But at the same time, it is also full of threats and challenges. “The future in the people’s eyes is full of attractions, temptations and hope. during the golden age of science fiction in the ’30s to the ’60s,” Mr. “China is on the path of rapid modernization and progress, kind of like the U.S.

In fast-changing China, stories that lay out what coming years may hold in store have therefore found deeper resonance among readers. Liu’s short stories in 2012, it was a sign that the genre was back in official good graces.Īt its core, science fiction capitalizes on uncertainty about the future to push the boundaries of the reader’s imagination. The genre went from being a vehicle for popularizing science for socialist purposes to drawing criticism in 1983 from party newspapers for “spreading pseudoscience and promoting decadent capitalist elements.” When the prestigious People’s Literature literary magazine published four of Mr. The series has also breathed new life into a genre that, here as elsewhere, the literary establishment often marginalizes.įor decades, science fiction was subject to the whims of Communist Party rule. Many interpret the battle of civilizations depicted in the series as an allegory for the ruthless competition in the nation’s Internet industry. In addition to the usual high school and college-age fans of science fiction, China’s aerospace and Internet industries have embraced the books. Liu the best-selling Chinese science-fiction author in decades. Since the third book was published in 2010, each entry in the series has sold about 500,000 copies in the original Chinese, making Mr. The success of the “Three-Body” series, as it is called in China, has gained a following beyond the small but flourishing science-fiction world here. It will be released in the United States on Tuesday by Tor Books. Translated by Ken Liu, an award-winning science-fiction writer in his own right who is based in the United States (the men are not related), it is one of the few Chinese science-fiction novels to be translated into English.

Liu, 51, has been promoting the English translation of “ The Three-Body Problem,” the first book in his best-selling apocalyptic space opera trilogy. BEIJING - With a state-owned power plant in nearby Shanxi Province temporarily shut down to reduce air pollution, one of its engineers, Liu Cixin, is using the free time to work on his hobby: reigning as China’s best-selling science-fiction author.Īlong with working on a new novel and advising on screenplay adaptations of his earlier fiction, Mr.

The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu