The Dark Forest

By: Cixin Liu, Joel Martinsen - translator

Narrated by: P. J. Ochlan

The inspiration for the Netflix series 3 Body Problem!

Over 1 million copies of the Three-Body Problem series sold in North America

PRAISE FOR THE THREE-BODY PROBLEM SERIES: “A mind-bending epic.”—The New York Times • “War of the Worlds for the 21st century.”—The Wall Street Journal • “Fascinating.”—TIME • “Extraordinary.”—The New Yorker • “Wildly imaginative.”—Barack Obama • “Provocative.”—Slate • “A breakthrough book.”—George R. R. Martin • “Impossible to put down.”—GQ • “Absolutely mind-unfolding.”—NPR • “You should be reading Liu Cixin.”—The Washington Post

The Dark Forest is the second novel in the groundbreaking, Hugo Award-winning series from China's most beloved science fiction author, Cixin Liu.

In The Dark Forest, Earth is reeling from the revelation of a coming alien invasion-in just four centuries' time. The aliens' human collaborators may have been defeated, but the presence of the sophons, the subatomic particles that allow Trisolaris instant access to all human information, means that Earth's defense plans are totally exposed to the enemy. Only the human mind remains a secret. This is the motivation for the Wallfacer Project, a daring plan that grants four men enormous resources to design secret strategies, hidden through deceit and misdirection from Earth and Trisolaris alike. Three of the Wallfacers are influential statesmen and scientists, but the fourth is a total unknown. Luo Ji, an unambitious Chinese astronomer and sociologist, is baffled by his new status. All he knows is that he's the one Wallfacer that Trisolaris wants dead.

The Three-Body Problem Series
The Three-Body Problem
The Dark Forest
Death's End

Other Books by Cixin Liu
Ball Lightning
Supernova Era
To Hold Up the Sky
The Wandering Earth
A View from the Stars

A Macmillan Audio production from Tor Books

Awesome book with some caveats

First of all: The audiobook is pretty bad for this. I really think he sounds like a text to speech engine. Also does a pretty racist Japanese accent pretty frequently and I’d prefer if he just… didn’t.

Narratively, Liu is pretty misogynistic and it shows throughout the book, namely the first and second portion. It eventually pays off, but it’s hard to get through. Once you get past it, though, it’s a fantastic story and hard to put down.

Like listening to an old Godzilla dub

Story is good. Narrator is boring. The dialogue feels wooden and unnatural. It sounds exactly like dub versions of old Godzilla movies from the 60s and 70s. The English translation of the dialogue sounds very odd to an English speaking listener.

Story is great

The narrator is hard to follow. He doesn't pause during scene changes so it can get confused.

First in the series has a much better narrator

Story is great. But the narrator changes between books… I much preferred Three Body’s performance vs The Dark Forest..

Rough start, but keep going. It's worth it.

Book 2 of the Three Body Problem trilogy took a while to get going for me. Gone are most of the characters from the first book, and in their place is new protagonist Luo Ji for reasons that don't become clear until the end. The first quarter of the book focuses on his selfishness and a particularly creepy obsession of his, and it was tough to get through. Keep going though - once the book makes it past it's first time jump, things pick up and I couldn't stop listening.