The Three-Body Problem

Award winning Chinese science fiction author Cixin Liu has said, “Science fiction is a literature that belongs to all humankind. It portrays events of interest to all humanity, and thus science fiction should be the literary genre most accessible to readers of different nations.” I think this is true, or at least it can be. For science fiction to appeal to everyone on the planet it is necessary that its stories portray situations that are relevant to everyone, that they are written about in a way that doesn’t exclude those whose cultural or societal beliefs fall into one political camp or another, and, most of all, it requires a literate world in which everyone has enough of their basic needs met that they have time for leisure reading. We are a long way from the ideal state described above, but some books are a movement toward it. Cixin Liu’s “The Three-Body Problem “represents a step in that direction. Liu lives in the People’s Republic of China. When I think of science fiction audiences, China doesn’t come immediately to mind, but that is because of my ignorance, not reality. “The Three-Body Problem” not only won the Hugo Award after its translation into English in 2014, but it also won China’s Galaxy Award for best science fiction in 2006, the year of its publication in China. Cixin Liu has won the Galaxy Award, which I didn’t even know existed, 9 times. “The Three-Body Problem “is hard science fiction, meaning that it is literally filled with science, some of it real, much of it speculative with kernels of real science leading to wildly fantastic consequences. One of its themes is the overturning of the basic principles of modern physics, or at least the apparent overturning of them, since another theme is the deliberate undermining of belief in those principles. The underlying plot of the novel is the mutual discovery of another race in our galaxy, mutual in the sense that we discover them at the same time that they discover us. The ideas contained in this novel are mind-boggling. What appears fanciful becomes less and less so, as more science behind it is revealed, although the science too, get stretched until everything seems fanciful, but I as a reader, was never sure if it was based on realistic science or not. That’s part of the entertaining quality of the book. The extraordinary discoveries come one after another, gradually unfolding the true plot that is determining the characters’ actions. There are political criticisms in “The Three-Body Problem,” almost entirely of China’s Cultural Revolution of the 1960’s and 70’s. As such, they are a criticism of constraining science because of political or philosophical reasons. The author himself has made some political statements, almost entirely in favor of Chinese government policies, which have earned him enough suspicion in the U.S. that several Republican Congressmen objected when they heard that Netflix was creating a film version of his work. But modern Chinese politics are not an issue in the novel. Liu’s comments at the end of the English translation of the book make it clear that he hopes science fiction such as his can bring the world together. A word about character development in “The Three-Body Problem.” The early portions of the book cover several years and skip from one character to another, many of them who die. Finally, the story settles down to a small set of regular characters. Some Western critics have complained that the characters are “shallow,” which may be valid when comparing the novel to many Western ones. I suspect that this reflects a difference between Western and Eastern cultures, as well as difference between science fiction as a genre (at least old-style science fiction) and other fiction genres. Our Western mindset is to attribute the causes of a person’s behavior to elements of their personality. They are adventurous, courageous, lazy, lackadaisical, psychopathic, etc. Sociological research has suggested that many Eastern cultures tend to see the causes of behavior as due to events and circumstance or even luck, rather than to ongoing personality characteristics (it is a more vs less difference, rather than an either-or difference). Liu’s novel takes the latter approach, giving a detailed description of the circumstances leading characters to do what they do in the novel. It is not a lack of depth of characters so much as it represents a different approach to character motivation that is reflective of the overall culture of the writer. In the case of “The Three-Body Problem,” this results in the novel gradually providing the basis for different characters’ otherwise puzzling behavior by providing after-the-fact stories of what happened in their lives to cause them to behave as they do. I found this book to be absolutely intriguing and impossible to put down until I got to its end. I am eager to read the two novels that are its sequels. It is science fiction at its very best

