Republished with modification.
Cixin Liu's "The Three-Body
Problem" is nominated for this year Hugo award and it may win it too. It is an amalgam of Chinese history, ecological desolation,
human courage or lack of it.
This is a sci-fi novel with a
unique plot. It is the story of a woman, Ye Wenje, whose
life was permanently shattered by cultural revolution that was
raging in China in 1960s. Really ugly period in modern Chinese history. Wenje witnesses the death of her father by
school girls brainwashed by revolution. In fact, it was her
mother herself who denounced her husband to the authorities. This
episode of Chinese history is not well known to the large audience.
It has some similarity to the Red Terror of 1930s in Soviet Russia or
Cambodia's Khmer Rouge regime in 1970s.
As novel progresses and main plot unfolds one
can see how Chinese society is returning to "normality". However, it is too late. Alien race is coming towards Earth
thanks to Ye Wenje and other human "traitors" who
believe that human race's self-destructive tendencies should be
checked by superior Alien race, whose societal structure resembles
typical dictatorship.
Strangely, as novel suggests there are
pacifists among Aliens who do not believe that they should take Earth
away from humans.
I would recommend anyone reading it. It is very original.
posted by David Usharauli
