SFX Magazine Wants Your Questions for Iain Banks

June 11th, 2010 in Global, Interviews

SFX Magazine will be conducting a fan-interview with Iain Banks and are requesting questions to put to the author.

The deadline for submitting a question is Tuesday, June 15th. Details of how to submit can be found at www.sfx.co.uk.

Iain Banks on BBC Radio Scotland's Stark Talk, 19.05.10

May 13th, 2010 in Global, Interviews, TV, Radio & Film

Iain Banks will be the special guest of BBC Radio Scotland's Edi Stark as she talks to Iain at his home in Fife for her regular Stark Talk series.

The show will be broadcast next Wednesday, 19th May, at 11.30 GMT BST and repeated the following Sunday at 10.30 BST. More info at the BBC Radio Scotland website. The show should also be available post-broadcast, via the BBC's iPlayer service.

Thanks to David H of The Banksoniain for the heads-up.

Quick Iain Banks interview on FT.com

September 21st, 2009 in Global, Interviews

Anna Metcalfe sends a series of quick-fire questions in Iain's direction for a 'Small Talk' feature over www.ft.com. Questions like: "What is the strangest thing you’ve done when researching a book?" (Answer: "Using the equation e=mc² to work out the explosive yield of very small quantities of antimatter, to determine how small an effective nano-missile could be.")

Iain Banks talks to… Ken Livingstone?

September 18th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

The New Statesman website has posted an interview with Iain carried out by none other than Ken Livingstone.

Yes, that Ken Livignstone, the former Mayor of London. Turns out he's something of an sf fan: he name-checks David Brin and mentions putting in an appearance at the Brighton SF Festival in 1987, and says he reads sf classics. You live and learn, eh?

Read the full piece at www.newstatesman.com.

Iain Banks interviewed for The Guardian

September 17th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

In a feature-length interview piece posted to The Guardian's website, Maxton Walker talks to Iain about whether or not Transition can (or should) be interpreted as a literary attack on American foreign policy and his attitude towards torture as a weapon in the fight against terrorism. They also discuss the Transition serial podcast and how current trends in the publishing industry are affecting Iain and other writers.

Good reading over at www.guardian.co.uk.

Iain Banks interviewed for The Independent

September 16th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

The Independent's website is running an interview with Iain conducted by Arifa Akbar. Discussions range across Iain's plans to write a symphony, the concept of "Christian terrorism" in Transition, the effect that the passing of his father, Robert, in June has had on his personal life and writing alike, and the contrast between his generally sunny disposition and the dark mood to be found in most of his books.

Well worth a visit to www.independent.co.uk to read the full article.

Iain Banks interviewed for The Scotsman

September 15th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

In an interview posted on The Scotsman's website, Aidan Smith asks Iain about Transition, as well as topics as diverse as his friendly rivalry with fellow Fife-resident Ian Rankin, drugs, the women in his life and his opinion of Prime Minister Gordon Brown ("I'm only a little disappointed in him. He's not a war criminal like Tony Blair, he's been unlucky, but he has ballsed up.")

Read the full interview at news.scotsman.com.

Iain Banks in conversation with Clive James – today

August 18th, 2009 in Interviews, UK-Specific

I've just been handed the following newsflash by the ever-alert Dave H of The Banksoniain fanzine:

"Iain Banks will be the guest on Clive James in Conversation on Tuesday 18th August (i.e. TODAY!) at the Assembly Rooms George Street, Edinburgh."

See www.clivejamesguests.com for more information.

Iain Banks talks to the Prague Post

June 18th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

Earlier in the month, to coincide with his appearance at the Prague Writers' Festival, Iain Banks was interviewed by the Prague Post.

When asked about forthcoming brand new novel Transition's placement in the M / non-M spectrum of his work, Iain said:

"The template I had in mind was The Bridge, my third novel, from 1986. I still think very highly of it, and I liked the way its structure let me use different voices and approaches. So, for Transition, I was trying to come up with something as different and challenging. I still think of Transition as basically mainstream, but I guess there's enough sci-fi in there to justify publishing it as such in a market where my sci-fi has generally done better."

Visit www.praguepost.com to read the rest of the interview.

Many thanks to Joe G of FPI Blog fame for the heads-up!

Iain Banks talks to The View From Here

April 3rd, 2009 in Global, Interviews

Mike French, Editor of online literary news & reviews 'zine The View From Here has posted a new interview with Iain Banks, in two parts: part one, part two.

The discussion ranges across Iain's love of Risk!, the 'anorak' label as applied to science fiction fans, the possibility of a Wasp Factory movie, Iain's reaction to reviews, his taken on the publishing industry and more.

Iain Banks discusses the Future of Science Fiction with the BBC

March 19th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

Iain has contributed to a BBC website column entitled How Sci-Fi Moves With the Times, along with fellow writers Ken MacLeod, Paul Cornell and Ian Watson.

In the course of describing his general approach to the degree of scientific realism he includes in his different writing modes, Iain also lets slip a tantalising hint about his next novel:

My new book is a mainstream novel that borrows science fiction tropes. It plays with the idea that there are an infinite number of different worlds.

