The Three-Body Problem

[anarresa]

The Three-Body Problem
By Liu Cixin
Translated by Ken Liu
4 stars

Trim the TBR #24

The good thing about a book lingering on the TBR for a few years is that I forgot why I wanted it in the first place. I just picked it up and dove right in, the whole thing was a surprise. I preferred that so I will keep the plot description very brief. A young physicist suffers through China’s Cultural Revolution, eventually finding some technical work to get her through. Years later another scientist enters an exciting virtual reality game that leads to strange encounters in the real world, including with the now aged physicist.

This is has been tagged speculative fiction, but I think it is proper science fiction. The physics described may or may not be accurate, but it is detailed…very detailed. The Chinese history might as well be non-fiction (with plenty of translator’s notes) but as soon as the story is in the present-day there is no mistaking it for reality.

For most of the novel I actually thought the story was going in one direction (which I preferred) but the book concluded in a different way. It was a good book, I will add the next one to my TBR (not much trimming going on) but won’t be rushing out to get it right now.

[annapi]

I've not picked up book 2 yet myself, but I was impressed by the creativity of his ideas. It is the kind of book I have to be in the mood for, though, so it might take me awhile.

Then again, the same thing happened with Ancillary Sword, and when I finally did get around to it because of this challenge, I devoured that and immediately went on to book 3.

I probably should push Cixin's book 2 up on my TBR...