The Three-Body Problem

The Three-Body Problem is the first volume of Liu Cixin's Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. It was serialized in Science Fiction World from May to December 2006 and published as a standalone volume by Chongqing Publishing House in 2008. Set against the backdrop of the Cultural Revolution, the novel opens with the physicist Ye Zhetai dying miserably during a struggle session; his daughter Ye Wenjie, a student of astrophysics, is swept into the maelstrom of the era and later enters the top-secret military project known as Red Coast Base. At Red Coast she accidentally discovers that the sun can amplify radio waves and reflect them deep into the cosmos, and so she privately sends a signal containing information about Earth into space. That signal is received by the inhabitants of the Trisolaris system, four light-years away. The Trisolaran world is governed by the irregular motion of three suns; its civilization is repeatedly destroyed and reborn amid disasters such as extreme heat, bitter cold, and three suns blazing in the sky at once. Because their living conditions are so harsh, the Trisolarans decide to emigrate to Earth upon receiving the signal. Meanwhile, a secret organization devoted to welcoming the Trisolaran civilization, the Earth-Trisolaris Movement, emerges on Earth. The nanomaterials scientist Wang Miao is asked by the police and military to investigate a series of anomalies in the scientific community, and he subsequently enters a virtual game called Three Body, gradually approaching the truth. The Trisolarans send a surveillance force made up of sophons to Earth, locking down humanity's basic science, and their vast fleet sets out for Earth. The novel involves concepts such as the three-body problem and the dark forest law, intertwining cosmic-scale competition between civilizations with individual fates. It is a representative work of contemporary Chinese science fiction.