He decided to try a more mainstream novel in the hopes that it would be more readily accepted, and wrote about a psychopathic teenager living on a remote Scottish island.

According to Banks, this allowed him to treat the story as something resembling science fiction – the island could be envisaged as a planet, and Frank, the protagonist, almost as an alien.

The Wasp Factory is written from a first person perspective, told by 16-year-old Francis Cauldhame ("Frank"), describing his childhood and all that remains of it.

This is in part due to the mauling coinciding with the last time he saw his mother, who had come back to give birth to his younger brother, and left immediately afterward.

Frank's older brother, Eric, escapes from a psychiatric institution, having been arrested some years prior for arson and terrorising the local children by force-feeding them live maggots.

The Wasp Factory is a mechanism invented by Frank, consisting of a huge clock face, salvaged from the local dump, encased in a glass box.

The corpses of animals, such as mice that he has killed, are placed onto the poles for the purpose of attracting birds which will fly away and alert Frank of anybody approaching the island.

While attempting to feed a brain-damaged newborn with acalvaria, Eric notes how the child is unresponsive and smiling, despite usually appearing expressionless.

Eric checks underneath the plate to find the child's exposed brain tissue infested and being consumed by day-old maggots.

During the ensuing confrontation, Eric attempts to destroy the house by setting light to the large stock of cordite kept in the cellar.

The remains of his genitals were fake, fashioned from wax as evidence in case Frank ever questioned his father's story.

[6] In 2013, the Australian producer and composer Ben Frost directed an opera adaptation of the Iain Banks novel, in which all characters are represented by three female singers.