The first chapter of The Three-Body Problem stands alone brilliantly, akin to a superb standalone short story. It offers a brief retrospective on the madness of the Chinese Cultural Revolution from the perspective of one of the characters, providing a great foundation (or so it would seem) for the rest of the story. It’s a real pity that not a single moment in the rest of Cixin Liu’s book lives up to this initial promise.
Casual MMO game with robot-like characters
Are scientists dropping like flies? Yes, especially those involved in fundamental research. This reeks of a foul conspiracy, so our protagonists set out to investigate. That is, until a virtual reality computer game takes center stage in their inquiries – from that point on, no one gives a damn about the dying scientists anymore. Instead, we get lengthy descriptions of in-game adventures wrapped in physics and mathematical jargon. Does all this sound interesting? Well, actually… IT. IS. NOT.
What’s even less interesting? The Chinese characters. In The Three-Body Problem, with one exception, everyone is completely unremarkable, as if they were brainwashed robots controlled by a single central will. Ahem. The exception, an overzealous police inspector, is like a half-deaf uncle who loudly tells nonsensical stories at a supposedly restrained family gathering (say, a wake) and occasionally spits on the floor with great gusto.
The lamest alien civilisation of all time
What’s even less interesting? The Chinese characters. In The Three-Body Problem, with one exception, everyone is completely unremarkable, as if they were brainwashed robots controlled by a single central will. Ahem. The exception, an overzealous police inspector, is like a half-deaf uncle who loudly tells nonsensical stories at a supposedly restrained family gathering (say, a wake) and occasionally spits on the floor with great gusto.
So, the average reader will likely throw this book against the wall around page 100. The above-average reader will tear The Three-Body Problem apart when they realize that the entire in-game ordeal is utterly pointless, revealing THE LAMEST alien civilization of all time, whose members dehydrate and deflate like balloons to protect themselves from extreme heat. (They still burn like rags. It’s a wonder, though, that they don’t sink from shame as well.)
It’s a real pity because these readers will also miss out on THE DUMBEST conspiracy of all time (for the second dumbest, see Tim Weaver’s Chasing the Dead), whose meetings resemble those of the Communist Party conferences of the 1950s. Even more, they parody them. These morons call each other comrades and split into factions. The stench of communism permeating the book is laughable when read in a Western democracy. However, in today’s China, it might be part of everyday life. Perhaps that’s why poor Cixin Liu can’t break free from these outdated tropes.
Scientific nonsense
What’s more infuriating than amusing is that after slogging through endless pseudo-scientific drivel and babble, tthe author has the gall to write that if you receive a message from an alien civilization, you simply feed it into your computer, it decodes it for you, and you can immediately write back to them…
The Three-Body Problem is a failure both as a piece of science fiction and as a straightforward story – it’s a stupid and amateurish mess. And there are two more books in the series. Let’s hope it’s not required reading at Fudan University.*
5.8/10
The Three-Body Problem (The Three-Body Problem #1) by Cixin Liu
472 pages, Hardcover
Published in 2014 by Tor Books
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*At the time of writing this post, the Hungarian* government had permitted the establishment of Fudan University in Hungary.
** This is a Hungarian blog.