It’s criticised a lot for lacking character depth and not focusing on the characters. I’d agree somewhat but there are a few characters and one in particular which I felt a real connection with as the world unfolds in the later books.What it lacks in character charm though it makes up for in mind bending sci fi. Scale. The possibilities that could lay ahead. It focuses on mass psychology, how civilisations react, different ages etc. It’s about a much much much bigger picture and almost sacrifices character development to focus on that other stuff.I wouldn’t change a thing despite finding book one quite difficult too.My appreciation for it warped beyond recognition as I made my way through books 2 and 3.

Chinese is a utilitarian language, yes. It's also a language that heavily relies on context for impact and meaning. Cixin Liu's writing is no exception and is similar throughout his entire bibliography. It's very recognizable when he was truly inspired, e.g. the hairs on Ye Wenjie's cheeks standing up when she first stepped on Radar Peak, the making of the first sophon, etc. These moments increase in number progressively through the series, and Death's End is mostly one super inspired moment he obviously dreamed about writing for a long time after another, to the point where the final chapters are a mind-boggling rush through new concepts, eons and the coming together of numerous old concepts and plot threads. In short, this was written by a practicing engineer.

And that a core portion of book two was about how wartime footing caused famines and death and hardship, and then there was an explosion of freedom, innovation, and overconfidence. He critiques both the East and the West. I liked that.

I’ve only finished Books 1 and 2, and truth be told, I read them because I wanted to know what would happen. So I’m definitely more into it for the big concepts and ideas than the stories. But I did find some of the stories very interesting, moving, or sad, or surprising, and I really liked the fact that during the first book, he talked about the Cultural Revolution, and censorship, and stifling political pressure, and as a Chinese insider rather than a critical outsider.

The strength of this book is scale and innovation. The 'writing' is not necessarily the best quality. The author is an engineer, not a professional writer, so you can only expect so much. In return, the ideas are much wilder than the typical sci-fi.

For scale, there are two aspects. First is the depth: you start in the cold war era and literally go the end of the universe, with all the major steps in between. Compare this to other sci-fi, like star trek, that happens in an advanced but static universe. There really aren't any game changing tech coming out through the course of star trek, but happens like 10 times in TBP. You can critique the actual science, but the consequences for each technology felt impactful.

At no point where the human and trisolarians even remotely on even grounds. This is in contrast with many other sci-fi works where aliens things had human equivalents (cars, jewelry, etc.) and they interacted face to face.

Chinese literary convention tends toward less emphasis on the individual and a preference for that which is larger scale. In Chinese literature, putting a lot of emphasis on the internal monologues of characters, expounding on their motivations and detailing the minutiae of events are seen as formal and stylistic faults that make a work tedious.

The highly divergent ideas about narrative and sense of aesthetics can make Chinese literature very difficult to read for us in the west, which is why the most popular ‘translations’ of Chinese literature tend to be abridged adaptations that interpret the spirit of the work rather than the actual contents, this is why Arthur Waley's Monkey: A Folktale of China is by far the most widely known and read version of Journey to the West in the English speaking world and the only people reading actual verbatim translations of the full work by Wu Cheng’en are scholars.

What made me love the wretched thing was its tender and intimate portrayals of friendship, how friendship can, if not save a life, make it bearable and offer innumerable joys for those who are shut off from the traditions of marriage and family.

Yanagihara’s rendering of Jude’s abuse never feels excessive or sensationalist. It is not included for shock value or titillation, as is sometimes the case in works of horror or crime fiction. Jude’s suffering is so extensively documented because it is the foundation of his character.

For the first fifty or so pages, as the characters attend parties, find apartments, go on dates, gossip, and squabble with each other, it is easy for the reader to think he knows what he’s getting into: the latest example of the postgraduate New York ensemble novel, a genre with many distinguished forbears, Mary McCarthy’s “The Group” and Claire Messud’s “The Emperor’s Children” among them.

As the pages turn, the ensemble recedes and Jude comes to the fore. And with Jude at its center, “A Little Life” becomes a surprisingly subversive novel—one that uses the middle-class trappings of naturalistic fiction to deliver an unsettling meditation on sexual abuse, suffering, and the difficulties of recovery.

In this godless world, friendship is the only solace available to any of us.

Like the axiom of equality, “A Little Life” feels elemental, irreducible—and, dark and disturbing though it is, there is beauty in it.