the missing volume before the Starveling Cult arrives. Unknown to the Mercatoria is that Taak’s sympathies lie with the Beyonders, and he alerts them to his mission and its goal.

Everything described here happens in the first act, and is just a sample of all the things going on in this novel. Humans in this universe are mortal, although there are treatments to preserve life indefinitely. And many characters have extended lives from traveling at relativistic speeds, or from existing in “slow time” while delving with the Dwellers. As a result, many of the adults have been alive for centuries.

Unlike in the Culture novels, there’s no artificial gravity or easy FTL. Characters have to spend time in capsules of shock-gel to withstand the crushing acceleration of relativistic starships, or to delve in the high gravity environment of gas giants. Space battles have to be fought with all the limitations of slower than light travel and transmission. It makes for some very cool descriptions of the tactics and logistics involved.

But much of the book takes place in the Dweller society. Their biology is very alien, although not as alien as I was expecting. I was anticipating gaseous entities or something along those lines, but the Dwellers and their environment turned out to be more solid than I expected. Which made me wonder where that solidity came from in a gas giant atmosphere. At one point in the novel it’s implied some of it comes from meteorites.

The worldbuilding in this book is rich and extensive. As far as I can tell, it’s the only story Banks wrote in this universe. Which is a shame, because it seems rife with possibilities. The ending leaves a number of loose threads that could have led to future stories. Maybe Banks would have returned to it eventually. (Lamentably he passed away a few years later.) The book itself was a Hugo Award finalist in 2005, so it received accolades.

It has similar themes to a Culture novel. Particularly noteworthy is that both the Culture and Dweller societies are anarchist, in that neither have formal governments, yet seem able to function as if they did. The idea of a very advanced but anarchist society appears to have been a fascination for Banks.

There are some nits I have with the book, my typical ones with Banks, mostly related to pacing and some avant-garde techniques I could have done without. But overall I thoroughly enjoyed it and highly recommend it if you enjoy space opera.