Death's End - Cixin Liu

Death's End is the concluding volume of a science fiction trilogy that started with The Three-Body Problem. These novels have been translated from Chinese, and that alone makes them stand out. Translations into English are rare in science fiction. Translations that win awards - The Three-Body Problem won a Hugo Award - are even rarer. Slowly, more attention for science fiction from outside the anglophone sphere is emerging and this series certainly played a part in that. Death's End takes Liu's vision to extremes. It is a book with a scope grander than we have seen in the previous volumes and as such, a fitting conclusion to the series.

The threat from the Trisolarans has, at least for the moment, been neutralized. By finding a way to expose the position of their home world to the galaxy, Earth now has a powerful weapon of deterrence. It is, in a sense, back to the cold war. The Wallfacer project was not the only one humanity started to deal with the crisis however. In this age of deterrence, a young Chinese aerospace engineer wakes up after many decades of hibernation. Her knowledge of one of these programs upsets the carefully maintained balance between the two species. Soon, Earth plunges into another crisis. This one even more lethal than anything they have encountered before.

The translation is once again in the hands of Ken Liu. As far as I can tell he did a splendid job. Liu translated the first novel, before handing over the reigns to Joel Martinsen for the second book. They obviously compared notes because the English version appears seamless to me. Although many of the characters are Chinese, the story takes place on a global scale or even beyond. Liu only needs eleven footnotes in a 600 page book, to explain a few phrases where the context might escape the western reader.

The main character is the Chinese engineer Cheng Xin. She is born in the twenty-first century and lives pretty much through the entire period of the Trisolaran crisis. Cheng takes a decidedly different approach to dealing with the crisis than Luo Ji, the main character in The Dark Forest. Where he sets humanity on a ruthless path of mutually assured destruction, Cheng doesn't care for the responsibility to condemn whole species to death and decide over the fate of whole solar systems. Her compassion proves to be costly in a universe where everybody is out to destroy everybody else.

I must say the parallel Liu draws between society and his main characters annoyed me a bit in this novel. Society swings from 'masculine' values to 'feminine values' and back again. From bellicose and ruthless, to compassionate and passive, and back again. These qualifications will have feminists all over the world up in arms. The idea that humanity needs an utterly ruthless man to survive the crisis and that by not following the examples of Luo and Wade (another powerful figure in the story, and a man devoid of any sense of morality), our species condemns itself to extinction. Whether or not it is desirable to follow a tyrant in wartime is debatable but surely this theme could have been handled without making it into a gender issue.

In the previous novel, the Trisolarans imposed limits on human technological development. After the start of what Liu calls the deterrence age, these limits disappear and humanity once again progresses in great strides. Liu's cosmology becomes ever more complex. His fondness for playing with dimensions and perspectives is given free reign in the book, leading to a number of memorable scenes. Once again, some parts of the novel reminds me of Arthur C. Clarke (Rendezvous with Rama and the Fountains of Paradise in particular) but there is also a bit of Poul Anderson in the book. Specifically his novel Tau Zero.

Although we follow Cheng for most of the novel, Liu inserts sweeping passages where he explains global developments. They are none too subtle for the most part. Humanity in Liu's vision moves as a whole. There is little room in the narrative for dissent or debate. When presented with irrefutable evidence (something not many people in the west seem to believe in these days), the Earth as a whole decides to follow the inevitable path. Liu breaks the show-don't-tell rule on a massive scale in this novel. If that bothers you as are a reader, this novel is clearly not for you. Personally it didn't bother me beyond the fact that humanity seems to behave a bit more rational than I would expect them to do.

Liu takes the story to the end of the universe and beyond. It is a dark journey, one that offers little hope for any of the creatures inhabiting it. There is just a glimmer at the very end though. While this universe may be doomed, from its ashes, a new one may arise. Since it is a worst case scenario, the salvation of the universe relies on many parties doing something completely selfish. Given all that has gone before, it is no more than the barest hint of light in the dark forest universe.

