Author of sci-fi epic The Three-Body Problem – newly serialised by Netflix – on ‘the greatest uncertainty facing humanity’ and how finding a s

Liu Cixin: ‘I’m often asked – there’s science fiction in China?’

submited by

Style Pass

2024-03-28 19:00:05

Author of sci-fi epic The Three-Body Problem – newly serialised by Netflix – on ‘the greatest uncertainty facing humanity’ and how finding a secret copy of a Jules Verne novel inspired his career

C hinese author Liu Cixin’s science-fiction novels have sold millions of copies all over the world, and have won him numerous awards, including the global Hugo award for science fiction in 2015. Now, the English translation of the first book in Liu’s Remembrance of Earth’s Past trilogy, The Three-Body Problem, is back in the Amazon bestsellers charts, after the release of a TV adaptation by the creators of Game of Thrones.

But a decade ago, few in the UK had heard of Liu and The Three-Body Problem, which begins as a contemporary murder mystery and gradually builds into a story of alien contact. When it was first published here, Nic Cheetham, managing director of Liu’s UK publisher Head of Zeus, remembers being unsure if anyone would turn up for a book signing with the author in a London bookshop.

“When we got to the store there were literally hundreds of people waiting for the signing, the majority of them Chinese students”, the publisher said. “Liu had a film crew with him, filming him for a documentary on Chinese TV. We only realised then how big he was in China. He’s like a rock star over there.”