So it's using speculative hard science. And it's important to the book that there's a degree of respectability about the idea of the multiverse, or the many-worlds theory.

You can discuss the implications of this little snippet over on the Iain [M] Banks fan forum, should you be so inclined...

Paul Cornell 'State of the Art' audio interview

March 4th, 2009 in Global, Interviews

As part of Sci-Fi London's Reality Check podcast series, Alex Fitch talks to Paul Cornell about his work on the BBC radio adaptation of 'The State of the Art', which airs on Radio 4 tomorrow (Thursday March 5th) at 2.15 p.m. as part of the current BBC R4 Sci-Fi Season.

[via the FPI Blog and Dave H]

Iain Banks email Q&A October 2008

October 14th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

Welcome to the latest Q&A session with Iain Banks. The first two sessions can be found here: Q&A session I and Q&A session II.

Read on for the latest Q's from Iain's readers and fans, with A's from the man himself...

Read the rest of this article

Iain Banks talks to Writing Magazine

October 10th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

Iain has been interviewed for the latest edition of Writer's News Writing Magazine and talks about a number of writing-related subjects, including plotting, character development, pre-planning and avoiding the temptation to polish work until the first draft has been finished.

Interviewer Judith Spelman has posted a (1.23Mb) pdf copy of the piece on her own website at www.judithspelman.co.uk.

[Thanks to DaveH for the heads-up]

A few more Banks-esque links

September 12th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

The Guardian asks Iain a few quick-fire questions about his environmental credentials in their Green Room column.

Independent columnist Matthew Bell makes a brief mention of Iain's recent appearance at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

Webzine Dazed & Digital has a brief interview with Iain, also conducted during the EIBF.

Paul Cornell gives a brief progress report on his BBC radio adaptation of 'The State of the Art' during an interview with IO9.com.

Iain Banks email Q&A August 2008

August 29th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

Welcome to the second Q&A session with Iain Banks. Iain enjoyed the first Q&A session back in July that he asked us to set up another one pretty much right away.

And so - without any further ado - we present Iain's Email Q&A, episode II:

Read the rest of this article

Iain Banks FinancialRadio.co.uk audio interview

August 4th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

Iain Banks has been interviewed by market news and interviews webzine Financial Radio. It appears that the interview was carried out and posted to the website back in April, but was added to YouTube a couple of weeks ago and subsequently discovered by Gary W, who sent in the link (cheers, Gary!)

Here's the link to the original article: www.financialradio.co.uk.

And here are the three YouTube links:

Part One
Part Two
Part Three

Embedded audio after the jump, click on 'read more' to access.

Read the rest of this article

Iain [M] Banks Q&A session II – more questions, please!

July 24th, 2008 in Global, Interviews

Iain enjoyed providing answers for the first email Q&A session so much that he's asked us to set up another one right away.

And so, without further ado, we hereby call for all you Banks-fans and readers to send in your next batch of questions for Iain. The same general guidelines as last time will apply once more:

Send your best question (just one per correspondent, please), by email, to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk, with the subject line 'Iain [M] Banks QandA Suggestion'.

The deadline for submissions for this second session is Wednesday August 13th. After that date, the half-dozen or so queries that - in the collective opinion of the team here at Orbit / Abacus - are the most interesting and / or intriguing will be put to Mr Banks for his consideration and contemplation. The resulting answers will then be posted to to the website as soon as Iain has gotten his answers back to us.

Fire away!

Iain Banks email Q&A July 2008

July 21st, 2008 in Global, Interviews

A few weeks ago, we invited readers of this website and www.orbitbooks.net to submit questions to be put to Iain Banks by email. Once the three-week submission period was over, the selection panel sifted through the submissions and picked half a dozen; Iain mused, pondered, cogitated and then sent back the following responses:

Read the rest of this article

Iain [M] Banks Q&A session – send us your questions!

June 23rd, 2008 in Global, Interviews

In a few weeks' time, the one and only Iain [M] Banks will be participating in an email QandA session, which will be conducted via this-here official Iain Banks website. We're therefore looking for a selection of interesting, intelligent questions to put to him.

So if you've got a burning issue that you'd like Iain to address, or if there's something that's intrigued you about his recent work, or a question that's been lurking in the back of your mind ever since you read one of his earliest novels that you'd now like to bring into the light of day, then this is your chance.

Send your best question (just one per correspondent, please), by email, to orbit@littlebrown.co.uk, with the subject line 'Iain [M] Banks QandA Suggestion'. The deadline for submissions for this first session is July 9th. After that date, the half-dozen or so queries that - in the collective opinion of the team here at Orbit / Abacus - are the most interesting and / or intriguing* will be put to Mr Banks for consideration. The resulting answers will then be posted to this very website in due course.

We're hoping that this will be the first of a number of regular Q&A sessions with Iain, so don't worry if you can't think of something fascinating to ask him straight away; why not mull it over a bit and maybe submit it to us for the next round?

*Hint: Questions such as "why did you cut up your passport?" and "why did you sell all your sports cars?" have been answered no end of times elsewhere, we feel. Likewise, "where do you get your ideas?" will be given short-shrift indeed. We're looking for interesting and / or intriguing queries to put to Iain, folks... so fire up those imagination circuits!