Peter M. Last

RANTS AND RAMBLES

• • DISCLAIMER: When I review books, weaknesses and inconsistencies tend to dominate my discussion; therefore, I will emphasize that any particular rant (and, yes, they can be long-winded) does not have special bearing on my unified opinion of the book. For this, please refer to my overall star rating. Additionally, this review is my personal opinion, intended to help like-minded readers navigate the plethora of available options. Use it as a tool but do not assign undue importance to it (i.e. feel free to disagree with me).
  • The Thoughts section of is review is somewhat abbreviated as it is the third in a series and I did not feel like belaboring points already made previously. Please check out my reviews for The Three-Body Problem, and The Dark Forest if you want a more in-depth discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the series.
  • An actual character in this book says about fairytales contained in the story: “But let me say something else that’s not directly relevant here. As a writer, I want to express my respect for the author. As fairy tales, these are very good.” End scene. This character literally does nothing of importance in this novel. He simply exists to say he has nothing to add to the conversation followed by a glowing admiration for the writer (which is, by extension, the writer of Death’s End). If you have to pat yourself on the back for your own fantastic writing, you may be overcompensating.
  • The author is super concerned with making sure readers know how clever and well-researched his ideas are. For example, there is a long explanation of how Dark Forest deterrence is similar to the mutually assured destruction of the Cold War. Or a long explanation of how cloning and hibernation technology were repressed by governments before finally being released to the world and how that makes perfect sense.
  • The author believes you, as the reader, are too dumb to piece together the clues he has spoon-fed you, so he takes pages upon pages to explain them in excruciating detail. Words like “Over the course of” signal an exposition dump followed by “thus” which precedes a second explanation/wrap up of what you were just taught. It is boring, condescending, and infuriating.
  • After about a week together, “Guan Yifan dimmed the cabin lights so (Cheng Xin) could see through them without glare. They anticipated each other’s needs now, as though they were a single person.” What the heck?! Many people are married for decades and are never this in tune with each other. This is unrealistic, but typical of character “development” in this series, which is to say there is none. The reader is simply told about the end state of a character’s development without any indication as to what brought them from point A to point B.
  • As with the previous books there is A LOT of explaining. Scientific concepts, both real and ridiculous. Chunks of human history. Character backstories. Characters are introduced, they progress a bit along their plot arcs, dodging scientific and historic exposition along the way, and then a massive break is taken to explain their entire history. The thing is, you can’t approach some sort of a payoff without any buildup and then have an exposition dump to supply said buildup via backstory. There is no tension and nothing interesting in this type of writing, so it falls flat every time. And there are many times.
  • …this belt was actually an extremely flattened oval, or perhaps a circle that had been stretched out. Isn’t an oval just a circle which has been stretched out? Statements like this stand out in sharp contrast to the statements and ideas which had solid thought put into them. For example, right before this, it is noted the stars in front of them are blue and those behind are red. I’m assuming this is because of the Doppler effect on light when the observer is traveling at light speed.
  • By now, he looked only about twice as tall as the others, no longer a giant. Wouldn’t that still qualify him as a giant?
  • Parts of this book read like the “records” or “notable” statistics provided by football commentators:
    • This was the most severe legal restriction against a technology since the nuclear non-proliferation treaties of three centuries ago.
    • Over three hundred thousand people died in the worst disaster since the Doomsday Battle.
    • This was the first time in human history where a unified world government controlled the majority of humanity’s armed forces.
    • The first trip to an extra-solar planetary system.
    • The first steps on the surface of an exo-planet.
    • The first voyage to a world with life outside the solar system.
  • Spoiler: There were so many metaphors and other artistic usages of language in this book as to boggle the imagination. It is probable at least some of these comical syllabic arrangements arise from things lost in translation, but due to the pretentious writing style as a whole, I cannot dismiss all instances in this manner. Plus, some of them are really funny. Below is a selection of my favorites:
    • A smile appeared on his face like water seeping from a crack in a frozen river.
