SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

Buddy Read for Death's End. It is the third book in the Remembrance of Earth's Past series by Liu Cixin. Dawn & I are going to start the book on March 26th. Anyone is welcome to join us! =)

Death's End Blurb:

Half a century after the Doomsday Battle, the uneasy balance of Dark Forest Deterrence keeps the Trisolaran invaders at bay. Earth enjoys unprecedented prosperity due to the infusion of Trisolaran knowledge. With human science advancing daily and the Trisolarans adopting Earth culture, it seems that the two civilizations will soon be able to co-exist peacefully as equals without the terrible threat of mutually assured annihilation. But the peace has also made humanity complacent.

Cheng Xin, an aerospace engineer from the early twenty-first century, awakens from hibernation in this new age. She brings with her knowledge of a long-forgotten program dating from the beginning of the Trisolar Crisis, and her very presence may upset the delicate balance between two worlds. Will humanity reach for the stars or die in its cradle?

I hope I remember enough of the previous one(s) lol!

Me too! LoL

Currently reading, close to finishing. I like it. Looking forward to the discussion.

Sounds good! I will start on Thursday as planned. =)

Started and the intro was great! I feel like it's the best one of the three on how the story starts. Nice mix of history, science and tons of social stuff. Decided this book will be my read for when I'm hiking. So glad I spent enough time exploring parks to figure out how to be outdoors and not cross paths with people that much.

Totally agree, Soo! I was immediately captivated by the beginning! I’m 24% in and it turns out it doesn’t matter what I do or don’t remember from the previous books, as we follow new people, and he’s fairly good at explaining things along the way.

I’m so happy to finally get started on it, it’s just as fascinating as Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy IMO.

Deterrence Era = Depressing!

I'm in Part 4: Bunker Era. I'll probably finish the book tonight or early tomorrow.

Loved Tian Ming's Fairy Tales.

Lots of cool things are being discussed in this book but the overall story feels impersonal due to the time jumps. It's also interesting to note how Dark Forest is referenced in this one.

Going back to the Deterrence Era, I liked the small side note about the Swordholder. How he became so focused on being the Swordholder that he stopped talking and meditated for years. It's the kind of odd isolation, hermitage that most would not see as a fulfilling action.

Yeah, Luo Ji's Swordholder duties struck me as a bit implausible at first, but for Luo Ji (i.e. introvert, takes his job seriously, maybe some measure of atonement for his frittering away of resources in the Wallfacer era) it makes sense.

Do you guys agree with the Dark Forest concept? It's plausible, of course, but it seems to me overly pessimistic to take for granted and as an underlying axiom, in general. In the book, of course, it makes sense after the destruction of the star whose location was broadcast by Luo Ji.

Ryan wrote: "Do you guys agree with the Dark Forest concept?"

It would only make sense if you first take for granted a whole lot of assumptions about science and technology, like the idea that sentient life is everywhere in the galaxy, and that wiping out other civilizations across the galaxy is physically possible and realistic, and that defending yourself without hiding or cutting yourself off is unlikely.

But given those assumptions, I don't think it's crazy. I am too young to remember the cold war, but the more I learn about the cold war the more plausible it seems.

I agree with David. You have to accept a lot of things in order to make Dark Forest a possibility but that's the case of any disaster prep/prevention.

I finished and loved all the ideas and concepts but felt it was more like a series of very dense short stories. There's a core idea but the range of time made it detached & impersonal.

How did the last sequence of events hit you guys? I'm curious to see what people thought of the ending.

I didn't feel like that, Soo. Yes, it spans quite a few years, but this isn't uncommon in sci-fi. The time spans are well-connected, so it felt like a cohesive story to me. Impersonal, maybe: the characters were weak. Ideas take precedence in this series.

I liked the ending. It tied everything together nicely and ends on a positive note in a book with a mostly negative view of interspecies cooperation (the Dark Forest, the flattening of humanity).

Was anyone able to see the implications of the fairy tales before they were revealed? I didn't, but they were entertaining regardless.

Just finished this and didn't realise you guys were doing a reading. Hi! Loved it. I was trying hard to be clever and figure out Tianming's fairytales too, but didn't. Kicked myself a bit that I didn't figure out the message of the paintings, but I'm probably being a bit too hard on myself! I slightly prefer fantasy to Sci-Fi, so the fairytales were a really nice surprise.