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The Dark Forest

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The Dark Forest

By: Cixin Liu, Joel Martinsen - translator
Narrated by: Daniel York Loh
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Bloomsbury presents The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu, read by Daniel York Loh.

Read the award-winning, critically acclaimed, multi-million-copy-selling science-fiction phenomenon – soon to be a Netflix Original Series from the creators of Game of Thrones.

Imagine the universe as a forest, patrolled by numberless and nameless predators. In this forest, stealth is survival – any civilisation that reveals its location is prey.

Earth has. Now the predators are coming.

Crossing light years, the Trisolarians will reach Earth in four centuries' time. But the sophons, their extra-dimensional agents and saboteurs, are already here. Only the individual human mind remains immune to their influence.

This is the motivation for the Wallfacer Project, a last-ditch defence that grants four individuals almost absolute power to design secret strategies, hidden through deceit and misdirection from human and alien alike. Three of the Wallfacers are influential statesmen and scientists, but the fourth is a total unknown.

Luo Ji, an unambitious Chinese astronomer, is baffled by his new status. All he knows is that he's the one Wallfacer that Trisolaris wants dead.

Praise for The Three-Body Problem:
'Your next favourite sci-fi novel' Wired
'Immense' Barack Obama
'Unique' George R.R. Martin
'SF in the grand style' Guardian
'Mind-altering and immersive' Daily Mail
Winner of the Hugo and Galaxy Awards for Best Novel First Contact Hard Science Fiction Science Fiction Fiction Thought-Provoking Astronomy
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Continue the series
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The Redemption of Time By: Baoshu, and others

Critic reviews

A unique blend of scientific and philosophical speculation, politics and history, conspiracy theory and cosmology (George R.R. Martin)
Wildly imaginative, really interesting... The scope of it was immense (Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States)
A milestone in Chinese science fiction
Cixin Liu is the author of your next favourite sci-fi novel
China's answer to Arthur C. Clarke
The Three Body epic concludes with sweep and scope and majesty, worthy of Frederik Pohl or Poul Anderson, Scholar Wu or H.G. Wells. The universe is likely to be a rough neighborhood. See just how rough... and how life might still prevail (David Brin)
This is a series that I will always have on my book shelves because of the pleasure it gives to revisit it... Credit is also due to the translator, the extraordinary Ken Liu, for creating a read which enables all the high level concepts to weld with the ongoing epic story'
Complex and grandiose... this is a mind-altering and immersive experience'
The grand scale continues in this third volume... There are many layers to this story, built up and woven together to form an extraordinarily grand tale of mankind's future. This volume brings the trilogy to a grand and satisfying conclusion'
Cixin's trilogy is SF in the grand style, a galaxy-spanning, ideas-rich narrative of invasion and war between humanity and the alien 'Trisolarians'
Even what doesn't happen is epic
The narrative and conceptual momentum of the series takes off at a scale and velocity I couldn't possibly have imagined before reading. The Three-Body trilogy makes insignificance and unknowability and futility seem so spiritually exciting that I felt breathless. I'd join a book club that just discusses it every month for a year
All stars
Most relevant
I read this book after book 3 by mistake but have still enjoyed it.


Rich in detail, grand in scale.
Makes you think about what makes the universe work and our place on it and explores the nature of humanity: heroism and love through to the primitive raw survival fears and the evil we are capable of.

No wonder Netflix will pick this trilogy up!
Not sure how they will produce something better than the books.

Until then, it will be a secret amongst certain friends who have read it and a certain type of person to whom I recommend it.

All with whom I discuss it, say the first book (Three Body Problem) is great and somehow 2 (Dark Forest) and 3 (End of Death) are even better. I agree.

One other note: for English speakers, Chinese names can be difficult and so I downloaded the pdf companion for each book and regularly had to check it. It really helps with audio books where you cannot search back in the text for a name you confused with another person. (Same with the characters in Russian novels and history).

Even better than book1

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The performance of audio book can made more sensible by using different person to voice over. Sometimes the audio delivery was such that it is difficult to differentiate between the character and narration

The story

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There is no other character as Luo Jin. Truly a remarkable heroe.
The reader was fantastic, I really enjoyed his performance.

Best heroe of the trilogy.

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There are many mystery boxes set up in this book, which are satisfyingly paid off. That's what kept me going through the rather clunky prose. There is only so many times you can hear "like on that rainy night 200 years ago" before it gets old. Thankfully the concept itself is strong to carry the story even through that, and I will be picking up book 3.

The reading is a bit slow, and monotonous. Multiple characters sound the same, making it hard to keep track. Not terrible overall, but one of the weaker ones on Audible.

Great concept, but clunky execution

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Enjoyed the journey, some real surprises and "I didn't see that coming". Very rare to find a story that just isn't predictable and whilst pushing and pulling all the way, leaves you with some hope for the future.
I thoroughly enjoyed the story (and whilst I wish I was able to understand the original dialect, the English translation feels very thorough). Narration is excellent as ever and went at a perfect pace. For part of a journey, this, as did the first book, felt like a complete story and whilst I want more of the story, it has also left me wholly satisfied. Excellent book.

I didn't see that coming!

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