I'm told there is a lot of great science fiction being produced in non-English speaking countries. Like most readers my age, I grew up on stuff that was written in the United States, and occasionally Great Britain, by white males. That's just the way it was back in those days. I'm guessing that most readers in the U.S. today still default to reading English language novels written by English speaking writers. We are typically not exposed to fiction from other countries and cultures, and even if a book is translated into English, we need to be made aware of that book before we'll pick it up and read it. I honestly can't tell you how many translated science fiction and fantasy books are sitting on bookstore shelves waiting to be purchased and read. Short of looking at every last one of them - and I'm not going to do that - I don't know how I would find out. But in 2014, a book from whom I understand is arguably China's most beloved science fiction author, Cixin Liu, received the translation treatment by Ken Liu (no relation), and was published by Tor. Before the book started getting some advance notice from folks in the field (I heard about it for the first time on The Coode Street Podcast last year), I'd never heard of Cixin Liu. I *had* heard of Ken Liu. Ken Liu is one of the most talented short fiction writers in the field today, with multiple Hugo awards already under his belt, as well as a Nebula, among others. However, I know absolutely nothing about the book translation process and how well the resulting work represents the original. Thus, I'll talk about what I do know, which is the story. And what a story it is. It's a throwback to 70s science fiction, a first encounter and alien invasion story all rolled into one (and that's not even true, since it's the first book of a trilogy, the second of which, THE DARK FOREST, hits our shores this year, translated by Joel Martinsen). It's got science - lots of science - and a bit of what looks like hand wavium going on at one point (until I started reading some articles in a magazine that were discussing something similar to what the hand waving was about - I think). It's grand in scope, has some terrific ideas, and really can make us stop and think about whether we're all alone out here. The story begins during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, and uses it as a launching pad for all that goes forward. A young woman, who sees her father killed during the revolution, is assigned to a military base in a remote part of China. The more time she spends there, the more she becomes trusted, and eventually she learns the true nature of the project - to send signals into space to contact alien life. The young woman, Ye Wenjie (thank goodness for the list of characters at the beginning of the book), learns of a way to amplify the signals that are being sent. She sends a signal into deep space - and hence the trouble begins. Over the course of the book we learn about the Trisolarans, an alien race that lives in a planetary system that has three suns. Trisolaran society is dying because of those three suns. Cixin Liu comes up with the clever idea of the Three Body game, wherein players are challenged to find solutions to the Three Body Problem (hence the name of the book) by interacting with characters from history in societies that keep dying off because of the unpredictability of the cycles of the three suns. (I should note that there really is something called the Three Body Problem; from wikipedia: In its traditional sense, the three-body problem is the problem of taking an initial set of data that specifies the positions, masses and velocities of three bodies for some particular point in time and then determining the motions of the three bodies, in accordance with the laws of classical mechanics (Newton's laws of motion and of universal gravitation).). The Three Body game is more than just a game - it is a gateway into a group of people who are working together to plan for the coming of the Trisolarans. I don't want to give too many more details, as I could start getting into spoiler territory, and I think the rest needs to be discovered by the reader. What I can say, however, is that book not only chronicles how and why this group of individuals came together, but it also explores how the Trisolarans plan to come to earth to take over. Yes, it's a hostile takeover, and there are no financial personnel involved, although this is where the hand-waving comes in and, in reality, I don't mind it in the least. Whether a super-intelligent computer can be made by unfolding a proton into two dimensions is not the point. Just thinking about the possibilities of being able to do that is the point, and indeed in a larger sense has been how science fiction has gone about its business since the field began. You know, "wow, wouldn't it be neat if we could do THAT?". The other thing I enjoyed about this book is the peek it gives to the reader into Chinese civilization around the time of the Chines Cultural Revolution going forward. Granted, it is just a peek, but I'd never given much thought to political, military, and academic life as well as the social status one acquires depending on who and where one was at any given time during that period of Chinese history. With regard to the translation, as I stated earlier, there's not much I can say about it. It's hard to be able to judge how well a book is translated when you don't know the original. I *can* tell you that I've enjoyed Ken Liu's writing style when I have read his short fiction, and I think that style comes through here. I can tell it was a good, fast paced, and interesting read. I was never bored, and actually looked forward to reading the footnotes as I was reading the main text. I did NOT have same eagerness while I was reading JONATHAN STRANGE AND MR. NORELL. If foreign language science fiction is like this, I need to read more. Even if it's not, I do look forward to the remaining two books in the trilogy, and hopefully there will be more translations of Cixin Liu's work coming our way in the future.