    • (Speaking of hibernation technology) Even for terminal patients, the future no longer appealed. By the time they woke up, perhaps the world would be bathed in a sea of fire. And they wouldn’t even be able to find an aspirin.
    • (Description of skyscrapers whose design bear resemblance to trees) If they had been walking along one of the lower branches, they would be surrounded by the bright buildings hanging from the branch above, and they would have felt like tiny insects flying through a dream forest in which every leaf and fruit sparkled and dazzled.
    • The individuals AA indicated had smooth, lovely faces, long hair that draped over their shoulders, slender, soft bodies, as if their bones were made of bananas…
    • The politician’s voice was lovely and sweet as though the words were strung together by strands of blown sugar.
    • All she saw was a lovely woman distinguished by her overwhelming femininity, like a concentrated pigment palette that could turn a whole lake pink.
    • Sitting there, he appeared as a stable, upside-down T, a lonely anchor on a beach, immobile under the winds of time howling overhead and before the roaring waves of the ages, steadfastly waiting for a departed ship that would never return.
    • Cheng Xin felt her previous life seep out of the narrowing crack in the door, like water escaping from a funnel…
    • They locked gazes and their souls embraced.
    • The struck buildings burned and then fell several hundred meters, like overripe fruits.
    • A gigantic tent appeared in the holographic display, like a broken half of an egg dropped in the desert with people spilling out of it like albumen.
    • Tens of millions flooded Sydney and looted it in the same manner a swarm of ants devours a fresh corpse.
    • The clear bitterness (of tea) seemed to suffuse her body as though she had drunk cold starlight.
    • As she soaked among the bubbles, she felt her body turn soft as noodles, felt herself melt into the bubbles.
    • Innumerable glutton fish approached from both sides and swam into the foam like pilgrims congregating at a river of clouds.
    • …and the four larger asteroid fragments simulating the gas giants behaved as four scoops of ice cream being heated on one side by a blow torch.
    • Only the phosphorescence of the planet’s liquid helium and hydrogen diffused through the thick atmosphere, formed patches of hazy light, roving about like eyeballs behind the closed eyelids of a dreamer.
    • Golden currents leaped away from the circular rim and formed a large number of two-dimensional prominences resembling graceful dancers cavorting wantonly around the sun.
    • AA’s words slid across Cheng Xin’s thoughts like drops of water across a Lilypad, leaving no trace.
    • The Milky Way appeared as a patch of ice, hiding bloody remains and (a planet) nearby appeared as a cremator, burning over an abyss.
  • Spoilers: There are so many details and explanation and exposition in this book which ultimately come to very little or nothing at all. Examples include: the 4^th dimensional space plotline which is quickly dumped; descriptions of the bunker cities which did not relate to the story or the setting in any meaningful way; Yun Tianming’s fairy tales which lead to a few realizations, most of which come too late to be of any help, though they do point to curvature propulsion which provides a convenient escape for the heroes so the book can run 60 pages longer than it has any conceivable right to be. I appreciate all the thought the author put into the world and the details he invented, but if said details don’t relate to the story, they should not be included in the final manuscript. It depends on the story, but a good rule of thumb is that only 10% of what an author comes up with should make it into a book. In the case of Death’s End, 60 pages would definitely be enough to cover the sparse plot of the book. The other 540 pages are filled with deadweight. Because there is so much content to get through, the book jumps from one topic to another, never staying with any long enough to develop it. This novel consequently has a cast of character husks populating a husk story which is too dull and impassive to create any sort of interest or even a coherent story line.
  • Spoilers: Characters are caricatured, boring, and flat. Take, for example, Mr. Wade, the leader of the Staircase Project. He is a terrible leader, comically angry, absurdly sadistic, and ridiculously psychotic. Anything getting done under his watch is not realistic, and any success in the Staircase Project is purely for plot convenience. The idea of his awakening from hibernation at the same time period as his previous subordinate is convenient, and his attempt to kill her so he can be the next Swordholder is farcical. Why would he do it? “You are between me and what I want” does not hold up because there are many other candidates for the new Swordholder and he does not attempt to kill any of them. Also, his execution of the plot is simplistic and easily resolved (with gory “action”) even though the police are slow to respond because they are out of practice due to there not having been a murder attempt in decades. It’s as if the author concocted this plot to add some spice to the book but became bored with it before it was ever written, so it dies with a whimper before ever beginning.
