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A brilliant collection of Science Fiction stories, imaginative and engaging. Some a bit over the top but the broad range of subjects makes this a great collection to enjoy.
After reading and loving The Three Body Problem, I definitely wanted to enjoy more stories by Cixin Liu. I love sci-fi, and these translated stories bring something different to the table than most of the modern Sci-Fi I read. The Wandering Earth is a collection of 11 stories. I first wanted to read this collection for the title story - The Wandering Earth - since a movie was made from this novella. I have a rule of always reading the book/story that a film is based on before watching the movie,...
The Wandering Earth 5/5, I was obsessed and now I get it. I get why people like to read Liu’s work.Mountain 5/5, I like how morally grey the protagonist is.Of Ants and Dinosaurs 5/5, this one made me laugh several times. Very interesting.Sun of China, 5/5 I think this was my favorite. It left me feeling very hopeful.The Wages of Humanity, 3/5 I was a bit bored by this one.Curse 5.0, 5/5 love that for her.The Micro-Age 5/5, I thought this one was so interesting and also took a suddenly dark turn....
I can’t help but compare this short story collection with Ted Chiang’s Stories of Your Life and Others, which prior to reading this was my favorite science fiction short story collection. It still has my favorite short story (Story of Your Life) but while Ted Chiang had an amazing story coupled with some good and average ones, Liu Cixin had just great stories. The Wandering Earth has 11 stories and I can honestly say that the quality was consistent from start to end and all the stories were memo...
(Not the Kindle edition in my case, but a trade-format paperback)So, take some Big SF Ideas, add a dash of unlikely, shake well, and examine the consequences. Extinction of humanity? Cool - where's the human story, let's see, aha! There it is. Extinction of earth? Same. Ants vs. dinosaurs. OK, skip the "human" part, where's the POV story of one character? ... and so on. Maybe not really a five-star, but it got there on bonuses -- for fresh ideas, for attitude that suggests Jack Vance without rea...
The most wonderful collection of stories ever read. It is an ode to Earth, to its beauties and history. Some are related but they can be read on their own. Very powerful, with the focus on social and environmental issues, highly actual nowadays.The Wandering Earth - to escape from Sun explosion, Earth was put on an accelerated course to the nearest star, Proxima Centauri. As I got used by now, the author emphasize the impact and consequences of this enormous change on the survivors through the e...
3.5 stars overall.As usual with a collection of short stories, some of the stories were amazing, some were good and some were boring. So I’m rating and reviewing each story separately.The Wandering Earth 5 starsMind blowing. Incredible. This story set up my really high expectations for the rest of the book. I’m not going to spoil anything -it’s best to go in knowing nothing, just waiting to be amazed by how smart Liu is. I’m so glad this was the first story because it’s so imaginative!Mountain 5...
If you like golden age science fiction, you will enjoy this collection of stories. The focus is on science, the plots unfold in a straightforward manner, and the social mores fit better with the 1950s. However, the observations, dark humor, and irony are every bit characteristic of the 2020s. I do see his treatment of women as something that was sexist back in the golden age of sf, but it may be representative of his cultural mores and personal experiences. Republished in 2021 and narrated by Th...
Most of these stories just felt like a collection of random, underdeveloped ideas that the author was testing out. A lot of exposition, with characters simply explaining story concepts to each other rather than letting them develop over the course of the story. The writing was clunky. Also, very insistently sexist. All of the female characters were described as pretty, delicate, beautiful, with soft hair and fair voices, etc. Also there was this odd element that also existed in Death's End where...
Hands down this is the best science-fiction collection I have ever read. At least in the past ten years or so. The very accessible style (at least the English translation that I had the pleasure of reading), combined with cool original ideas is the perfect recipe. Granted, the stories hover in the same general "genre", a future Earth, with either some kind of alien invasion or a technological breakthrough threatening the planet. A personal touch that I was surprised to find and enjoyed are the "...
Some intriguing concepts, but the characterization and other human elements are so lacking as to be almost nonexistent - characters exist only a framework is needed upon which stories can be hung.
Book rating : 3/5——————————————The Wandering Earth : 3.5/5Mountain: 3/5Sun of China : 4/5For the Benefit of Mankind: 2/5Curse 5.0 : 2.5/5The Micro-Era : 1.5/5Devourer : 0.5/5Taking Care of God : 0.5/5 With Her Eyes : 5/5 Cannonball : 5/5
A delightful collection of imaginative science fiction. Each story in The Wandering Earth is a cascade of ideas. Liu Cixin starts each one with a concept, which then leads to another, and then a third, and on. He's not shy about yanking a narrative sideways into another world, then circling back to the start to ring changes. Most of the stories feature embedded stories.The stories have a large emotional range, from joy to tragedy, civilizational disaster to triumph. Generically all are recogniza...
My thoughts of some of the stories:Mountain - loved this one - just like Liu to think of something so creative. I won't say much here - it's best going in blind!Sun of China - this hit close to home. Up til now most of Singapore's infrastructure is built by immigrants from China and other parts of Asia. The hard work and long hours they put in, together with their constant refrain of making enough money for their family is admirable and touching. I wish the nation would do more for them.The Wage...
Wandering Earth is a collection of eleven science fiction stories by Liu Cixin, the author of the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy. I would say that all the stories in this collection are well worth reading; they offer a representative sample of his science fiction ranging from "hard" technology-based stories to more humorous and allegorical writing. Two of the stories, the first, title story "The Wandering Earth" and the seventh, "The Micro-Age", deal with humanity's attempts to survive a co...
I'm not used to reading standalone short stories. I tend to have a hard time relating to the characters and caring about their fate. I don't have enough time to get immersed in the story and when I do, the story's already over. But I guess I had yet to come across the exception when my way of thinking was this.Utter fascination is the word I'd use to describe my opinion of this. Even if there were a couple of stories I did not like as much, the rest were true diamond treasures. Wild ideas develo...
I had a difficult time trying to think of ways to explain how Cixin Liu's collection of science fiction short stories, The Wandering Earth, affected me. But in the end, I have to say it was sheer awe at his writing ability that was the overwhelming factor in my decision to go buy more of his books. (And I have!) This was indeed the first work I'd read by him, being personally more enamored of 'softer' sci-fi. I prefer more rollicking space adventures usually, so this book of novellas was a depar...
Very cool to see the beginnings of ideas that ended up in the "Three Body Problem" trilogy. Liu Cixin amazes me with his ability to take the most outlandish scenarios involving the future (and past) of Earth and its technology, and turn them into totally believable situations with scientific backing. For example: the Sun is going to explode, so of course humanity would build giant rockets to move the Earth to a new star. He seems to have a weird fascination with ants and dinosaurs. I would absol...
4⚝I had previously read 'Of Ants and Dinosaurs', 'Mountain' and 'The Wandering Earth'. At the time, my excitement was immeasurable and hardly contained that I dived straight into his The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth's Past Trilogy) and read them all back to back. After a year of hiatus, and a significant lack of some good Liu Cixin in my life, I decided I had better finish this. And I am not disappointed. Here's hoping to get around to more of his published works sooner than later. ⩨...
Just when I thought I'd read most of the great sci-fi short story collections, Liu Cixin comes along and surprises me. I loved the sheer variety and novelty of stories, and the subtle connections between them. It's also been translated really well; I never felt that the stories weren't originally written in English at any point of time. Highly recommend this for sci-fi fans!