Peter Last

RANTS AND RAMBLES

• • Disclaimer Time: When I review books, it is my job to discuss both strengths and weaknesses of the books in question. Weaknesses and inconsistencies seem to be the easiest to discuss and pick apart and so tend to dominate my discussion. Nevertheless, any particular rant (and, yes, they can be long-winded) does not necessarily have special bearing on my overall opinion. Please refer to my overall star rating for my unified opinion of the book as a whole. Additionally, if you happen to disagree with my book rating (and many people probably will) there’s nothing wrong with that. These reviews are simply my personal opinions and are intended to help readers who enjoy my writing and/or the types of books I enjoy to navigate the plethora of options available to them. Use them as the tool they are but do not assign importance to them which they do not deserve.
  • This review is somewhat abbreviated as it is the second in a series and I did not feel like belaboring points already made previously. Please check out my review for The Three-Body Problem if you want a more in-depth discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the series.
  • You can tell exposition dumps have become a very real problem for a novel when they happen so often, you can tell when they are about to happen because the author has written cues. Examples include:
    • Phrase: “You are permitted to be redundant.”

 Meaning: feel free to tell me things I already know because the audience doesn’t know them.

• • • Phrase: “But I’ll continue anyway,” the Wallbreaker said, almost gleefully. “I’ll leave historians with a complete record, even if history won’t endure for much longer. And an explanation for the Lord as well, of course. Not everyone has the keen intellect of the two of us, able to grasp the whole from the merest part.”

 Meaning: the audience is too dumb to figure out the brilliant things happening in the plot, so here is a detailed explanation.

• • • Phrase: “I know a few of the reasons, but why don’t you tell me why.”

 Meaning: tell me stuff I already know because the reader may not.

These are just a few of the many exposition dumps and cues, and look, I know the material in this book is a little big brained, but an inability to provide the necessary information to the reader in an elegant way thereby necessitating the use of exposition dumps is a failure on the part of the author, not a function of the complexity of the subject matter.