  • Spoilers: Cheng Xin goes blind in Australia for no reason. The stated reason is that it was psychosomatic, which is certainly an explanation, but this sequence of event has absolutely no bearing on the story. Immediately after the blinding “event,” the plot jumps forward six years to a period when she has undergone a medical procedure to retore her sight. Why did she go blind in the first place? Is it supposed to be a metaphor for something? I am at a loss.
  • Mild Spoilers: The idea Trisolaris is worried about human technological advancement makes no sense. Society has become so sensual and decadent that humans apparently don’t even make their own art anymore. I can’t imagine many people choosing to work for technological achievement when it appears anyone can live comfortably in an apparent utopia without many if any contributions to society. It would actually be more interesting to see humanity fall due to apathy than Triosolarian superiority.
  • Spoilers: There are so many parts of this story which could be interesting novels in their own rite. Like any number of stories from the Australian resettlement which were all glossed over by time jumps. Or more investigation and investment in fourth-dimensional space, the history of that space, and the potential abilities arising from being able to use it. Marines being able to board a space vessel undetected through the fourth dimension was pretty cool as were the weapons utilizing its abilities. Unfortunately, fourth-dimensional space is mentioned once in a sequence which, while not perfect, is one of the best parts of the book and then is promptly forgotten about. Or stories of the space colonies and their politics, how the systems were created and evolved, power struggles between bureaucracy and scientific teams. All these items are skipped over as the main character hibernates. There were a lot of interesting ways the book could have gone. It was not the lack of potentially good ideas which sank this book and this series. It was extremely poor execution.
  • Spoilers: The author’s writing style does not build momentum but instead actively opposes it. Rather than build the world from the ground up in an orderly fashion, parsing out information in places where it makes sense to give impact to future scenes, it seems the author often gets to the middle of a scene, realizes the reader does not have the requisite information to understand what is going on or why it is impactful, and stops to provide explanation and backstory. This can take paragraphs such as when a scene was stopped cold to describe the Australian House of Commons so the reader could visualize the outroar which was occurring. It can also take much longer, for example, when Cheng Xin shows up to stop the medically assisted suicide of Yun Tianming, we have no idea who she is or why her arrival is important, so we stop the action and take several chapters to catch up on her backstory. This writing organization makes for a read as jerky as a teenager learning to drive a stick shift, and there is consequently never enough momentum to carry a single impactful scene. It feels like the books is always behind and trying to catch up to itself.
  • Spoilers: Massive amounts of space are used to explain events in clinical fashion like a history book. Years are glossed over in paragraphs. For example, little is said about the horrors of the Australian Resettlement except to say that it was horrible. Nothing is said of the human resistance except that they existed. The great culling is mentioned only to say it almost happened. Australia in turmoil due to over-crowding is mentioned, and that’s it. The sad part is each of these events, glossed over in this brick of a tome, boasts the potential for a hundred more interesting stories with a far superior ability to comment on the nature of humanity and our place in the universe. These are topics the author clearly wants to talk about but is not talented enough to do so in an interesting, effective, and competent manner.
  • Mild Spoilers: Fourth-dimensional space is a neat idea with intriguing implications based on how it is described here. For the first time since beginning The Three-Body Problem, I felt an iota of interest, a small flickering flame of intrigue. What lives in 4D space? Why are they all dying? How does this impact 3D space? As per usual, this guttering flame is soon smothered under the mountains of boring explanations, exposition, and pontification, but for a brief moment I was interested.
