Get Free Shipping on orders over $89
A View from the Stars - Cixin Liu

A View from the Stars

By: Cixin Liu

Paperback | 29 April 2025

At a Glance

Paperback


RRP $22.99

$20.75

10%OFF

or 4 interest-free payments of $5.19 with

In Stock and Ships next day
'We're mysterious aliens in the crowd. We jump like fleas from future to past and back again, and float like clouds of gas between nebulae; in a flash, we can reach the edge of the universe, or tunnel into a quark, or swim within a star-core... We're as unassuming as fireflies, yet our numbers grow like grass in spring. We sci-fi fans are people from the future.' - Cixin Liu, from the essay - 'Sci-Fi Fans'

A View from the Stars features a range of short works from the past three decades of New York Times bestselling author Cixin Liu's prolific career, putting his nonfiction essays and short stories side-by-side for the first time. This collection includes essays and interviews that shed light on Liu's experiences as a reader, writer, and lover of science fiction throughout his life, as well as short fiction that gives glimpses into the evolution of his imaginative voice over the years.

About the Author

Cixin Liu is China's #1 SF writer and author of The Three-Body Problem - the first ever translated novel to win a Hugo Award. Prior to becoming a writer, Liu worked as an engineer in a power plant in Yangquan.
Industry Reviews
A true genius of the genre... leave[s] readers refreshingly excited not just about sf but about humanity's future - Booklist, STARRED REVIEW

His stories are filled with a sense of wonder as they push ideas about the future of humanity to their extremes, and the personal essays offer a rare glimpse into attitudes towards science fiction in China and how the genre has changed. A fascinating collection. - Guardian

Very reminiscent of Golden Age science fiction, and it's great - SF Crowsnest

A vital collection. . . . down-to-earth, but unafraid to ask big questions

- Publishers Weekly

A wonderful insight into the writer and the recent history of the science fiction genre in China... Liu has always been a talented writer but is also a deep thinker... A must read - SF Book Reviews

'If the purpose of speculative fiction is to discover new ideas, or encounter old ones from an unexpected point of view, then A View from the Stars offers a galaxy of rewards to the reader.' - The Wall Street Journal

More in Literary Essays

The Land and its People - David Sedaris

RRP $32.99

$26.99

18%
OFF
We Should All be Feminists - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Backstage : Stories of a writing life - Donna Leon

RRP $26.99

$22.99

15%
OFF
In Praise of Shadows and Other Essays - Junichiro Tanizaki
I Feel Bad About My Neck : And Other Thoughts On Being a Woman - Nora Ephron
The Ruin of Magic : Longing and Belonging in Strange Times - Kate Holden
Light and Thread - Han Kang

RRP $29.99

$24.99

17%
OFF
Discourses and Selected Writings : Penguin Classics - Epictetus
Tayla Made Meals - Tayla Broad

RRP $39.99

$35.99

10%
OFF
Slouching Towards Bethlehem - Joan Didion

RRP $24.99

$21.75

13%
OFF
Meditations : A New Translation - Marcus Aurelius

RRP $45.00

$38.75

14%
OFF
The Prince : Penguin Pocket Hardbacks - Niccolo Machiavelli

RRP $19.99

$12.99

35%
OFF
The Diary of a Young Girl : 70th Anniversary Edition - Anne Frank
No Time to Spare - Ursula K. Le Guin

RRP $22.99

$18.75

18%
OFF
Ethics : Penguin Classics - Benedict De Spinoza

RRP $26.99

$22.99

15%
OFF
A Room of One's Own : Penguin Modern Classics - Virginia Woolf

RRP $22.99

$17.75

23%
OFF
The Rebel : An Essay on Man in Revolt - Albert Camus

RRP $24.99

$21.75

13%
OFF
Crip Stories : An Anthology of Disabled Writers - BS Windon

RRP $34.99

$29.99

14%
OFF
The Histories : Penguin Classics - Herodotus

RRP $26.99

$20.75

23%
OFF
The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat : Picador Collection - Oliver Sacks