• • There is a part of the book (ultimately worthless as it does nothing to progress the plot, develop a character significantly, or affect the later sections of the novel) where a character is talking about writing. She says: “Your approach is wrong. You’re writing an essay rather than creating a literary figure. What a literary figure does in ten minutes might be a reflection of ten years’ experience. You can’t be limited to the plot of a novel – you’ve got to imagine her entire life, and what actually gets put into words is just the tip of the iceberg.” I have two problems with this exchange beyond the exposition of it. First, writers usually just do this sort of thing without feeling the need to explain to their readers how much work actually went into writing a novel. We all know it, most of us just try to write good books without the preachiness. Second, and more importantly, the author clearly does not see the irony of this pontification since his book is written like an essay and his characters have practically no depth.
  • Barely Spoilers: Some aspects of the novel’s science are quite well thought out while the author gets some elementary details wrong. Its jarring to see the contrast between these two extremes which makes the inaccuracies stick out much more than in other science fiction novels. Two examples are:
    • A person is shooting other people in space. This series of events requires him to take off his space suit glove so that his hand is only covered by a thin cloth glove. To avoid a “quick freeze” due to “the minus-one-hundred-degree temperature of space” he turns so the sunlight can shine on his hand. The only problem is that things do not cool off this quickly in space. Yes, space is “cold” because it is practically a vacuum, meaning the frequency with which molecules collide, the condition which creates “heat,” is very low. However, vacuums are also really great insulators due to their lack of molecules. Without said molecules, heat can only be transferred to or from a body via radiation (the book even acknowledges this with the reference to using sunlight to warm the hand) and heat leaving a body due to radiation would be relatively slow. In short, a “quick freeze” does not happen in space, and the negligible pressure from the vacuum of space will kill an unprotected person long before the cold.
    • Early in the book’s history, astronauts apparently had to navigate spacecraft by pushing off bulkheads and “paddling through the air.” The problem, of course, is that air paddling does nothing in space. A person could flail their limbs in zero gravity and never go anywhere due to Newton’s Third Law of motion. Paddling or swimming only works in water because the mass of the fluid is large enough as to give a swimmer something to push against. The same is not true of air. This contrasts sharply with the pretty novel idea that in the future era, astronauts got around with equipment which created electromagnetic fields.
  • Barely a Spoiler: The statement is made at one point that “Right now, the greatest obstacle to humanity’s survival comes from itself.” There is nothing before or after which serves to justify this statement (it seems like the author’s own imprecation of humanity rather than a logical statement based on actions in the book). In fact, by this point, it is well established that the greatest obstacle to humanity’s survival comes from an alien race who has much higher levels of technology and who is preventing human scientific and technical progress from occurring. Compared to that, the would-be machinations of a few human dissidents seem like small potatoes.
  • Barely a Spoiler: So much time is wasted in this book. For example, there is an entire sub-plot where a Trisolarian probe is entering the solar system. It cuts off its engines, making it basically impossible to track. A plan is developed to spread solar dust which will create contrails when the probe passes through it, making it possible to track again. First, the fact that this works is a massive convenience because, due to the size of space, it would be much harder than trying to hit a bullet with another bullet while blindfolded. Second, almost immediately after passing through said dust cloud, the probe turns its engines back on, making the whole ordeal a waste of several pages spent with people we don’t know and will never hear from again. At least half of this book could be cut out and nothing of significance would be lost.
  • Barely a Spoiler: There is a part near the end of the book where three characters are, as near as I can figure, communicating using telepathy, though this not set up anywhere prior in the book. There is some weird explanation for them communicating through their locked gazes, but how is a glance supposed to convey complex ideas like the distance to a specific planet and fuel reserves being insufficient to decelerate for the spaceship to refuel? It is laughable at best. Plus, this section has many of the “communications” repeated three times making for a really drawn-out, unnecessary, and ridiculous exchange. Although, repeating everything three-fold does help stretch out the book some. Maybe the author was being paid by the word.
  • Mild Spoilers: As with the previous book, the core ideas are not bad and, had they been properly developed and explored, may have made for some truly interesting reading. For example, when the main character goes into hibernation and wakes up two hundred years later, there is mention of The Great Ravine, a sort of global great depression which resulted in half of the world’s population dying. That sounds like an interesting idea for a book. Can we have that one? Clearly not. Or the creation of space-fleet nations which are so politically at each other’s throats that they cannot decide who should be the first to make contact with the alien species and so they bungle the whole thing. That dynamic sounds like it could be fun. Can we explore that more? No. And so goes every interesting concept in this book. There is no time to develop them since we have to speed along so we can get to all the big-brained science fiction concepts. The sad part is there is adequate space to develop many of these concepts into a compelling narrative had this book been more expertly written.
  • Mild Spoilers: As long as we’re talking about the Wallfacer project, let’s discuss the counter project from the Earth Trisolarian Organization (ETO), the Wallbreaker project. The ETO assigns a person to each Wallfacer whose job it was to determine the true intent of the Wallfacer and reveal it to the world, thereby robbing the Wallfacer project of its single advantage. This makes sense on its face but there are about one hundred and thirty-seven inconsistencies (this is hyperbole). With such an important task for their organization, why does the ETO seemingly randomly assign a Wallbreaker to each Wallfacer? Wouldn’t it make more sense to find someone whose thought process closely aligns with that of each Wallfacer to give the highest possibility of determining their plans? Also, why is the main character of the book not assigned a Wallbreaker despite the Trisolarians considering him to be the most dangerous Wallfacer? The explanation provided in the book is that he will be his own Wallbreaker, but how does that make any sense? I (sort of) understand from a philosophical aspect what the book is trying to (poorly) convey, but from a practical standpoint, it is an illogical way for the ETO to approach the situation. Then there is the execution of the whole dynamic between Wallfacers and Wallbreakers, namely, there is not one. The Wallbreakers are not mentioned until they have discovered their Wallfacer’s true intent at which point they reveal themselves, explain the plan via exposition dump, and are never heard from again. Why do all three Wallbreakers manage to complete their tasks in less than eight years when the whole timeline the author has to play with is closer to four hundred? It would be much more interesting to create a cat-and-mouse game of espionage jumping through time (utilizing hibernation technology which totally exists) as the Wallfacers try to create plans and stay one step ahead while the Wallbreakers try frantically to discover the true intent of each. And this point also makes me wonder, once again, why the main character was not assigned a Wallbreaker. With the speed and effectiveness the other Wallbreakers managed to complete their tasks, it seems there would be a very good chance, statistically, that a fourth Wallbreaker could have discovered the main character’s plan, thereby dismantling any final resistance to the Trisolarian invasion. Seems like a lost opportunity for the ETO.
