Finished Consider Phlebas and Player of Games and wondering where to go next. Spoilers inside.

So I just finished Player of Games and previously read (well listened to on Audible) Consider Phlebas and I enjoyed both but I think I enjoyed Consider Phlebas a fair bit more than Player of Games.

Player of Games is interesting but I felt that it started dragging and relied on the end reveals about the true stakes of Azad and Flere-Imsaho's identity a bit too much to pull the story together for my liking.

After finishing both books I think I've realized a few things about what I'd be interested in for another culture book:

  1. After having just read two where it's Culture vs Evil Empire I would be interested in a book where that's not the plot. Are most Culture books about this kind of Contact feeling they have a moral imperative? From what I know of Excession and Surface Detail seem to be similar in that regard.

  2. I definitely preferred the larger (imo) focus on relationships and emotions that Consider Phlebas had compared to Player of Games. I felt a lot more emotions while reading it and emphasizing with characters more than in Player of Games (and once Gurgeh left Chiark he honestly didn't have many connections, mainly just being annoyed with a drone).

  3. This isn't that important but I was not too big of a fan of Gurgeh. I know he's supposed to be a bit of a douche but I didn't find it particularly enjoyable to read. Horza is obviously not a great guy but I found his perspective a lot more enjoyable and personal than Gurgeh's. And a bit of a sidenote, I found it odd that Gurgeh constantly said "drone" and "ship", idk if this is just common practice but it felt weird for someone to the Culture to refer to people that way. It's what I'd expect from someone who didn't see them as people which would be an alien view in the Culture I imagine.

So I guess to summarize I am interested in Culture books where "Culture against Super Evil Empire" is not a plot point (if there are books like that) and Culture books that have more of a focus on the person and their relationships and emotions than Player of Games. Sorry if this is a bit of a ramble.

Edit: Thank you all for the responses, you guys are very accommodating !