"There was no best-seller in the science fiction genre in China," says Yao Haijun, chief editor of Science Fiction World, the largest sci-fi magazine in the world with a monthly circulation of 100,000 copies.

"Liu Cixin was the right sci-fi writer to make science fiction more popular," Yao says, explaining why his magazine published The Three-Body Problem.

Yao recalls that letters from readers flooded into his office, most of which were compliments to Liu Cixin.

The Three-Body Problem was reprinted in Chinese in January 2008.

Yao says the trilogy is the best-selling sci-fi novel in China and the first to be translated into English in the past three decades. He said 400,000 copies had been printed in Chinese as of last year, though he says he did not have data about how many copies have been sold.

He believes that The Three-Body Problem meets Western readers' expectations for a sci-fi novel and presents Chinese solutions to some future problems.

The science fiction genre has represented a literary minority in China, as highly imaginative works were once thought of as nonsense.

Only three decades ago, when Liu was in college, China's science fiction suffered a blow as it was seen as "spiritual pollution" from the West that should be cleaned up.

Liu never imagined that one day his sci-fi novel would reach the West.

Science-fiction writer Han Song believes the trilogy will win Liu the Hugo Award from the World Science Fiction Society. Liu, though hopeful, expects nothing.

"I wish to win, but it's not easy," says Liu.

The trilogy won him a national children's literature prize last September. In China's government-backed literature awards, science fiction is grouped with children's literature.

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