Ball Lightning (novel)

Lore & Background

The novel follows Dr Chen, an atmospheric physicist who, after witnessing his parents killed by ball lightning as a teenager, dedicates his life to studying the phenomenon. He joins a military research team alongside PLA Major Lin Yun, who seeks to develop a ball lightning weapon. With theoretical physicist Ding Yi, they discover ball lightning is not lightning but an excited state of a macroscopic fundamental particle called a macro-electron. The team creates a weapon that destroys targeted materials, first tested during a terrorist attack at a nuclear power plant, where the child hostages are killed by the terrorists before the weapon is used.

Reader's Guide

Ball Lightning is significant as a precursor to Liu Cixin's acclaimed Three-Body Problem, sharing characters such as Ding Yi. The novel explores themes of trauma, weapons development, and the ethical consequences of scientific discovery. Critics have called it an important meditation on science and how people confront trauma. The book is regarded as having the most complete story line and being closest to real life in Liu's science fiction universe. A TV series adaptation was filmed in 2022 for the iQIYI platform.

Did You Know?

• The novel was inspired by Liu Cixin's own sighting of ball lightning in 1981 in Handan City.
• Liu Cixin wrote the novel while believing he had liver cancer due to a misdiagnosis.
• Characters Lin Yun and Ding Yi also appear in Liu's Remembrance of Earth's Past series.
• The English translation was published by Tor Books in 2018.