  • Mild Spoilers: The concepts of Cosmic Sociology and the interactions of the last quarter of the book are all based on game theory which is somewhat interesting in and of itself. The basic concept of game theory is a scenario where two entities must either choose to help or exploit the other. The solution where both chose to help results in a net good for both parties, the second solution involve one of the entities helping while other exploits giving the best result for the party which exploits and the worst for the party which helps, and a third solution exists where both parties exploit creating a result for each worse than solution one and the exploiters of solution two but better than the helper in solution two. Armed with this information, the book purports, all parties will always choose to exploit another since no matter what the other party choses to do, the rout of exploitation will always produce the best result for your party. In this book, every entity, whether a spaceship or an entire species, falls into the trap of exploiting the other. Every single time. This is, essentially, taken to be one of the basic tenets of cosmic sociology. The book seems to agree this outcome is inevitable, but experience in our world does not bear this out 100% of the time. Nor does the book seem to agree with its own premise as humanity did not chose the path of exploitation. Granted, on a big enough scale, the results might be the same often enough to provide an actionable theory, but in the micro interaction between two species, or two spacecraft, why is this always the result? It makes the story flat and unnuanced.
  • Spoilers: The idea with the most squandered potential in the book is the Wallfacer Project. The background is that the Trisolarians have better technology than humanity and have erected a technological wall against further human advancement. The only thing humans have to their advantage is the ability to keep a secret (something Trisolarians find culturally impossible to do). But with alien sophons running around earth spying on every interaction, any plans which are openly discussed will be relayed to the Trisolarians and subsequently dismantled. The only option, then, is for lone geniuses to work inside their own heads, never relaying their plans to anyone. For this to be effective, these Wallfacers have relatively broad powers, are expected to leave red herrings for the rest of the world, and have their directives followed with no question. The interesting dynamics of this arrangement are immediately seen when one of the Wallfacers refuses his appointment to the role. His security cannot protect him when he orders them not to, they will not even save his life until he asks for help, since the supposition is that any action, order, or directive may be directly related to this Wallfacer’s brilliant plan. Here there is a lot of room for discovery, introspection on the current world, and intrigue. Concepts of government overreach and unbridled power could be considered. The idea of perpetual isolation due to an inability to tell anyone one’s inmost thoughts could be explored. An inability to form relationships in this scenario or the burden of such a great responsibility for the good of all humankind is ripe for dissection. Each of these concepts is briefly touched upon, but there is no time for significant exploration of them as the scientifically “brilliant” concepts of the book take precedence and swamp out any potential for a truly interesting narrative.
  • Spoilers: The concept of the Wallfacers project is primarily obfuscation and secrecy, an idea the world leaders in the book clearly do not understand. The Wallfacer’s are overseen by a board which demands regular updates on each person’s progress as well as justifications for the expenditures made. One of two scenarios is possible here. The first is that the author did not fully understand or commit to his own idea and used this government oversight as a convenience to hamper and ultimately render unusable the ideas from the three non-main character Wallfacers. The second possibility is the author was making a commentary on the fickleness of humanity. The government wants the benefits of the Wallfacers’ secrecy without giving up control over them. This could be an indictment of humanity wanting to have their cake and eat it too. It is unclear which of these was the author’s intent, but the whole dynamic sticks out like a sore thumb, leaving the reader wondering how humanity could be so stupid as to start something like the Wallfacer project and then immediately hamstring it into impotence.
  • Major Spoilers: Why is so much time wasted on pointless explanations which serve to a) bore the reader to tears, and b) suck all the air out of scenes which might have otherwise been epic, exciting, and impactful? Take for example the scene where the alien probe destroys the entire human fleet. A few pages devoted to a space battle seems promising. But then you find out the humans are incredibly outmatched, and this alien probe can rip through their ships like butter. A massacre can also be powerful in a novel, a sucker punch ripping the rug out from under what humanity thought was a sure-fire defense against the invading alien force. But for that to land, we would have to actually see humanity despair, struggle, triumph, and create this impressive armada. We didn’t of course, since this all happened off page while the main character hibernates. It could also have some impact if we cared about any of the characters involved, which we don’t since we don’t even know who any of them are. The action could be cool though, right? Only if you like clinical descriptions of an object smashing through one spacecraft and then another and then another. And each one getting hit in the fuel reserves so they explode. And then the object turning and slamming through another ship and another ship and another ship. We’ll take a break in the middle of that for two characters we don’t know to discuss how the object appears to slow slightly upon smashing through each ship only to accelerate to its original speed before hitting the next ship. Then they will note a hundred more ships have exploded. Then we return to the riveting action of the object smashing through a bunch more ships in sequence, all while being informed at each pass as to how much time has elapsed (i.e “In one minute and eighteen seconds, the droplet had completed a two-thousand-kilometer course, passing through each of the hundred ships…” “…in the space of just ten seconds, it passed through twelve ships: Ganges, Columbia, Justice, Masada, Proton, Yandi, Atlantic, Sirius, Thanksgiving, Advance, Han, Tempest.” “One minute and twenty-one seconds later, the hundred ships in the second row had been completely annihilated.” “The droplet took two minutes and thirty-five seconds to destroy the third row of ships.”) I’m frankly surprised the author didn’t treat us to the names of all two thousand spacecraft in the fleet as they were destroyed.
  • There’s a lot more I could rant about, but I’m over three thousand words in this review now and I need to let go of my hatred or I will turn to the dark side. So with that, I will end this particular reading experience and move on with my life.