Liu's trilogy evolves into space opera on the largest possible canvas. It is a trilogy that will awe the reader with grand vistas of the universe. While not flawless, the series has already shown that it is more than capable of finding a global audience. This novel manages to raise the stakes to dizzying heights, and forms a worthy conclusion of the series. I suspect it will turn out to be a favourite for many readers. If I had to pick a favourite it would probably be the first book. It shows us a bit more of Chinese society and that adds to the story in my opinion. For the pure science fiction fan, Death's End is probably more appealing. I do hope that the success of this series has opened the door a bit further for other translations. If anything, these novels show that there is a wealth of material to discover beyond what is written in English.

Book Details
Title: Death's End
Author: Cixin Liu
Publisher: Tor
Pages: 604
Year: 2016
Language: English
Translation: Ken Liu
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-765-7710-4
First published: 2010

The Dark Forest - Cixin Liu

Last year the first part of this trilogy, The Three-Body Problem, was published by Tor. American publishers see translated works as a risk because of the cost of translations so works like this are unfortunately something of a rarity still. Tor cleverly made use of the reputation of the translator of the first volume, Chinese-American author Ken Liu, to draw attention to it and that worked very well indeed. It won the Hugo Award this summer and has certainly been one of the most discussed novels in science fiction this year.The Hugo vote this year is highly controversial because of the Puppies' attempt to manipulate the shortlist. In fact, it was only added to the shortlist because one of the other candidates withdrew. Personally I feel that in a year with normal voting practices it would have had a shot at the award as well. It is definitely Chinese but also firmly rooted in western science fiction, making it very accessible to western readers. While I doubt that The Dark Forest can repeat its predecessor's feat, I do think it is a worthy sequel. If you liked the The Three-Body Problem, you will want to read this book.

The Trisolarans are coming and their mission is to exterminate humanity. The human race has four centuries to prepare but with the help of the sophons, sub-atomic particles, they can listen in on any kind of human communication. Humanity is completely exposed to the Trisolarans except for one place: the privacy of the human mind. To exploit this one advantage, the Wallfacer project is started. Four people overseen by a UN committee  are granted the freedom to work on a plan to defeat the Trisolarans without having to outline it to anyone. They are granted access to enormous resources and are expected to defeat the enemy through deceit and misdirection. A dangerous and desperate plan but it seems like the only chance at survival.

The translation of this second volume is in the hands of Joel Martinsen of whom, other than what it says on the back flap, I know absolutely nothing. A quick search doesn't turn up any other translations by his hand. He follows Ken Liu's lead closely though. There is no noticeable difference in tone of voice and Martinsen is equally reluctant to add footnotes, only doing so in cases where the English-language reader is very unlikely to understand a reference to Chinese history or literature. The switch in translator will not bother the reader. I understand Liu is translating the final novel in the trilogy so continuity in the translation should not be a problem.

The novel covers about two centuries. Liu introduces a new calendar in the novel, counting the years from the start of the crisis. In a way, a lot of things stay the same during this long timespan. The Trisolarans use the sophons to limit humanity's progress in physics, essentially allowing only improvements in already existing technology. Quantum computers for instance, cannot be developed so after a certain point there is no increase in the computing power of processors any more. The technological explosion, as Liu calls it, stalls. It leaves the author free to speculate on what such a threat will do to human society and economy.

In his Big Idea piece on John Scalzi's blog Liu said he was writing a worst case scenario. No benevolent aliens or a prospect of a harmonious federation of planets of the people in this story. One of the major themes Liu examines is what the prospect of near certain extinction would do to the human psyche. It shows up in several forms but despair seems to take over every time. Liu describes the severe economic effects of creating a war economy when there isn't an enemy to fight yet. Something that will eventually lead to a collapse some time in the twenty-first century followed by a renaissance some decades later. Personally I'm wondering if something that is four centuries in the future will affect the human psyche to that degree -  we can't even be made to pay attention to a number of environmental problems that most of us most definitely will live to see after all -  but it is an interesting scenario.

Like the previous novel the author, and many of his characters, think about large groups of people. He pays attention to the thoughts and feelings of the main characters to illustrate a larger point. In themselves they are not all that interesting. Something that is probably more of an issue than in the previous book. I thought Ye Wenjie was a more interesting character than Luo Ji, the central character in this book. Luo keeps his cards close to his chest, which I suppose makes sense for a Wallfacer, but it doesn't do much for our insight into his motivations.

