Iain Menzies Banks ( ; 16 February 1954 – 9 June 2013) was a Scottish author, writing mainstream fiction as Iain Banks and science fiction as Iain M. Banks. His books have been adapted for theatre, radio, and television. In 2008, The Times named Banks in their list of the 50 greatest British writers since 1945. Banks began writing full time after the success of his debut novel The Wasp Factory (1984), which has since sold over a million copies and been translated into 80 languages. The novel was named one of the 100 best books of the 20th century in a 1997 poll; in 2016, it was ranked the second-best Scottish novel of all time in a BBC Scotland poll. His first science fiction book, Consider Phlebas (1987), marked the start of the Culture series, consisting of ten novels. In April 2013, Banks revealed he had inoperable cancer and was unlikely to live beyond a year. He died on 9 June 2013, at the age of 59.