I’ve been turning this over in my head as a translated work vs a work on its own, and I don’t know that I’ve come to any conclusions. I do know I’ve placed the sequel on hold and that it was one of those books I couldn’t put down. I didn’t love the writing style, but don’t know who’s responsible, and don’t know if it’s even something that I should be caring about, given the gap between my experience and Liu Cixin’s. I spent a lot of time thinking about post-Communist narratives and trauma, and wondering whether he wrote what is very definitely a book with an Agenda on purpose, because since it took off he’s been denying that it has an Agenda.

I spent a lot of time thinking about physics. Kudos to Liu Cixin, the physics is mostly comprehensible.