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Ball Lightning  By  cover art

Ball Lightning

By: Cixin Liu, Joel Martinsen - translator
Narrated by: Feodor Chin
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Publisher's summary

"Wildly imaginative." (Barack Obama on The Three-Body Problem trilogy)

A new standalone military science fiction adventure from the New York Times best-selling and award-winning author of the Three-Body Trilogy.

When Chen’s parents are incinerated before his eyes by a blast of ball lightning, he devotes his life to cracking the secret of the 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 in particle physics. Although Chen’s quest provides a purpose for his lonely life, his reasons for chasing his elusive quarry come into conflict with soldiers and scientists who have 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.

Ball Lightning, by award-winning Chinese science fiction author Cixin Liu, is a fast-paced audiobook about what happens when the beauty of scientific inquiry runs up against a push to harness new discoveries with no consideration of their possible consequences.

This program is read by Feodor Chin, voice of Zenyatta in Overwatch.

©2005, 2018 Liu Cixin; Translation copyright by China Educational Publications Import & Export Corp., Ltd. (P)2018 Macmillan Audio

What listeners say about Ball Lightning

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

if you loved the three body problem . a must

even though this is a prequel for the three body problem I suggest reading it as a number four book. As a super enthusiastic fan of the three body problem series this one is an excellent 4th listen

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33 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Ate it Up With a Spoon...

I don't know how Cixin Liu does it, but he writes some phenomenal, eye-opening and mind-expanding technical stuff that goes down smooth and leaves you wanting more. What an imagination, I swear this could be real. Not since Frank Herbert has a sci-fi author come up with rich, detailed characterizations, plots and ideas. We need more of his stuff translated and I mean RIGHT NOW! Hungry for more....

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30 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Silly title, great book

This is a great book from the same author as “The Three Body Problem” and it’s series. It takes place in the same “universe” before the Three Body Problem, but isn’t really related to it. There’s just some characters you may find recognizable, is all. Other than that, this is a great stand-alone that takes place before any of the events of The Three Body Problem.

I almost didn’t even click on the link for this book. I didn’t know “ball lightning” was a thing, and I actually LOLd IRL when I read the title, and muttered something along the lines of, “what genius picked that title?”

Then I checked the author’s name and went, “wait a second.”

Worth it. Get it. Enjoy it. And if you haven’t read the The Three Body Problem, you should, but do it after this book.

Btw, this book was written before The Three Body Problem, and it shows. It’s not as good obviously, but it’s still pretty good, and I still recommend it.

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28 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

This book is actually very short...

It might seem like an average length audio book, but that's only because of the hours taken up by the words "ball lightning," which appear hundreds of not thousands of times. I'm not kidding. OK, It might be a cool term in Chinese, but "ball lightning" in English... It's just awkward to use "ball" as an adjective to describe anything. It's hard to take the story seriously when every few sentences you hear "the BALL LIGHTNING phenomenon was not taken seriously outside the community of BALL LIGHTNING enthusiasts and the first BALL LIGHTNING researcher." (not a real quote - it's just to illustrate.). It's also the dorkiest title of a serious sci-fi book I've ever encountered. Beyond that, the story is OK...ish.. How hard would it have been to come up with something like Persistent Anomalous Lightning... So you can refer to it as PAL: "Since the dawn of PAL research, only a scant few have taken the notion of PAL phenomena seriously-- most of whom would have dismissed it as pseudoscience, had they not witnessed a PAL event first-hand." (again made up, to make the point.) NOTE: there is one amazing unforeseen benefit in my life from encountering the goofy term BALL LIGHTNIG! To this day, if my wife is feeling down or upset in any way, all I have to do is sprinkle in a few references to ball lightning and she can't resist laughing herself into a better mood. "what's the matter, beautiful? Oh, no. No no no... Don't tell me it's that damn ball lightning again! Freakin' BALLLL LIGHTNING!" 👍 😎

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21 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Great cover....

It was a dark and stormy night, during which something interesting happened, then nothing interesting happen for a very very very long time. By the time I thought I was going to have no pulse, like the narrative arc, a few interesting things were starting to happen. But, by then I found myself playing the audio at 1.5x speed just to get through the book so I could listen to something else.

The narrator was too singsong for me. He was not dry, but in my opinion did not convey the emotions the book was trying to evoke.

Overall, the book was not bad, but it was not good. It was average and mundane. The only aspect that stood out was the Mainland China centric people and places.

The cover is great.

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21 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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The infinite state of matter.

The characters in this book come from the mind of the author of the book. It stretches your brain to believe and accept science fiction at its best. The geeks of this world and beyond will laugh and cry with the characters and the story that is told.

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12 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Thought provoking, with compelling narration

If you've heard Feodor Chin as Zenyatta in the game Overwatch, it's strangely appropriate to feel like you're being read a book about the moral quandaries of technological innovation by his character in that game (an extremely philosophical robot, for those unfamiliar). He's got a great voice, and I enjoyed his performance of this book as well.

The story is unsettling and sometimes nightmarish, especially when exploring human motivations for scientific discovery, but there's still a hint of optimism. Recommended if you like hard science fiction or just want more from Cixin Liu!

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11 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent read.

Great sci-fi story with insight into modern day China. When I was listening to it I thought it was non-fiction. The story seemed very believable.

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11 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A romantic explanation to BL

This might not be the most accurate scientific explanation to the ball lightning, but it's definitely the most romantic one. A pseudo-presequal to the Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy (starting with The Three Body Problem)

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9 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Just wow.

First, allow me to say how much I have enjoyed this author. I have now completed each book he has published and each time I am left stunned by the author's command over imagery and his ability to blend believable characters with fantastical science. To call the author imaginative is, I feel, an understatement. Liu is a visionary blessed with the ability to depict a believable alternate reality. The concepts he introduces in his books have affected the way I look at my own reality. The performance of the audio book was an excellent contribution to an incredible story. Liu's name will be placed among the greatest sci fi writers in history.

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7 people found this helpful