Added this series to my list a few months back. Read book 1 about a month ago and I’m about 70% through book 2.
I’m struggling to understand why this book is so recommended here and on Amazon. Perhaps the English translation version is just bad?
The pacing is terrible and the plot is meandering (to put it nicely). And overall the character arcs and storyline is confusing. It has a ton of filler content that doesn’t add much and feels like it needs an editor to chop it down / tighten it up.
Every once in a while there are some novelties, like droplets (book 2). But last night while reading I was just skipping pages hoping to get it over with.
Was hoping for Alastair Reynolds but this is more Ayn Rand.
I hate quitting a book but I’m just about there. Throwing out a lifeline in case I’m missing something…
I had the same impression, wondering if the english translation was to blame for hte books issues, but eventually accepted that a translation won’t change the plot elements significantly, and that’s where the flaws are.
there’s just too much meandering plot that seems intended to make the book longer without being necessary or even enjoyable. The later books don’t improve either. The speed of light is a huge barrier to the plot, and sometimes it’s dealt with realistically and other times it’s just literally ignored. there are some really cool concepts, like “the dark forest” that was such a non-sequitur in the larger story that I honestly think the book was completed and then Liu Cixin got the idea and shoehorned it into the book by simply starting a new chapter.
the overarching problem of maintain a characters across a story that spans centuries was childishly hand waved away, and not even necessary.
I enjoyed Cixin previous book “Ball Lightning” much better because it had the hard science ideas without trying to hard to be bigger than the idea was. and I just finished his book “Supernova Era” and it’s a steaming pile of garbage.