Editing Excession (section)

{{Short description|1996 Book by Iain M. Banks}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox book | <!-- See Wikipedia:WikiProject_Novels or Wikipedia:WikiProject_Books -->
| name         = Excession
| orig title   =
| translator   =
| image        = IainMBanksExcession.jpg
| caption      = First edition
| author       = [[Iain M. Banks]]
| audio_read_by  = [[Peter Kenny]]
| cover_artist = Mark Salwowski
| country      = Scotland
| language     = English
| series       = [[Culture series|The Culture]]
| genre        = [[Science fiction]] 
| publisher    = [[Orbit Books]]
| release_date = 1996
| awards = Best Novel (1996) [[BSFA Award|BSFA]]
| media_type   = Print ([[Hardcover|Hardback]] & [[Paperback]])
| pages        = 451 
| isbn         = 1-85723-394-8
| oclc= 35379578
| preceded_by  = [[The State of the Art]]
| followed_by  = [[Inversions (novel)|Inversions]]
}}

'''''Excession''''' is a 1996 [[science fiction]]  novel by Scottish writer [[Iain M. Banks]]. It is the fifth in the [[Culture series]], a series of ten science fiction novels which feature a [[utopian]] [[Interstellar travel|interstellar]] [[society]] called [[the Culture]]. It concerns the response of the Culture and other interstellar societies to an unprecedented alien artifact, the Excession of the title.

The book is largely about the response of the Culture's [[Mind (The Culture)|Minds]] (benevolent [[AI]]s with enormous intellectual and physical capabilities and distinctive personalities) to the Excession itself and the way in which another society, the Affront, whose systematic brutality horrifies the Culture, tries to use the Excession to increase its power. As in Banks' other [[Culture series|Culture novels]] the main themes are the [[moral dilemma]]s that confront a hyperpower and how biological characters find ways to give their lives meaning in a [[post-scarcity]] society that is presided over by benign super-intelligent machines.{{Citation needed|date=January 2021|reason=This seems like a personal interpretation of the book's message. I haven't read it and can't debate whether or not I would come to the same conclusion, but, as I see it, a Wikipedia article for a book should stick to describing the plot of a book sans the underlying message as the article's writer perceived it.

If someone can provide a reference showing the author has expressly stated that the books thematically center on this concept, that would be more appropriate for inclusion.}} The book features a large collection of Culture ship names, some of which give subtle clues about the roles these ships' Minds play in the story. In terms of style, the book is also notable for the way in which many important conversations between Minds resemble [[email]] messages complete with [[Header (computing)|headers]].