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Comment by e12e | Hacker News Reader

While not my favorite book, I think it's certainly Hugo quality. What would you pick for 2015? Besides, winning would seem fair, nominations possibly not?

The list was:

https://www.thehugoawards.org/hugo-history/2015-hugo-awards/

The Three Body Problem, Cixin Liu, Ken Liu translator (Tor Books)

The Goblin Emperor, Katherine Addison (Sarah Monette) (Tor Books)

Ancillary Sword, Ann Leckie (Orbit US/Orbit UK)

Skin Game, Jim Butcher (Orbit UK/Roc Books)

The Dark Between the Stars, Kevin J. Anderson (Tor Books)

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I read "The Three Body Problem" due to all the promotion it received at the time. In fact, I proposed it as the first book for our small reading club. We all agreed that I should have simply bought some beers and read whatever book another member had proposed. While the book presented two very good ideas (the nature of the history loop and the "computer architecture"), it was marred by excessive repetition, flat characters, and poor writing (at least, in the Spanish version). Some characters' reactions to certain events were utterly ridiculous, and the deus ex machina resolution was disappointing. The structure was so repetitious that it seemed as if half of the book was the same chapter repeated over and over. I found it quite boring.

I would appreciate any suggestions for works by other Chinese science fiction authors, as I understand that it's not fair to judge such a vast culture based on a single data point.

I concur on all your points. The writing was so bad - basically middle of the line fanfic level - that at first I thought that it was a low-quality English translation; but I was assured that it was faithful to the original. When it was announced as Hugo winner, I was speechless.

I should also add that as reasonably hard sci-fi goes, the very notion of "sophons" (and their mechanics) as presented are not even wrong. In general, when it comes to most sci-fi elements of the book aside from the titular concept, it felt like someone just clipped whatever sounded cool from a popular science magazine and then tried to write a segment of the story around it - i.e. some things, like nanowires/sheets, are introduced not because they make sense in context, but solely for the cool factor.

It’s crazy how much people adore that novel though, despite the OBVIOUS flaws.

Funnily enough, in his interview with Jim al-khalili, Liu Cixin describes roughly what you conjectured as how he gets inspiration for his works

I think Liu's writing is not bad (Chinese version), but the economics may not be good

2015 was the first year of the Rabid Puppies, as can be seen from "No Award" actually winning the Best Novella and Best Short Story categories, among others.

We'll never know who would have won in the absence of all that ballot stuffing.

Personally, I enjoyed Goblin Emperor much more

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