Use of Weapons

Iain M. Banks
1992

Use of Weapons begins with what is actually the end of the story, and ends with the beginning, to an extent, perhaps, depending on how you view a story. By this I mean that Iain Banks carries us through the main “present” storyline, but adds scenes from other places and times to fill out the main character, Cheradenine Zakalwe, his past and his motivations, and his association with the Culture.

Zakalwe is a mercenary of sorts, who has worked for some time with the Culture, a vast society of humanoids who have apparently banished disease, poverty, and boring jobs. They cohabit with Artificial Intelligences, ranging from small drones to Minds that control giant ships and orbitals. They have a branch to deal with other societies, called Contact, and sub-branch for interfering with them: Special Circumstances.

It is quite clear from the scenes described during his career that he is a cunning strategist and a dangerous warrior, and that he is tormented by something, which not even the Culture knows about. His entire service with them is a form of reparation, his attempt to know that he is on the right side. In the end, he wants forgiveness, or he wants death.

In payment for his work with Special Circumstances, he receieves money, rejuvenation, and one other, highly personal, request.

We learn how he is recruited to Special Circumstances, on a planet where he is betrayed and left to die, and Diziet arrives like an angel out of the storm. We learn how he arrived at that planet, travelling in cold sleep for a hundred years from his home, escaping. We learn about his childhood, the four children and the garden, and the beginning of the bitter rivalry between them. We begin to learn what drove him away.

The answer is cleverly shown to us, but also hidden away, after we finally think we know what’s going on, we discover that nothing we knew is true after all. We think we know the source of his guilt, we find that we’ve been tricked.

The novel hints around the secret, never quite revealing it, you think you know, but then you think you’re wrong. This is a fascinating exploration of one man’s experiences working for a more advanced culture and trying to make amends. There are very few books that can carry off a story with a twist like this one, and this is one of the best I’ve read.

I won’t tell you what it was, this is a book that should be read in ignorance. It is a brilliantly twisting story, funny and strange and tragic, and it has that most precious quality that is often missing from novels with a secret ending, it is possible to go back and read it again, knowing the secret, and get more out of it, not less.