Anyway, you can't leave her like that. You can't do that to the woman. She doesn't deserve it; nobody does. You don't belong to her and she doesn't belong to you, but you're both part of each other; if she got up and left now and walked away and you never saw each other again for the rest of your lives, and you lived an ordinary waking life for another fifty years, even so on your deathbed you would still know she was part of you.
Iain BanksI just come up with the stories and write them as well as I can. There's not really a great deal of strokey-beard thinking going on.
Iain BanksEven in my side of the world, I've been in publishing for what, 25 or 26 years, and it's gone from being a gentlemen's club to being a few big players, and it's very corporatised.
Iain Banks-"Then what," Lededje asked, trying to keep her voice cold and not get caught up in the avatarยดs obvious enthusiasm, "is making you smile about a disaster?" -"Well, first, I didnยดt cause it! Nothing to do with me, hands clean. Always a bonus.
Iain BanksTruth, I have learned, differs for everybody. Just as no two people ever see a rainbow in exactly the same place - and yet both most certainly see it, while the person seemingly standing right underneath it does not see it at all - so truth is a question of where one stands, and the direction one is looking in at the time.
Iain Banks