The novel opens in 1967, during the Cultural Revolution, when astrophysicist Ye Wenjie watches her father beaten to death at a struggle session. Disillusioned with humanity, she is later sent to a remote military base, Red Coast, which turns out to be a secret project to search for extraterrestrial life. A decision she makes there sets the story in motion.
Decades later, nanomaterials researcher Wang Miao is drawn into an investigation by police officer Shi Qiang after a wave of scientists' suicides. Wang finds his vision disrupted by a mysterious countdown and becomes absorbed in Three Body, a strange virtual-reality game set on a world with chaotic, unpredictable suns, where civilisations rise and fall. The game hides a larger truth.
Liu blends hard physics, Chinese history and big philosophical questions about contact with alien civilisations. Ken Liu's 2014 translation introduced the book to English readers, and it became the first translated novel to win the Hugo Award. It opens the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy and has been adapted for Chinese television and Netflix.
Book details
| Author | Liu Cixin |
|---|---|
| First published | 2008 |
| Original language | Chinese |
| Translated by | Ken Liu |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Type | Fiction |
| Pages (approx.) | 400 |
| Setting | China, from the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s to the present day |
| Awards | Hugo Award for Best Novel 2015 |
Themes
- First contact
- Science and politics
- Disillusionment with humanity
- Cosmic sociology
- History's scars
Who should read it
Readers who love ambitious, idea-heavy science fiction with a non-Western perspective.