Cixin LiuResenhas

Now, I am as big a fan of hard sci-fi as the next b*tch, but the info-dropping in this one reached second-hand embarrassment levels. You think two characters are talking about in-world stuff that is relevant to them, and bam! - they start reciting paragraphs and chapters about world-building, as if they had just been possessed by the accursed soul of everybody's pedantic high school years' philosophy or greek teacher. At least good old Stanislaw Lem just info-dropped, elegantly, without a care in the world for what his characters were doing at the moment; but we would keep reading and ask for more, wouldn't we? Hey, why do I even cite THE Lem's name in vain, in the same review with Liu Cixin's name in it?
Awkward info-dropping wouldn't annoy me that much, however - I am a veritable sucker for information-dense sci-fi - if it were not for the constant reference to highly intelligent people as only and ever only being perfectly identifiable with upper-class people. Two fingers to you, Mr. Liu. As a champion of the People, you should know better than pissing off working class readers with a brain. We'll come for you, when the revolution is ripe. Also, characters' motivations and the general narrative side of the novel are quite risible. I don't know how much is lost in translation, but I have studied oriental languages and literatures for a while and this smells a lot like a problem at the roots, rather than cultural misunderstanding.
The science-y materials are cool, anyway, at least for humanities-confined me.
It is still to be clarified what political propaganda aim the People's Party is trying to push by inflating this visibly rhetorical modest sci-fi novel. Ok, the cultural revolution BAD, modern Chinese society GOOD (maybe that's why upper class people are the only ones in the novel with a culture: have you seen, rest of the world? we are reassuringly classist too! Nothing to hide here!). On the same tune, all that pain taken to describe a united humanity against the evil environmentalists must have been dictated straight away by someone in the Government.
Ah, I nearly forgot: there is a moment of glory. It's when a series of memos from the upper echelons of the late Sixties People's Party are undisclosed, including a proposal by some apparatchik to send a message to space asking alien listeners to join the fight against capitalism, and the Central Leadership's (a.k.a Mao Ze Dong) answer: "this is utter crap". I spluttered my coffee. Even the most boring flatliner always contains a pearl of luminous beauty.

I'm sure there's some brilliant ideas going on here, unfortunately I'm not an astrophysicist so this was as exciting as reading a chemistry textbook (with apologies to all the chemists out there). I mean I just read "Astrophysics for People in a Hurry" a month or two ago and I still wasn't prepared for this onslaught of technical philosophizing.

I didn't totally hate it, but man, does this author have something to learn from Asimov. I'm really surprised that this extremely hard sci-fi book has been accepted by the masses. I'm really curious how they're going to dumb this down for the Netflix show. Which is the whole reason I decided to try this.

My wife gave up on this about 3 hours in (of 13), I really wish I would have followed her example, because there wasn't a big payoff, just endless science experiments.½

Das Buch startet wirklich seeehr langsam. Erst etwa ab der Hälfte nimmt es Fahrt auf, ab da hat es mich dann aber auch echt gepackt. 3,5 Sterne

Imaginative and compelling all the way through. It’s nowhere near as epic in scope as the three body problem, and I’d always recommend people read that series first, but this is well-imagined hard SF for people who enjoy the writer’s style. Overall, its not a great novel, with underdeveloped characters, somewhat forced interpersonal relationships, and science that is a bit too farfetched, but it’s still a fun read.

To some extent, there's no valid rating for this book aside from 5. If you've come this far, then you won't be disappointed with this book, because it achieves something that is by all rights impossible: a succinct and tidy ending to a series whose scale is quite literally the universe, and whose level of detail extends well beyond the limits of human science.

That said, unlike other books in this series, it was clear when things were beyond the realm of possible, even in the sense of being not "internally consistent" with previously described features of this world (in previous books, the scale of science was "closer" to human science, and so to a non-hard-scientist like me, it wasn't easy to discern things that were "obviously impossible," though I have no doubts that a scientist may find a few holes in previous novels. Probably no more than they find in published papers!). It doesn't matter, though, because I have no better suggestion for how to tell the story, or how to explain anything. The scope is simply too large.

Easily one of the best series I've ever read, and without a doubt a pillar of science fiction for years to come. Compared to previous science fiction classics - Dune (not actual sci fi but people claim it is), Childhood's End, Foundation, Ender's Game, and every other book on this list that I've read https://www.worldswithoutend.com/lists_classics_of_sf.asp and likely almost all that I have not read - the scope and breadth of the science fiction setting of this novel is so dramatically large that it's not possible not to be impressed.

I'm not sure I'd want to live in Liu's world, but I'm awestruck by it.

Series Info/Source: This is the first book in the Three-Body Problem series. I got an eGalley of this book through NetGalley to review.

