Ziller lives in self-imposed exile on Masaq', having renounced his privileged position in Chel's caste system. To protect him from detection at Masaq', Quilan's memory is selectively blanked until he reaches his target, thus preventing the Mind from reading his thoughts. Quilan is then sent to the Culture's Masaq' Orbital, ostensibly to persuade the renowned composer Mahrai Ziller to return to his native planet Chel, but in reality on a mission to destroy the Orbital's Hub Mind. His 'Soulkeeper' (a device normally used to store its owner's personality upon their death) is equipped with both the mind of a long-dead Chelgrian admiral and a device given to the Chelgrians by a mysterious group of Involved aliens that can transport wormholes through which weapons can be delivered. A high-ranked Chelgrian priest offers Quilan the chance to avenge the Chelgrians who died by taking part in a suicide mission to strike back at the Culture. Major Quilan, a Chelgrian, has lost the will to live after the death of his wife, killed during the Chelgrian civil war that resulted from the Culture's interference. The Chelgrians are a race of centaur-like cat aliens with three hind-limbs and a humanoid catlike torso. Consider Phlebas took its name from the following line in the poem and dealt with the events of the Idiran-Culture War Look to Windward deals with the results of the war on those who lived through it. Look to Windward is loosely a sequel to Consider Phlebas, Banks's first published Culture novel.

Excession iain banks