It’s been a few days since I finished this book, and after digesting the novel, I think I’m ready to share some thoughts. First, I freely admit that part of the appeal of this book comes from the novelty of reading a translated Chinese novel - it did not disappoint. The Translation Before I start talking about the book, I need to point out that the translator, Ken Liu, did beautifully. The prose is quite good, and Ken Liu did a marvelous job of retaining the differences in style and sentence construction between Chinese and American writing. I always appreciate metaphors, similes, analogies, etc. that are written by someone from another part of the world. We Americans have our preferred methods of explaining ideas, but reading these new voice from across the Pacific Ocean was quite refreshing. The Novel The basic plot of The Three-Body Problem is relatively simple and is set against the backdrop of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. (Talk about a moment in history that gets glossed over here in ‘Murica. I knew nothing about this period in Chinese history. It's totally fascinating.) The action centers around several scientists who gaze at both the very large and the very small. Through a series of discoveries, deaths and mysteries, the problem of the three-body system presents itself as a big dumb object plot ...well, kinda - but it works very well. It’s unfortunate that the dust-jacket blrubs all spoil the fact that aliens are involved - it’s a rather neat moment when it happens, and it would have been even niftier if I hadn’t known it was going to happen. Stupid publishers. (But not so stupid that we want you to stop publishing! Just clarifying…) The science behind the titular three-body problem is also totally cool and mind-bendy (if you just run to Wikipedia and search for “three-body problem” it’ll kick back a basic overview of the concept), and one that I have never read about before. But Cixin Liu uses a sleek virtual reality video game to show slowly explain to the reader the erratic effects of a three-body solar system and how such a system would affect an orbiting planet, and the result is simple to understand and quite brilliant. To be fair, the plot does move very quickly, and the pacing occasionally feels uneven. Certainly most Western readers would balk at this, but I wonder if the novel's pacing is just part of the cultural differences between us and the Chinese. In addition, some reviewers have commented on the fact that Cixin Liu does a lot of telling rather than showing, and I agree, however, again I wonder how much of this is a difference between Western and Eastern expectations. If you’re looking for an American comparison, I would compare the novel’s pace and scope and the author’s writing style to Robert Charles Wilson, Greg Bear, or a long-winded Arthur C. Clarke, all of whom write about huge physics ideas using engaging plots, but no one would ever claim that their plots are “super exciting.” Overall, this is a fantastic novel, and a fantastic beginning to an already successful trilogy. The Three-Body Problem deserves a place on the bookshelf of Science Fiction Awesome alongside other classics such as Eon, Spin, and A Fire Upon the Deep. If this novel is indicative of the SciFi hiding in the East, then publishers, start hiring more translators and bringing these gems to the States. China’s first imported SciFi novel is a jewel indeed. P.S. Dear publisher, The dust jacket blurb claims that The Three-Body Problem contains the “scope of Dune and the rousing action of Independence Day.” So...you're saying it’s like...Star Wars? Yeah, no - not even close. The trilogy might reach the scope of Dune eventually, but it barely leaves Earth in the the first novel. And as far as the “rousing action” of ID4, not by a long shot. This is a very slowly paced novel that focuses not on rousing action scenes, but on the aftermaths of action scenes, and conversations, and explanations. Will Smith it is not. Every once in a while a bullet will fly, but not very often at all. Surely you can come up with better ways to call this novel a classic and hook people rather than comparing it to Dune or ID4. Just sayin.’

Bought after watching the show. The show is great as is, but there are some pretty big differences, especially with characters and nationalities. It took me about 100 pages before I was comfortable with who the characters I knew from the show were, but fortunately there is a character list at the beginning to reference. That said, absolutely fantastic book! Again, the show is really, really good, even better in some areas, but the book just goes deeper. When I got halfway, I ordered Dark Forest, and next week I’m getting Deaths End.

