One of the two Culture books I really like, the other being Excession. Expert board-game player is sent to a foreign star system to participate in the game played by an empire which defines itself by how well you play. This is a great introduction to the Culture (which Consider Phlebas is not); throwaway lines such as "They probably think we have a home planet or something" make it clear just how far we have to go to get to that stage, without being lecture-y about it.

Deeply, deeply odd story, and the first from Banks. Teenager with an extremely active (and cruel) internal fantasy life discovers his mad brother is coming back to their isolated village. I recognise more of the internal fantasy life than I might generally care to admit; I suspect that lots of readers do, which is one of the reasons why this was so popular on release.