Thoughts: I finished this but it was a struggle. I skimmed through the last 20% or so of the story, to see what happened. I almost put this down multiple times, but some of the VR elements introduced about 30% of the way in made me curious enough to keep going.

The writing here is stiff and the dialogue is awkward. I assume a lot has been lost in translation, but based on the other reviews of those who have read the original Chinese version maybe not. The characters are forgettable and hard to keep track of. Really the characters feel like generic placeholders that any random person could fill in.

I actually liked the beginning of this but then when we moved to present I lost interest. I did appreciate that we did get to go back to see the events that happened in the past progress. The story ends up bouncing between three different settings the present real world, the present in the VR Three Body World, and the past. There are footnotes throughout which did explain a lot of the science and Chinese historical subtleties in more detail; I liked learning about this but was frustrated that these footnotes broke up the story even more.

There are some very creative ideas here and that seems to be mainly what this book is, an idea story. I did enjoy the irony around the actions the characters took in both locations being based around how much they disliked their own species (I know this is a vague statement but I am trying to avoid spoilers).

The ideas here are cool...the plot, the characters, and the general readability here are weak. I did not enjoy this and it was not fun to read, it felt like work to read and was almost textbook like at times.

My Summary (3/5): Overall I really struggled with this book and do not plan on reading any more books by this author. Yes, this was a neat idea but the flow of the story, the characters, and the writing were all very awkward and weak. This was work to read and I didn't really enjoy it. I do appreciate the idea and creativity though.

Interesante perspectiva novedosa sobre la ciencia ficción. Aunque anticomunista, es crítico y sus cuentos tienen interesantes enfoques, y con dilemas que hacen pensar.

Siendo la continuación de "El Problema de los tres cuerpos", libro que me gusto mucho (4.5/5), empecé a leer esta obra con bastante cautela para no arruinar mi lectura, pero la verdad me sorprendió bastante y me gusto incluso más que el primero, todo lo que sentí que le falto al primero lo tuvo este.

Es un libro más fácil de leer gracias a su apartado "científico" menos denso, aunque igual tiene varias partes en las que puede costar un poco entender de de que se esta hablando pero en comparación al primero es mucho mas "amigable".

Hay una infinidad de personajes, de distintas nacionalidades, edades, profesiones, que en un principio no entendía para que estaban ya que al parecer no aportaban nada a la trama, pero es ahí donde el autor magistralmente nos quiere dar a entender como responde la civilización humana en su conjunto al futuro aciago que se acerca, como si la "humanidad" fuera un personaje más en la trama.

De este punto en adelante no podre evitar posibles SPOILERS por lo que lean bajo su propio riesgo.

El tema de los Vallados (y desvalladores) me pareció muy creativo y como lector me mantenía al pendiente tratando también de desentrañar cual sería su plan oculto, cual de ellos más ingenioso, pero siempre con el "derrotismo" y "escapismo" presente finalmente en cada uno de sus planes, al menos en 3 de ellos. Algunas cosas parecieron obvias otras no tanto y algunas sorpresas me lleve a medida que avanzaba la lectura.

Los personajes de Luo Ji y Zhang Beihai me parecieron muy bien creados y con un buen desarrollo, algo que critique del primer libro es que sus personajes me parecieron muy planos, bueno aquí al menos ya no son unidimensionales y estos dos en especial tienen claramente más de una capa. "Da Shi" sigue siendo un gran personaje secundario.

Sin hablar mucho de la trama tengo que decir que en su segunda parte (después de 200 años) el triunfalismo, los planes absurdos, el encuentro con la sonda y el desastre que ocurre posteriormente me pareció al principio obvio, ridículo, super esperable, pero al analizarlo comprendí que es la idea que quiere transmitir el autor y creo que como civilización que llevamos repitiendo errores los últimos 3000 años posiblemente actuaríamos de la misma forma.

Finalmente lo disfrute demasiado, me tuvo enganchando todo el tiempo y creo que si les gusto el primer libro este no los defraudara. El final me ha parecido excelente, el concepto de El Bosque Oscuro genial y da para infinidad de posibles escenarios, es medianamente cerrado por lo que uno no queda en un cliffhanger terrible ni nada parecido.

I am the only person who isn't overwhelmed by this book. Sorry.