  • Spoilers: When it is revealed the futuristic “feminized” version of humanity lacks the will to continue deterrence, there are two possibilities from a writing standpoint. The first possibility is that of a really lame contrivance to move the plot forward onto Australia (if you have no idea what that means, consider yourself lucky). It feels like the author had a general plot he wanted to pursue and made up all the details to make it happen on the spot. “I want the peace of the deterrence era to end. I guess someone will just not be able to push the button. Wouldn’t humanity have more than one person who could do that? No, for…reasons. We’ll call this person the Swordholder. Overblown and pretentious titles are kind of my hallmark when it comes to silly or non-sensical ideas in this series. Wait, if this happened, wouldn’t humanity be dead? How will I make all my other heavy-handed philosophical points? Ooo! Maybe the humans can export their culture to Trisolaris which will make them respect humanity enough to not kill them. How can we show that? Trisolarians will make all the award winning films that year. What award? The Oscars? I could come up with a more futuristic-y sounding award, or I could just contend that the Oscars are as important in 400 years as they are today. I’ll go with the second option. Then when the Trisolarians show up, they can set up reservations for humans to live on. This will allow me to string the plot out while also poking a bit at the past ills of the West. That sounds perfect! No editing necessary.” The second, and considerably more generous, possibility is that of a rebuke of humanity along the lines of “Hard Times = Strong Men, Strong Men = Good Times, Good Times = Weak Men.” This is poorly done, of course, because this slide into “weak men” is skipped over via hibernation and is told to the reader instead of shown, but if true, this idea isn’t bad.
  • Spoilers: At a certain point, Yun Tianming is with the Trisolarians and has learned information which would help humanity; unfortunately, Trisolaris does not want to provide this information. Yun Tianming has the opportunity to video chat with Cheng Xin (just accept this arrangement as it sort of makes sense in the context of the book) and decides to encode critical information into a series of three fairy tales which he tells Cheng Xin. Humanity must now decipher the fairy tales, and this task relies on an inconceivable number of coincidences. First, soap is used to propel a paper boat across a tub which is an important clue to an understanding of curvature propulsion drives, a form of propulsion used to reach light speed which I will not even pretend to understand. Soap is a relic of the old world and so not readily available. AA’s desire to acquire soap was a direct result of hearing the fairy tale, so that makes sense, but why did she want to make a paper boat? And why did Cheng Xin attach a soap chip to the boat to make it go across the tub? A second coincidence involves a linguist who talked in his sleep and his girlfriend overheard him say a particular word from one of the stories. This word happened to be a mash-up of two words which were the names of old Norwegian cities. His girlfriend happened to be knowledgeable of Norwegian geography. An old “common era” man happened to be living on the island this clue pointed to because he used to be a lighthouse keeper, and it was the only place anyone would let him build a lighthouse (the lighthouse has nothing to do with anything). This man takes the main characters on his boat into a maelstrom (basically a whirlpool) where Cheng Xin happens to remember a poem from Edgar Allen Poe about this particular whirlpool. This whirlpool obviously referred to blackholes (what blackholes had to do with anything, I honestly can’t remember). Those were just two of the conveniences used to decipher the fairy tales.
  • Spoilers: The book periodically takes a break to insert mini-games, brain teasers or ideas which the author finds to be clever and unique. An example of this is when there is a Dark Forest threat false alarm, and people are scrambling to escape. Cheng Xin and AA have an opportunity to save three children out of a group, so to decide who gets to come, AA asks them a series of brain teasers (all math based since apparently math is the most important skill set) with the understanding that whoever answered them first would earn a seat on their shuttle. Each brain teaser is spelled out in detail so the reader can play along. A tip for writers: mini-games are rarely fun even in video games, and they are never fun in novels.
  • Spoilers: The consistency of the world is abysmal. Some things last seemingly forever while others are forgotten as soon as they happen. For example, the current-day Australian Parliament building is still standing and in use over 300 years in the future, yet the awful genocide in Australia is described as a “distant memory” a mere seven years later. In the future portions of the book, it is stated that soap has not been used for centuries, yet the Oscars are still around. The main character goes into hibernation for 60 years and upon waking notes she recognizes none of the brands in commercials which seems like an awfully short time for every brand to become defunct. This whiplash is simply one example of a plethora of inconsistencies which make it impossible to immerse oneself in the story.