I spent the first half of this book telling myself that my negative reactions to it existed in the realm of cross-cultural communications, and that it was not a failing on the part of the writer. Somewhere around half way through, I decided that the real issue is that the author isn't a particularly good writer, which is not necessarily the same as being or not being a compelling story teller, which I believe he is. There are three story lines in this book: one in the past, during Mao Zedong's "cultural revolution" and told in flashbacks, a second and primary story line in the present, and a third story line that takes place in the present in a virtual reality puzzle game, but where the game also parallels the history of an alien species on their home world in the past. The story line that begins toward the end of the cultural revolution in China and follows a physicist whose father was tortured and executed by the party, follows her along a path that leads her to first contact with an alien race, and the choices she makes regarding contact with that race -- that story is interesting and compelling. And how that story is integrated into the structure of the book as a whole is handled skillfully. The primary story line in the present is itself interesting in subject matter, though childlike in structure. The characters are largely wooden, and the narrative structure feels like a quest-oriented video game. We watch the character move from Point A to B, where someone tells him something and tells him to head to Point C, where someone tells him something and gives him an object to carry to Point D, where... so on... and so on... and so on.... And while one might say that ALL narratives universally follow this model to some degree, most don't do it in such transparent fashion. It reads like one of the old "choose your own adventure" books, but where someone has already chosen the adventure for me. The third story-line that takes place in the VR video game is flat out boring. At the beginning, it was moderately intriguing, but this story-line gets its own chapters -- MANY of them -- and after a few, I could see that these chapters were the author's self-indulgent darling. I largely skipped these chapters in part or in whole in the second half of the book, and I lost nothing. There is, in the school/art of writing, a common directive to "murder (or kill) our darlings (or babies)," and while it is attributed to countless writers, the original comes from Arthur Quiller-Couch: "Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it—whole-heartedly—and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings." And that's the sin of the virtual reality chapters - the author of this book sent his big fat darling to press. These chapters are the part of the book that the author is most in love with, and the part of the book that the reader least needs. The following is not a spoiler -- it's a mercy: "An alien race lived on a planet in a system with three suns, and the unpredictable, chaotic nature of three-body orbital physics lead to the rapid rise and fall of civilizations on the lone, surviving planet in the system until one civilization finally concluded that if they were to survive as a species, they needed to leave the planet and settle on a world in another system, and they devoted all the civilization's resources to that end." Trust me -- if you read that lengthy sentence above, you can skip all the VR chapters. Is there detail you're missing? A lot. Is that missing detail relevant to the main story? NOT AT ALL. After having given this book 3 stars and more or less trashing two-thirds of it, I will say that I have not yet read, but I have bought book 2. ?!?!?!?!?! What?!?! The present day plot line, and its origins in Mao Zedong's cultural revolution are compelling, and I want to finish the story. It also helps that I have read from people who have had similar complaints as mine regarding the first book that the second and third books are better. Compelling story-telling overall. Amateur writing.

