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The co-op bookstore for avid readers
Ball Lightning
From the New York Times bestselling author of the Three-Body Trilogy, Cixin Liu's Ball Lightning is the story of what happens when the beauty of scientific inquiry runs up against the drive to harness new discoveries with no consideration of their possible consequences.
When Chen's parents are incinerated before his eyes by a blast of ball lightning, he devotes his life to cracking the secret of this mysterious natural phenomenon. His search takes him to stormy mountaintops, an experimental military weapons lab, and an old Soviet science station.
The more he learns, the more he comes to realize that ball lightning is just the tip of an entirely new frontier. While Chen's quest for answers gives purpose to his lonely life, it also pits him against soldiers and scientists with motives of their own: a beautiful army major with an obsession with dangerous weaponry, and a physicist who has no place for ethical considerations in his single-minded pursuit of knowledge.
"Wildly imaginative."--Barack Obama on The Three-Body Problem trilogy
Tor books by Cixin Liu
The Three-Body Problem Series
#1 The Three-Body Problem
#2 The Dark Forest
#3 Death's End
Book Details
- Publisher: Tor Books
- Publish Date: Jun 25th, 2019
- Pages: 400
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 9.10in - 6.10in - 1.10in - 0.90lb
- EAN: 9780765394095
- Categories: • Science Fiction - Hard Science Fiction• Science Fiction - Military• World Literature - China - 21st Century
More books to explore
About the Author
More books by Cixin Liu
What people are saying
Hideo Kojima is a video game designer, director and producer.
I just received a copy of Liu Cixin's new book, "Ball Lightning", the prequel to "The Three-Body Problem"! Thank you! This is a big deal!!!!!!! I will read it at the end of the year. 🙏🫶 https://t.co/5OX9l151RL
Chuck Baggett likes space exploration, AI, peace & freedom. Joined Oct. 8, 2008. Enjoys followers, retweets, & replies. Individual rights are human rights.
@pickover Very science-fiction-y. I think I stopped near the end because it was too bleak. Just listened to short stories by Cixin Liu in "To Hold Up The Sky". Listened to Ball Lightning. Watched the movie about moving Earth, The Wandering Earth. Listened to The Cretacious Past. All great.
Founder @brevilabs | Copilot for Obsidian | 👨‍💻 Building a series of new things in 2023 https://t.co/UO47y9d7fp…
Just finished the book Ball Lightning by Liu Cixin. He never fails to shock me with his wild imagination and countless plot twists. The ending was so romantic and poetic, it refreshes my concept of what sci-fi is.
Praise for this book
"Wildly imaginative, really interesting." -President Barack Obama on the Three-Body Problem trilogy
"A breakthrough book . . . a unique blend of scientific and philosophical speculation, politics and history, conspiracy theory and cosmology." --George R. R. Martin, on The Three Body Problem
"Extraordinary." --The New Yorker, on The Three Body Problem
"Remarkable, revelatory and not to be missed." --Kirkus Reviews, starred review, on The Three Body Problem
"A must-read in any language." --Booklist, on The Three Body Problem
"A meditation on technology, progress, morality, extinction, and knowledge that doubles as a cosmos-in-the-balance thriller.... a testament to just how far [Liu's] own towering imagination has taken him: Far beyond the borders of his country, and forever into the canon of science fiction. - NPR, on Death's End
"The best kind of science fiction, familiar but strange all at the same time." -- Kim Stanley Robinson, on The Three Body Problem
What people are saying
Hideo Kojima is a video game designer, director and producer.
I just received a copy of Liu Cixin's new book, "Ball Lightning", the prequel to "The Three-Body Problem"! Thank you! This is a big deal!!!!!!! I will read it at the end of the year. 🙏🫶 https://t.co/5OX9l151RL
Chuck Baggett likes space exploration, AI, peace & freedom. Joined Oct. 8, 2008. Enjoys followers, retweets, & replies. Individual rights are human rights.
@pickover Very science-fiction-y. I think I stopped near the end because it was too bleak. Just listened to short stories by Cixin Liu in "To Hold Up The Sky". Listened to Ball Lightning. Watched the movie about moving Earth, The Wandering Earth. Listened to The Cretacious Past. All great.