Absolutely fascinating, on so many levels. In spite of its "faults" (and I will explain the double quotes shortly ...), it's a riveting read, a deft parable of current issues that affect China and the wider world, and a heartbreaking story of how ideology can cause good people to persuade themselves to do bad things.

First, to address the elephant in the critical room: the style and structure of this novel are, hmmm, different from what Western readers might be used to. This is the slowest of slow burns. The author isn't afraid of exposition, and infodumps of eye-wateringly complex science and mathematics. Characters are more like archetypes than living, breathing people, and moments of deep emotion, if they are there at all, are more likely to be conveyed by an ellipsis ...

In fact, true confession, I am coming to this party as late as I am because I was avoiding it-- based on excepts I had seen, in an earlier, clumsier translation -- worried that his was going to be one of those "emperor's clothes" books, a "critics' darling" that gets rave reviews for all the wrong, virtue-signalling reasons but turns out to be unreadable.

It isn't. Author Liu knows exactly what he's doing (Translator Liu, too, for that matter ...), and at the end has me craving more ...

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