Reviews

Trinity Sight by Jennifer Givhan

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kleonard's review against another edition

1.0

Calliope, a professor, is driving when she experiences what she thinks is an earthquake. But she finds almost all of the population in her area missing--empty cars litter the highways, her neighbors are gone, as are her husband and son. Taking charge of the six-year-old girl from next door, she embarks on a long and nonsensical road trip. Along the way she encounters people turned to stone, Coyote the Trickster, and some very angry Zuni gods, who appear to be getting revenge on the atomic bomb testing of the 1940s. Throughout, Calliope protests that she's a scientist and that none of this can be real. She also falls in love with a traveling stranger, apparently giving up on ever finding her husband again. But through magic and fighting, Calliope and her fellow travelers are returned to the world they know. This could have been a good read, but the prose is positively purple throughout and horribly overdone; the plot has holes the characters walk through, the "science" Calliope and others cite is mostly BS and badly presented to boot, and the characters have no depth. A good developmental edit could have made this a fun and interesting book, but it's too messy and wordy by half.

rakoerose's review against another edition

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2.0

Man, I’m really bummed by how much this book wasn’t for me, because I really was fascinated by the premise!

”Children are too smart for anything but the truth, mujer.”
“Yeah, but whose truth?”
“Exactly.”

First and foremost, the piece of this that angered me the most: I absolutely loathe cheating in fiction. Calliope is married and I already hated the implied emotional cheating, and my dislike grew to detestment with their relationship. She only ever remembered Andres when it was convenient it seemed.

Another big part that made this book difficult to read is Calliope herself. That same convenience hypocrisy happened as she is an anthropology professor (aka invested in cultures) and yet absolutely refused to listen to Chance’s explanations for what was going on based on his Zuni heritage. She also didn’t listen to Eunjoo, belittling her worries as nothing but nightmares, when there was clear evidence it was more than that. I don’t know how you can just ignore the evidence in front of you for both counts - it was so anger inducing.

Not to mention that instead of treating Amy with respect and saying “I would like to do this and then we’ll look for your family” she lied by omission and was going to take Amy on a different path to find Calliope’s family instead. I think that’s what made this so difficult. Calliope just had such a fundamental disrespect for everyone around her. It doesn’t make for a very likeable protagonist. Even with her pregnancy as an “excuse,” a lot of it was still unforgivable to me.

It’s so unfortunate because I liked Chance (until cheating occurred) and Eunjoo! Eunjoo is honestly my favorite and I think this book would have been stunning if told just from her wide-eyed, child perspective. Seeing her visions and reactions to learning about other cultures, instead of through the uninterested lens of Calliope. If I were to ever come back to this it’d be primarily for her. With Chance, I don’t like how he seems to fit an overly-attractive, “mystical” Native stereotype. It just didn’t sit well initially, though I do like a lot of other parts of him. His gentle disposition was a good contrast to Calliope’s.

I also really was interested in the Zuni aspects of this! I’ve never read about them before and my excitement was really hampered by all the other negative aspects. I also can’t speak to its accuracy, though this author is not native to that culture, as far as I know.

I don’t know what else to say other than at times I was actively avoiding reading this book. I was just really disappointed by this, but I’m still open to seeing what Givhan will do next.

cc_tay's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

carriedbythecosmos's review against another edition

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5.0

This book was an enthralling read. The first few chapters set up mysteriously. There was no grounding, which worked for the book because it placed us in the same situation as the protagonist. We were thrown into chaos from the first page and wanted nothing more than to figure out what was happening and how to stop it.

Once I had a footing in the setting, I couldn't put it down. The plot was intense; the turns and surprises twisted my expectations for dystopian novels. The language was sensational and, at times, definitely read like poet-turned-novelist (more poets should write novels).

I appreciated the way the worldbuilding happened in this book: subtlely and over time. I take issues with books that gave genre elements when the genre elements have an extensive backstory that begins early on, or we cannot grasp one part of the world before we move into another aspect. This book avoids all of that and masterfully pulls you more and more into a reality that is unlike any you might have expected.

Also, I love seeing moms as protagonists. And I especially loved seeing a mom pregnant with twins as a protagonist. We don't see this often and it feels good to read about other moms in a dystopian world. Like, moms would kick ass in dystopians. Why aren't there more as protagonists in dystopians?

curlymango's review against another edition

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3.5

Quick read with a lot of fun and spooky imagery. I think the clairvoyant child trope gets overused. She was ok in this. The little twists along the way were good. There were some passages that read kind of stiffly for me (mostly the parts where Chance sits down Calliope and says “I’m going to tell you a story to give context for that thing we just saw”). Overall, really cool take on an “apocalypse” as a thing with its own agency, in a way.

megatsunami's review against another edition

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4.0

3.5 stars. I loved the writing (the author is a poet as well) and the book was really original. When we finally got an explanation for the mysterious events, it was unexpected and interesting.

I wanted the characters to feel more human and less like plot devices to provide information, especially Chance and Eunjoo.

agentlesound's review against another edition

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1.0

DNF at 57.6%

This book is interesting and I enjoyed the mythology components, but I could not finish it. I honestly think it was just the author's excessively descriptive writing style that threw me off and made it difficult for me to follow.