The Dark Forest contains a number of massive scenes in space. For the hard science fiction fan this is probably the highlight of the novel. Not all readers will like them but, as he has shown in The Three-Body Problem,  Liu is good at writing such scenes. In this novel he is absolutely ruthless in them. He so thoroughly quashes humanity's previously held beliefs  that it has made me wonder what he can come up with for the third installment of the trilogy.

Liu's story is again firmly grounded in western science fiction. He formulates an answer to the Fermi paradox for instance, and refers to some of the genre's great works (Foundation, A Clockwork Orange) and he doesn't hide his admiration of Arthur C. Clarke. As we move into the future and Liu is able to use less of China's actual history and as the story takes on more of a global perspective, it becomes even more accessible for the western reader. The Dark Forest delivers everything that The Three-Body Problem does and a bit more. If I had to choose my favourite it would still be the first book because of the historical background used in much of that story but I suspect many readers will find the second book a step up. It is a very dark story though, it will be interesting to see if the final volume, Death's End, will show us a bit of light at the end of the tunnel. It is scheduled for April next year. I for one can't wait to get my hands on it.

Book Details
Title: The Dark Forest
Author: Cixin Liu
Publisher: Tor
Pages: 512
Year: 2015
Language: English
Translation: Joel Martinsen
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-7653-7708-1
First published: 2008

The Three-Body Problem - Cixin Liu

Note on Chinese names: Tor has chosen to put the name of the author in the western order. In (tradition) Chinese the family name would come first. Doubleday, for its edition of The Fat Years, has chosen to leave the Chinese order as it is. The translator of The Three-Body Problem uses the Chinese order in the entire novel, with the cover being the only exception. I always use the title of the novel and author name as they appear on the cover but in the rest of the review I've chosen to use the Chinese order for the author and the characters mentioned. Also note that the translator Ken Liu uses his western name - I don't know what it is but I'm pretty sure he has a Chinese one as well -  so I've followed that in the review.

We tend to think of Science Fiction as a largely Anglo-Saxon affair. Most of the big names are from the US, with a bunch of Brits mixed in. This overemphasis on English-language works is a bit misleading however. Science Fiction is written all over the world and one of the largest markets is currently in China. Only very rarely does something of this vast body of work make it into western bookshops but recently a number of initiatives to sell Chinese Science Fiction to a western audience have appeared. Clarkesworld ran a Kickstarter project to make it possible for them to include translated stories in their magazine, stories have shown up in the three volumes of The Apex Book of World SF and a couple of years ago Doubleday published Chan Koonchung's novel The Fat Years, which I must admit is the only Chinese-language Science Fiction novel I've read to date. Now Tor has spotted the possibilities as well and bought Liu Cixin's Thee-Body trilogy. The Three-Body Problem is the first volume and it has been translated by the Chinese-American author Ken Liu, someone with a keen interest in Chinese Science Fiction. Not surprisingly, this publication has attracted a lot of attention, and after reading the book, I can only add my voice to the chorus of reviewers out there telling you to read it. It really is one of the most exciting books published recently.

Amid the turbulent events of the Cultural revolution, astrophysicists Ye Wenjie's life is turned upside down. She witnesses her father, a once well-respected professor, be killed by the Red Guard, and is branded an enemy of the revolution after being caught reading the subversive novel Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. Her knowledge is too valuable to waste away in some reeducation camp however. She is assigned to a military base that serves as a Chinese answer to the SETI project. There, she witnesses what without a doubt is the most important event in human history.

Tor hit the jackpot with this novel. There is of course a large cultural gap between China and the western audience, and that is apparent in the novel. The story and themes clearly reach back to classics of the genre however. Liu's novel is firmly grounded in science. The title refers to a well known mathematical problem in both classical and quantum mechanics. On top of that there is quite a bit of astronomy and references to nanotechnology. I was surprised by the inclusion of ecology in the novel. I must, to my shame, admit to never having read Carson's Silent Spring. A great sin for someone who studied environmental science. It is a very influential novel in the field. Of course the Cultural Revolution and a number of other developments in Communist era China did great damage to the environment so perhaps it is not that surprising.

