Supernova Era

A Novel by Cixin Liu, translated by Joel Martinsen

© 2019 Tor Books

Reviewed by Peter Jekel

When you first pick up Cixin Liu’s Supernova Era, you notice the praise reviewers heap upon his work. Perhaps the most prominent endorsement comes from former president of the United States Barack Obama. “Wildly imaginative, really interesting… The scope of it was immense.” The quote grabs your attention, but in smaller type you see that the comment is for another of Liu’s books, The Three-Body Problem, which first became available to English readers in 2014 and was originally published in Chinese in 2007.

The Three-Body Problem (part of a trilogy called Remembrance of Earth’s Past) put Liu on the radar of hard science fiction enthusiasts, receiving nominations for both Hugo and Nebula awards for best science fiction novel. It won the Hugo in 2015, the first Asian novel ever to do so.  Wanting to tap into this success, publishers sought more translations of Liu’s novels and found Supernova Era. The book was written shortly after the infamous 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, when the Chinese army violently broke up a freedom protest in the Beijing square. It wasn’t published in China until 2002 and was published in English in 2019. Nineteen eighty-nine was a pivotal time of change for China and provided the inspiration for the writer, as the book describes a sense of disaster, rapid social changes and heartbreak, all outcomes of the Massacre.

Whereas Liu’s The Three-Body Problem primarily focused on humanity’s relationship with an alien civilization, Supernova Era, despite its title, is actually about speculative sociology—a bit of a letdown for hard science fiction enthusiasts. Supernova Era begins with a lengthy but entertaining discussion of a nearby star, from its birth to its eventual collapse upon itself, which sends a blast of lethal radiation toward Earth. The radiation is lethal only to those over the age of thirteen within a year of exposure; younger DNA is able to repair itself. The adults make a desperate attempt to train the children who will inherit the Earth in their various vocations. Although the explanation of a star’s evolution to eventual supernova is well-written and, to a hard science fiction enthusiast, accurate, this chapter demonstrates one of the flaws in the tale. If there were a nearby supernova in our universe, the results would be devastating, but children would be the ones most affected, not the other way around. However, as with much speculative fiction, it is easy to suspend belief, especially in the hands of a capable writer.

Liu tends to focus his works on a few characters, which makes reading the imaginative tales a pleasant and inspiring ride. In The Three-Body Problem, a few characters make the big decisions that affect the relationship of humanity with an alien civilization. In Supernova Era, three children become the leaders who must find a way to save humanity. Sounds a little like William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, where a few children stranded on an uninhabited island jostle for a place within the power hierarchy.

However, this tale is not about who comes out on top but rather about how a small group of children cope with the nonsensical demands of peers free of adult supervision. One fanciful demand is for the creation of a Candyland covering hundreds of square miles. And then the children decide it’s more fun to play than to do the work required to maintain the infrastructure of society.  Unfortunately, unlimited wish fulfillment becomes stale in time, and so the leaders are confronted with how to deal with despair as society disintegrates.

Supernova Era is one of Liu’s earliest writings, and it shows. The writing is somewhat clunky, with scenes appearing to be tales unto themselves, like a series of short stories, As a result there is little room for character development. There’s also more talk than action, surprising considering the scope of the disaster that has befallen the Earth.

The story is not without its strengths. The children’s grief when the last adults pass away is portrayed realistically, and Liu ably describes the struggle for dominance, no different than kids in a schoolyard—a nod to Lord of the Flies. There is an actual nuclear war in the novel, one waged by children, a little far-fetched on the believability scale. However, speculative fiction is all about suspension of disbelief.

Probably owing to its episodic approach, Supernova Era is a marvel of juxtaposition. Liu contrasts the way Chinese society handles the crisis with the same scenario in the United States.

Despite some stretched believability, Supernova Era is a good science fiction tale. Under the guise of speculative fiction, it creates a world that has undergone an enormous change, not unlike 1989 China, and in the process, provides an entertaining analysis of modern society, including governments, economics, education, communities and the role of the family. It is well worth the read, especially in terms of the evolution of the writer from this early start to The Three-Body Problem, the all-star novel that launched him onto the world stage.