⋙ Read Gratis Ball Lightning Cixin Liu Joel Martinsen 9780765394071 Books

Ball Lightning Cixin Liu Joel Martinsen 9780765394071 Books

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Ball Lightning Cixin Liu Joel Martinsen 9780765394071 Books

The book flap and reviews of "Ball Lightning" reveal little about the story or plot, so I thought I'd talk a little about that without giving too much of the game away. It should be noted that the author (who claims to have personally experienced ball lightning) discusses the book's genesis in the afterword, which was originally released in China prior to the Three Body Problem at the publisher's behest. TBP name-checks ball lightning once or twice along with physicist Ding Yi, but mainly as teaser references the way Michael Moorcock might. The story feels familiar though as renegade scientists, quantum physics, military concerns and heroines figure prominently and there's even a hint of aliens (Trisolarans?) watching us from afar.

In a nutshell, the story revolves around an atmospheric scientist who lost his parents to ball lightning getting sucked into a military attempt to weaponize the phenomena. The cast of characters expands to include others with deep personal connections to tragedies involving ball lightning or advanced weaponry in general, with Cold War-era research that goes nowhere until renegade physicist Ding Yi solves the puzzle and progress - involving some truly crazy quantum extrapolations - begins apace. Experimental weapons obsessive Lin Yun serves as the heroine driven by personal demons to exploit Ball Lightning (which turns out to have unusually broad and magical applications) in its war against the United States and perhaps indirectly, avenge her mother's death.

"Ball Lightning" is a smoother read than the "Three Body Problem" was; the relationships are better developed, the storytelling less forced, and the political Great Leap Forward tropes that weighed down TBP are nowhere to be found. The future science though is not up to the same level that TBP was, making suspension of disbelief a bit harder the second time around but you won't regret it, because... well, it's got a bit of a Hollywood ending. In fact, the whole book has a bit of a Hero's Journey feel to it, possibly written with film in mind. A great beach read!


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Ball Lightning Cixin Liu Joel Martinsen 9780765394071 Books Reviews

I appreciated the explanation of where Ball Lightng fits in his work as a whole, as this book is very different than the 3 Body series, one of my all time favorites. That said, the precision with which speculation is clothed in stunning imagery, that compounds into complex metaphors--the nearly invisible space bending macroelectrons, the slow fadeouts of quantum phenomena writ large, the perfect mirror that Lin Yun stands on , the pool of sky and passing clouds above, below, Lin Yun neither existent nor non-existent --a thoroughly Buddhist texture throughout.
I recently read Cixin Liu’s science fiction Three Body Problem trilogy, and was pretty much blown away. The second book in the series, The Dark Forest, may be the finest science fiction work I have ever read (and I’ve read hundreds). I was anxious to read more of his work and purchased a collection of short stories as soon as I found it. Overall, it was a good read, just not up to the level of the trilogy.

This novel, while recently translated into English, was actually written prior to the Three Body Problem. The subject is the atmospheric phenomenon of ball lightning and a group of researchers and military personnel that study it, capture it and attempt to weaponize it. I found the early parts of the novel to drag somewhat, but then advance strongly to a powerful ending.

The story has a good amount of highly technical language and theories concerning quantum mechanics, which are obviously over the head of almost anyone reading the book, however the author does a masterful job of making the story readable and understandable, without the necessity of a graduate level degree in physics. Cixin Liu is a fantastic story teller and a master in the field of science fiction.
I didn't realize, until reading the afterword, that this was written before The Three-Body Problem. If you enjoyed that series, then you definitely want to read this. I highly recommend it. Definitely makes you think, but not as challenging as the 3BP series. I plan to re-read those books after reading this. Can't wait for more books from Liu.
Sixty one years ago when I was in high school I could recognize 3 shining stars in science fiction, Azimov, Clark, Heinlein. Now 61 years later there is an even more brilliant star Cixin Liu a Chinese science fiction writer who has won multiple awards.

His latest book just published in English is Ball Lightening. This story is worth whatever award that it might win. I waited months for it to be published and it was so worth the wait!

I finished the book Ball Lightening by Cixin Liu which is easily the best SF book that I've read in years even better than the Three Body series.

The story plays on advanced physics. The theory Liu about which he writes is not only speculative but incredibly inventive and this carries the reader through the book as fast as one is able to read. And the story concludes with a bang far from a whimper of disappointment.

Yet the book is not only about science, his characters are very well developed. By the end of the book one has developed an interest in them and they appear as very real people; and when as I read along I developed and interest and concern in the characters none of whom are flat.

So Cixin has developed an inventive science based novel as well as excellent character development. And finally like Azimove he lays out a world social milieu which had become responsive to the development of the science that the author has created.

This is a remarkable book. Once started I found that every available moment I had to find myself a quiet place to read. The only moment of disappointment I had during my reading the book was the sentence "At the moment, I'm sure that the quantum rose will smile at me" -- Cixin Liu's last sentence of the book.
The book flap and reviews of "Ball Lightning" reveal little about the story or plot, so I thought I'd talk a little about that without giving too much of the game away. It should be noted that the author (who claims to have personally experienced ball lightning) discusses the book's genesis in the afterword, which was originally released in China prior to the Three Body Problem at the publisher's behest. TBP name-checks ball lightning once or twice along with physicist Ding Yi, but mainly as teaser references the way Michael Moorcock might. The story feels familiar though as renegade scientists, quantum physics, military concerns and heroines figure prominently and there's even a hint of aliens (Trisolarans?) watching us from afar.

In a nutshell, the story revolves around an atmospheric scientist who lost his parents to ball lightning getting sucked into a military attempt to weaponize the phenomena. The cast of characters expands to include others with deep personal connections to tragedies involving ball lightning or advanced weaponry in general, with Cold War-era research that goes nowhere until renegade physicist Ding Yi solves the puzzle and progress - involving some truly crazy quantum extrapolations - begins apace. Experimental weapons obsessive Lin Yun serves as the heroine driven by personal demons to exploit Ball Lightning (which turns out to have unusually broad and magical applications) in its war against the United States and perhaps indirectly, avenge her mother's death.

"Ball Lightning" is a smoother read than the "Three Body Problem" was; the relationships are better developed, the storytelling less forced, and the political Great Leap Forward tropes that weighed down TBP are nowhere to be found. The future science though is not up to the same level that TBP was, making suspension of disbelief a bit harder the second time around but you won't regret it, because... well, it's got a bit of a Hollywood ending. In fact, the whole book has a bit of a Hero's Journey feel to it, possibly written with film in mind. A great beach read!