Trinity, Trinity, Trinity by Kobayashi, Erika

"Delicately weaves generations of women to the lasting wounds of nuclear destruction and the hubris of war. A unique and unforgettable novel." --Kali Fajardo-Anstine, author of Woman of Light

A literary thriller about the effects of nuclear power on the mind, body, and recorded history of three generations of Japanese women.

Nine years after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant disaster, Japan is preparing for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. An unnamed narrator wakes up in a cold, sterile room, unable to recall her past. Across the country, the elderly begin to hear voices emanating from black stones, compelling them to behave in strange and unpredictable ways. The voices are a symptom of a disease called "Trinity."

As details about the disease come to light, we encounter a thread of linked histories--Prometheus stealing fire from the gods, the discovery of radiation, the nuclear arms race, the subsequent birth of nuclear energy, and the disaster in Fukushima. The thread linking these events begins to unravel in the lead-up to a terrorist attack at the Japan National Olympic Stadium.

A work of speculative fiction reckoning with the consequences of the past and continued effects of nuclear power, Trinity, Trinity, Trinity follows the lives of three generations of women as they grapple with the legacy of mankind's quest for light and power.

Author: Erika Kobayashi
Publisher: Astra House
Published: 06/28/2022
Pages: 240
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 0.75lbs
Size: 8.40h x 5.40w x 1.00d
ISBN: 9781662601156

Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 05/01/2022
Library Journal 07/22/2022 pg. 1
Booklist 07/15/2022

About the Author
Erika Kobayashi is a novelist and visual artist based in Tokyo. Kobayashi creates works that are inspired by things invisible to the eye: time and history, family and memory, and the traces left in places. She was awarded the 44th Japan Sherlock Holmes Club Encouragement Award in 2022 for her novel His Last Bow (Kodansha, ) the 7th Tekken Heterotopia Literary Prize in 2020 for her novel Trinity, Trinity, Trinity (Shūeisha, ) and won the the 2022-2023 Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission Prizes (JUSFC) for the English translation of Japanese literature for Trinity, Trinity, Trinity, translated by Brian Bergstrom. Trinity, Trinity, Trinity is her latest novel and her story collection Sunrise: Radiant Stories, is forthcoming from Astra House in 2023.

TRANSLATOR BIO: Brian Bergstrom is a lecturer and translator who has lived in Chicago, Kyoto, and Yokohama. His writing and translations have appeared in publications including Granta, Aperture, Lit Hub, Mechademia, Japan Forum, positions: asia critique, and The Penguin Book of Japanese Short Stories. He is the editor and principal translator of We, the Children of Cats by Tomoyuki Hoshino (PM Press), which was longlisted for the 2013 Best Translated Book Award. His translation of Trinity, Trinity, Trinity by Erika Kobayashi (Astra House, 2022) won the 2022 Japan-U.S. Friendship Commission (JUSFC) Prize for the Translation of Japanese Literature. He is currently based in Montréal, Canada.