Nunca me deja de sorprender la cantidad de ideas y la velocidad con la que pasa de una a otra de Liu Cixin. Esta claramente es la novela más "grande" de las tres. No sólo por su tamaño literal (es un librote) sino por cuanto abarca en tiempo y espacio. Cuando pensas que va a detenerse en algo, salta 2 siglos, y despues pensas que un clímax está llegando, y ¡oh! se detiene durante 3 capítulos a contarte cuentos de hadas con mensajes ocultos. De esta manera te mantiene siempre adivinando hacia donde va la historia. En los dos libros anteriores tuve la sensación de que los personajes realmente no importaban, lo que importa de verdad son las ideas. Y aquí sigue esa misma línea, pero si que hay un esfuerzo mayor en hilar la historia en torno a Cheng Xin, la protagonista (una mujer!).
En fin, que pese a lo esquemático de sus personajes y lo expositivo de la narración, no pude dejar de leer este libro que hablaba del destino de toda la raza humana y su lugar en el universo, desolador y lleno de esperanza a la vez.
Y mirá, si me lei 800 páginas en menos de dos semanas, para mi son 5 estrellas que queres que te diga.

Very disappointing end to an otherwise strong series. Cixin Liu's writing style left this book (like the previous two to a much greater extent) longer than necessary. Unlike books one and two, Death's End didn't have the strong story behind it to make that forgivable - the plot here serves for Liu to string together philosophical treatise and half-baked science against the backdrop of a society that grows scientifically while, against all odds, stagnating socially.

The MC, Cheng, was frustratingly mopey who should never have been in a position of power and despite consistently proving she wasn't up to the task was continually asked to make decisions regarding humanities fate. On top of that, every time she makes a poor decision she decides to put herself in cryo-sleep (or whatever Liu calls it) so others have to deal with the fallout. Appropriately, I guess, the MC does seem to be a stand-in here for the entire human race who throughout this book makes the wrong decisions repeatedly. So I guess in that regard she was a great choice as the Sword Holder.

Moving on from the MC - the dimensional fuckery was, ridiculous and where I started to really drag on this book. I read fantasy and science fiction happily but thanks to the 4th dimensional discussions this book swung wildly from side to side across the plausibility resulting in a book that couldn't decide if it wanted to be science fiction or science fantasy...and apparently I don't do well with that. I'm willing to accept additional dimensions beyond 3 T but I need more explanation than "4th dimension bubbles go pop".

Finally, or maybe a revisit to my complaints about the MC/humanities decision making capabilities, it seemed like the last quarter of this book was just Liu adding on a bit of hope and jerking it away...repeatedly. Into the last pages when due to a light tomb the MC and her always estranged would-be lover manage to get separated by 18 million years.

First book in a trilogy, The Three Body Problem is set in Communist China, in the present day and in flashbacks to the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s there. Ye Weijing witnesses her physicist father being killed during the height of the Cultural Revolution, and eventually ends up at a remote science station dedicated to the search for contact with alien intelligences.

In the present day, scientists are killing themselves at a startling rate, as they are puzzled that the laws of physics no longer seem to apply in their research. Wang Miao is developing a super-strong polymer, and experiences a bizarre experience in which a countdown starts appearing on film that he is using for his amateur photography. He is then brought into a government-led project that knows more than he does about what's going on. He infiltrates a shadowy group that also seems to know much more about what is happening, and starts to play an immersive video game "three body". We later learn that this game is telling the story of the development of civilization in a solar system that has three stars and a doomed planet that is passed constantly between them. That civilization is in a desperate battle to survive the "Chaotic Eras" and learn to predict when to start building, which requires a lengthy "Stable Era" when extreme heat and cold are absent.

There's a lot going on in this story! The science is very dense, character development less so. I had a tough time following the physics. But it has something interesting to say about how humans might react to news of alien civilization. It was worth sticking through the science for me, and I look forward to the rest of the series.½

So I read the first book, and I thought it was very good. Then I read this one and suddenly I felt like compared to this the first one was nothing. It just blew my mind, repeatedly.

Este es el primer libro que leo de este autor y el primero de un autor chino y debido a la gran publicidad que le dieron a la nueva serie de netflix quise darle una oportunidad.

Decidí leerlo a ciegas, sin ver de que se trataba ni ver el trailer y creo fue lo mejor porque es bastante difícil de explicar de que va sin tener que entrar en detalles de la misma. Es una obra que me gusto bastante, me entretuvo y me confirma mi gusto por la ciencia ficción dura y en este caso muy especulativa.

No es un libro sencillo, ni para cualquier persona, hay muchas explicaciones científicas relacionadas con la física teórica y aplicada que además se entrelaza con la política, y si no se disfruta de estos temas es una lectura posiblemente aburrida. Si sacáramos toda la base científica creo nos quedaría una trama que se podría explicar en unas pocas páginas.

En particular disfruto mucho de la ficción especulativa y creo que el planteamiento que se da en la novela es bastante original y plausible. Me sorprendió bastante en algunos momentos y no fue para nada una lectura aburrida. Me entretuvo esta narración a distintos tiempos y escalas y el no entender casi nada hasta ya bien entrada la novela por lo que me tuvo intrigado bastante.