The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu The Three Body Problem is a hard science fiction novel by Chinese author Cixin Liu or Liu Cixin, I have seen it written both ways and I am not familiar with the Chinese protocol for names. It was the winner of the 2015 Hugo Award and was nominated for the 2014 Nebula Award, so it had to be good – right? Well, maybe at one time, but as of late it seems as if the awards - all awards - have become politicized and not necessarily the best entry is chosen. But that is a discussion for another time. At the very least, I thought The Three Body Problem deserved at least a chance to prove itself. While I do not think the novel was worthy of an award, I did find it had some merit and well worth the read. The story takes place in China, and the beginning deals with the cultural revolution of the 1960’s. I must admit that I know very little of China’s history, or what life is like in China at all, and I found the history lesson fascinating. I could not see the relevance of these seemingly disjointed segments, but by the time the novel ended everything fell into place. In fact, the main plot line did not become evident until shortly after the halfway point of the novel. But after the slow start, things picked up fairly nicely and became more interesting to me. The characters, with the exception of the astrophysicist Ye Wenjie and the police detective Shi Qiang, were flat and one-dimensional. The dialog seemed clipped and at times forced, but I am giving the author the benefit of the doubt due to translation restraints. I can sympathize with Ye Wenjie but cannot justify her betrayal. I feel her logic was flawed by equating a stronger civilization with a superior one. I did like the character of Shi Qiang. He was abrasive and somewhat uncouth, but he was very smart among all the scientists and felt real to me. All things considered, I give this read 4 stars. As someone with a math and science background, I enjoyed the reading the hard science. I can see where it may not appeal to all readers, but I think there are enough other items that will appeal to lovers of the genre. The premise was believable and it was interesting to speculate how humanity would react to another civilization and how the people separated into different camps. I always thought humans would line up to protect their world, but I can see how some people may have become disillusioned with our society. I do not feel this work is worthy of receiving an award, but it still has something to offer sci-fi fans.

Epic... There really is no other word for this trilogy and yes, although this review is attached to the first book in the series, I'm writing it after finishing the third part - you have to make the commitment to the full story. A problem with writing a review for this work, with its vast scope and eye-popping concepts is that there is little to compare it with, there were parts that reminded me of the Helliconia stories, there were nods in the direction of Arthur C Clarke, Van Vogt, Azimov and even Norse Mythology - there's certainly a strong echo of Ragnarok in the third book but I can't really think of any modern writing that comes close to Cixin Liu's ambition and vision. It can't have been an easy book to write - don't expect it to be an easy one to read. So, no spoilers, just a some pointers that may help if you are thinking of taking the plunge. The language: Obviously this was written originally in Chinese so a lot relies on the quality of the translation. Personally I think that the translation works better in the second and third book although I know others disagree and would put that around the other way. In translation, the writing is elegant and evocative with just enough 'difference' remaining to give the writing a slightly alien quality that adds to the atmosphere. I would not be in the least surprised to hear that it has inspired readers to want to learn the language to read it in its original form - in much the same way that people have learnt Spanish to read Don Quixote. The Characters: The balance is about right - well developed lead characters, as deep and complex as the story, supported by a wide ranging cast of flatter archetypes. Their strengths and flaws (of which there are many) are those of people who are both ordinary and remarkable at the same time. I found that I wanted to learn more about many of the supporting cast - watch out for a character called Wade, I really want to know his back-story. The Science & Technology: Despite all the SF tech, one of the strengths of these books is that somehow, none of it seemed far-fetched. Every invention, every breakthrough was a logical extension of something that preceded it. It was handled so well that, on more than one occasion, I found myself wanting more details about how something worked, almost forgetting that I was reading a work of SF. The way that the secret to achieving lightspeed travel was discovered was particularly well done. The Story Itself: While the majority of the story takes place over a period of a few hundred years the whole arc stretches from the opening scene in the cultural revolution in China through to pretty much the end of the universe. There are many twists accompanied by highs and lows that actually justify the use of the cliche 'emotional roller-coaster'. There are grand space battles, brain transplants, space-cities orbiting Jupiter and high adventure. But there are also moments of peace and tranquility, there are fairy stories and a recurring theme around the power of forgiveness. At times, it's a warts and all look at humanity and many of those warts are pretty ugly. Do I recommend it? yes, wholeheartedly. If you, like me, see 'hard' sf as a genre that started in the golden age under guidance of people like John W Campbell, then the Three Body trilogy probably represents the current pinnacle - the state of the art.