Chinese novels tend to contain an awful lot of references to the long history of the nation and the literary traditions that go back more than two thousand years. Much of which would be lost on the reader without a little explanation now and then. In fact, when I read Chan's novel I did have the feeling I was missing quite a lot. Translator Ken Liu has tried to help the reader a little bit with a series of footnotes explaining some of the details. In an afterword he also explains some of his choices in translating the novel. There is always a lot of tension in translation between the literal meaning and the intent of the words and I suspect Ken Liu has been a bit more liberal in his translation than Michael S. Duke has been for his translation of The Fat Years. It is a novel that reads very smoothly for the western reader. I did note some things that you don't come across in many western novels, most notably the way the writer conveys the information the reader needs to follow the plot. It borders on infodumping at times and it is something I also noticed in Chan Koonchung's writing. That being said, the differences in this novel are not so obvious that I got the feeling I was missing things.

Liu tells his story out of chronological order. We have sections covering the 1960 to the 1980 that tell the story of Ye Wenjie and her discovery in the military observatory. Her views on humanity and the decision she makes on behalf of the species is the mystery that forms the centre of the plot. The man to unravel it is the nanomaterials researcher Wang Miao. His part of the story is set sometime in the early twenty-first century. Liu doesn't mention a specific year but around now feels right. Near future from the perspective of the novel. The Chinese edition was published in 2007. Wang is caught in a web of mysteries, manipulations of a global movement with, to him, unknown goals and seemingly impossible manipulations of the physical reality at the quantum level. It drives Wang to desperation and many prominent theoretical scientists to suicide. The very foundations of natural science are shaken. This part of the story reminded me of the short story Division by Zero written by Ted Chiang.

The scope of Liu's tale is much larger than that of Chiang of course. Over the course of the novel the meaning of the Three-Body Problem, the mysterious computer game so many of the characters are playing and Ye's discovery and subsequent actions fall into place. Liu has built a story out of these and many other elements that fans of classic science fiction will appreciate. It is also very much a first book in a trilogy.  Ye's view on humanity is not overly positive, shaped as her life has been by violence and political insanity. She feels the human race is not capable of cleaning up the mess it has created and takes drastic action. This novel mostly deals with the motivations for that action and Ye's secrets becoming public knowledge. The full impact, it is to be expected, won't be felt until the next volume of the trilogy.

Ye is definitely the star of this novel. Her character is by far the most well rounded of the bunch, for the most part skilfully navigating the political minefield she finds herself in. Wang is a spectator by comparison. With his actions mostly guided by others he is not a very interesting man to read about. I would have liked to see him break away from the suggestions of others which he unfailingly follows up on. His scientific world view crumbles to the very foundation but he doesn't think this is enough to put a toe out of line. Around him, many of the secondary characters have less problems with rash action. It lends some parts of the novel an almost thriller like level of suspense.  I can't help but wonder what The Three-Body Problem could have been if the uncovering of this enormous secret would have been a bit less orderly.

The Three-Body Problem is not a flawless novel but it is certainly a very good one. So good in fact, that I wouldn't be surprised if it shows up on a few award shortlists. Ken Liu has obviously put his heart into the translation, as well as his impressive knowledge of both the English and Chinese language. As someone writing is a second language, I cannot emphasize enough how hard translating is. The linguistic and cultural differences that find their way into the text and the shades of meanings and connotations that words can carry in one language but not in another make translating an art as much as writing. The novel itself has many elements of classical science fiction to make it familiar to the reader and enough Chinese culture and history to make it different to the reader, but not overwhelmingly so. It was probably a very good choice picking this novel to bring Chinese science fiction to a western audience. I enjoyed reading it a lot. Bring on the second volume!

Book Details
Title: The Three-Body Problem
Author: Cixin Liu
Publisher: Tor
Pages: 399
Year: 2014
Language: English
Translation: Ken Liu
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 978-0-7653-7706-7
First published: 2007