Count Sessine is about to die for the last time.

Chief Scientist Gadfium is about to receive the mysterious message she has been waiting for from the Plain of Sliding Stones.

Bascule the Teller, in search of an ant, is about to enter the chaos of the crypt.

And everything is about to change.

For this is the time of the Encroachment and, although the dimming sun still shines on the vast, towering walls of Serehfa Fastness, the end is close at hand. The King knows it, his closest advisors know it, yet still they prosecute the war with the Engineers with increasing savagery.

The crypt knows it too; so an emissary has been sent, an emissary who holds the key to all their futures.

Feersum Enjinn is an imaginative tour de force, a stunning novel of bravery and hope, fear and betrayal, strangeness and charm in the face of darkness: it is Iain M Banks at his unparalleled best.