The other month ago I read an article in Wired magazine about the Hugo Awards (a pretty big deal in the world of science fiction). More specifically the article was about the lack of women and people of color who are nominated for and receive a Hugo Award. This isn’t because women and people of coloring write sub-par science fiction but because certain groups try and rig the voting to keep a certain type of science fiction author at the top of the list. (And yes, this “certain group” and “certain type of author” are white straight men.) Thanks to this article I was pointed towards some Hugo Award winning science fiction by a diversity of authors. After reading some synopses and reviews online, I bought The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu, a book that won the Hugo Award in 2015 after two other authors, both white, withdrew as they realized they were being pushed to the top simply to keep diverse authors down. (Seriously, someone should make a movie about that.) To be honest, I was a little nervous about starting this book. Not because it’s science fiction (major geek over here) but because I didn’t know if I would be able to keep up with the context of the Chinese Revolution or keep track of so many names that I am so unfamiliar with. However, all of my fears were satiated once I began reading the book. Yes, the book revolves around the Chinese Revolution and yes it is filled with Chinese names. But the footnotes along the way did an excellent job of explaining the context (and teaching me many new things) and the names were much easier to remember and keep track of than I thought, probably easier than if they had been names I am overly familiar with. As I came to the final chapters of the book, I found myself utterly satisfied with the story, only sad that I had so few pages remaining. The book lands well, leaving you satisfied upon completion, but I was curious to know more about the larger meta-narrative and the always looming “what happens next?” After a quick google search I discovered that The Three-Body Problem is the first in a trilogy. And the English translation of the third book would be out this August! I bought the sequel, The Dark Forest, and will be reading the finale, Death’s End, once it is released. All this to say, go read The Three-Body Problem. It will remind you why science fiction is an amazing genre and introduce you to a diversity of amazing scifi authors in the world. And if that’s not enough to convince you, President Obama took a copy of this book with him over the holidays! // Oh, and I love this book so much that I gave it a shout out in my latest sermon at Middle Church (as well as comparing the book of Revelation to science fiction). Enjoy! https://youtu.be/n_TPhxJonuA

I loved this book, so much so that I think it's probably some of the finest science fiction I've read in some time. As I've said before, my love of the genre comes primarily from its exploration of big ideas and there are some fascinating concepts explored in this book. The most obvious of which is first contact, and although this is far from an original topic, it does have some novel nuances here. Beyond that we have the puzzle of why two protons are fired into the Solar System, and the discovery of why and how is truly fascinating. There is clearly a wealth of research and knowledge in this story. And some of it I found quite challenging, and I love that it in a book. Some of the science is so esoteric that I had to pause my reading to contemplate an idea. There is considerable depth here, that some might find off-putting, but don't let it be. This is a wonderful exploration of complex concepts and philosophy, and is all the more rewarding because of it. Of course a story isn't carried by grand ideas alone. There is a balanced cast of characters that allows for the tale to be told in a more comprehensible manner. There's also a curious transformation of the characters at play here as well. You start off with sympathies for some, and loathing for others, and their roles switch as you learn more of the truth. That in itself makes this an interesting read. The Chinese history and perspective of the story also casts a layer of fascination, and some novelty - for me at least. The circumstances of the characters lives added an attraction to the story, and here as well there were discoveries to be made. The historical and cultural differences allowed the slow (but steady) build up to have an interest that might have otherwise be lacking. Finally we come to the writing itself. It's always difficult with a translated work to determine whether the fault, or the praise is due to the original author, or the translator. For the reader I suppose it makes little difference, it is the end product that counts. The writing is quite dry which doesn't carry the emotion well, although there were a few exceptions. However this does carry the discovery in the story in a robust fashion. As I said at the beginning I loved this book. It's not perfect (but what is?), but it is an incredible read, and a must read for those who enjoy science fiction with some depth.

The quality of print (hard cover) is on top. The book itself is special, very deep and intresting

This book is a mind-bending journey through science fiction! I was hooked from the first page, and I couldn't put it down until I finished it. The story is complex and thought-provoking, exploring themes of alien contact, human nature, and the nature of reality itself. The writing is beautiful and the characters are well-developed. I especially loved the way the author seamlessly blended science and fiction, creating a truly believable and immersive world. If you're looking for a challenging and rewarding science fiction read, I highly recommend The Three-Body Problem.

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Nice read and the pace is even. May be slightly on heavier side of science but opens readers to vast possibilities that lies ahead for humanity.