You know when you can recognise that a book is brilliant in its own way, but that way is just not for you? I think that's what's happened here.

I'd been waiting so long to read this book and maybe my expectations were too high, or I wasn't in the right mood. In any case, the book didn't quite gel with me.

I like to understand and visualise most things when I read, and even though the physics concepts discussed were all things I've come across before, I found some of the descriptions too abstract for me to fully grasp what was going on. I got the overall gist, but it meant that I'd find myself reading paragraphs over and over again to make sure I drew out the significance of what Cixin Liu was trying to make me understand. 

Overall, I would definitely recommend this book if you're a fan of science fiction, that is staunchly science fiction, where the foundation is real-life science. There's certainly lots of intrigue and I was compelled to get to the end to figure out what was going on. However, I'm not sure when or if I'll pick up the second one.