The Player of Games

From Freepedia

The Player of Games (ISBN 1857231465) is a science fiction novel by Iain M. Banks, and the second published to feature the Culture, his fictional utopian society. It is widely considered the most immediately accessible of the Culture books, and is therefore perhaps a better introduction to the sequence than the earlier Consider Phlebas.

Jernau Morat Gurgeh, a master gamesplayer from the Culture, is bored with life. The Culture's Special Circumstances (SC) section suggests that he goes to participate in a games tournament in an alien civilisation, the Empire of Azad, where a complex game (also named Azad) is used to determine social rank and political status. At the same time, he is blackmailed by an ex-SC drone into accepting the assignment so that he can use his newfound influence to have the drone accepted back into Special Circumstances.

The game itself is sufficiently subtle that a player's tactics come to reflect their own political and philosophical outlook. As a Culture citizen, Gurgeh naturally plays with a style markedly different from his opponents, and finds that his system is extremely successful. As he plays increasingly more powerful Azad politicians, Gurgeh ultimately plays for the position of Emperor of Azad. Belatedly, he discovers that his participation is part of a Culture plot to overthrow the corrupt and savage Empire, and that he, the player, was in fact a pawn in a larger game.

Although Gurgeh never discovers the whole truth, it is ultimately revealed to the reader that even the blackmail that forced him to accept the mission was carried out with the knowledge and permission of some faction within Special Circumstances itself. The book therefore contains a rare example of a possible abuse of power within the Culture.