Hay una crítica hacia el ser humano como "ente destructor" durante todo el relato y creo que es algo que se repite en la narrativa de Cixin Liu.

Algo que me complico es el no estar acostumbrado a leer literatura china, los personaje se me confundían, y por suerte el libro trae una lista de personajes al comienzo, supongo que pensado en los lectores occidentales, además el libro tiene varios notas al pie de página, que se agradecen, ya que de esta forma se entienden cosas relacionadas con la cultura oriental muy ajenas a nosotros.

Lo único que podría criticar es por un lado que los momentos de grandes revelaciones o de "acción" eran muy rápidos, hubiera disfrutado más con mejor desarrollo de esas partes lo que me lleva a los personajes, no se si por la diferencia cultural o por la traducción pero muchos de ellos me parecieron sumamente planos, por lo mismo se me confundían.½

A friend once complained about his undergraduate Science Fiction class that they only discussed character, theme, and other elements of literature without talking about the "ideas." The appeal of The Three-Body Problem has to be its ideas, which are mind-blowing, because the technique is bad. I don't think this is the fault of the translation or the audio performance. The way information is presented lacks life: coming off as essays about what's going on. We are (mostly) told about things rather than shown. A few sparks of real drama lured me far enough into the book to keep reading, but I'm left not caring enough to continue to the next books.½

Loved it mostly. Did not keep me up trying to find out what would happen next, but since I read before bed, that can be a good thing.

I loved that the characters are believable. The writing style is enjoyable and does not get in the way of the story. Kudos to the translator. I also love that science is an integral part of the story. I will be reading the sequels.

Disappointing. Some interesting ideas but poorly written ( or perhaps something is lost in translation? ) Some cheesy dialogue and overly reliant on "data dumps"

This book was fine. The premise was interesting. The only problem I had was some of the writing and dialog. I don't know if that's the author or because it was translated from Chinese. At any rate, it was a worthwhile read, I'm just not sure if I *need* to read any further in the series.

O encontro com outras civilizações planetárias é muitas vezes descrito como terrível e o nosso fim. É o caso aqui. Pelo menos é o que parece neste primeiro livro da trilogia, o fim da nossa espécie. Drama político e existencial, numa trama que combina ciência e distopia.

Cool and weird and maybe unintentionally religiously profound.

A ver, qué dificil a veces puntuar un libro. más cuando es uno tan largo como este. La primera mitad, (o más bien el primer tercio) definitivamente se me hizo cuesta arriba. Creo que con Cixin Liu hay que mentalizarse en que los personajes no importan demasiado. Son dispositivos para la trama y las ideas sci-fi que quiere desarrollar. El. "protagonista" Luo Ji y toda su historia de amor imaginaria es de lo peor del libro, ni hablar del (no)lugar de las mujeres en toda la historia. Pero dejando eso de lado, una vez que el plan de los "Vallados" comienza, la novela toma velocidad y ya no te suelta. Grandes ideas y un buen cuidado en la trama, con giros sorpresa bien justificados y un final satisfactorio con una idea aterradora por detrás, que te deja con ganas de leer la siguiente novela.

I don’t even know how to describe this one well enough without giving stuff away. It’s a scifi novel set in china over several decades starting during the Cultural Revolution, and it involves a cult conspiracy, a VR video game with a more sinister purpose, and lots and lots of physics.

I enjoyed the plot (although I confess I was hoping for a more twisty reveal of the mysterious bits), but I could certainly have done with a great deal less science exposition. Hoping that the Netflix rendition leaves all that to the imagination.

I felt mixed about this novel by the end. Once I had settled in to a different style of writing, a Chinese style, there were elements of the story that I enjoyed. There was also a lot of maths and physics that I found tedious and too difficult to grasp. The beginning and the historical context of the cultural revolution and how science fitted in to that was good. And once the story got going, once first contact with a race on another planet had been made, the narrative gained some momentum. It still felt quite rambling and the characters seemed two dimensional, although there were points of time when Wang Miao developed somewhat. Some of the ideas were so radical and fascinating and I was gripped, such as the nanotech filaments that sliced a ship but at other times I was willing the story to move on. So generally interesting but I'm not going to rush out and read another.

"The fate of the entire human race was now tied to these slender fingers. Without hesitation, Ye pressed the button."

i don't know what i was expecting. i knew next to nothing of the plot going in and it was better than i could have ever hoped for!!! taking my ass to the library posthaste for the second book

This is my first graphic novel. It’s like a new medium with its own rules and conventions which I don’t yet understand. Frankly, I don’t know what the story is about, even though I read Cixin Liu novels before and could follow their plots. Not this one, but I think that might not be the author’s fault.