I haven't read a book this full of ideas in a long time. I highly HIGHLY recommend the first novel of Cixin's Three-Body Problem trilogy. English translations of the remaining volumes are rolling out over the next 8 months (The Dark Forest comes out in a few weeks and Death's End drops April 2016) but this shouldn't stop you from getting started. There are awesome set pieces in this novel in the true sense of the word. I often turned to my wife after reading passages and enthusiastically tried to recount what I just read and why it was so cool. Hats off to Ken Liu - my translations never worked.

I really was impressed with the translation from Ken Liu, an accomplished writer himself. Ken was able to transition some very tricky cultural moments with minimal interruption and his writing flowed so well I often forgot it wasn't a book written in originally in English. It will be interesting to see how Joel Martinsen measures up in his translation of the second volume.

All in all, this is a novel of epic ideas and despite it's fantastic flourishes based in scientific theory feels rather relevant. Cixin manages to balance the optimism necessary to make very grim stakes wondrous. This is perfect beach reading material.