Customer Reviews

Triads

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I hate spoiler reviews which divulge the entirety of the book in question, so expect none of that here. Let me simply say that Triads is a gorgeously written, haunting, and moving story. Told in three parts, Triads is a collaboration between Christa Faust and Poppy Z. Brite, originally conceived as a novella for the anthology Revelations. In fact, the first part of the story, taking place in 1930's China, is the original novella. Parts 2 (set in 1940's Hollywood) and 3 (set in the present day) expand upon the story, continuing the themes of ill-fated love and the miseries of living as an outsider in a world intolerant of difference. Of course, the small-minded, racist, insecure, and those suffering severe religious mania will find nothing to enjoy in a story which so sensitively and beautifully handles the subjects of love, compassion, and the fragility of human life. Though this is no soft-focus historical drama, for all the lush detail and bittersweet romance, this is also a tale of gruesome murder, passionate sex, and contact with the supernatural. Fans of Poppy Z. Brite will find much to enjoy, and hopefully Christa Faust will find new fans in those who accept the challenges of this stunning work.

"Triads" is written by Poppy Z. Brite and Christa Faust, who have expanded an earlier story into a beautiful, gripping, three-part novel. Brite is one of my favorite authors, and "Triads" makes me want to read more of Faust's work as well. The book contains an exquisitely written trio of stories, all of which are connected by characters and circumstance. It's violent, erotic, romantic, and fascinating to read. "Triads" also deals with the issues of homophobia, transvestism, and bigotry as they change over time.

The first story takes place in Hong Kong in 1937, where Ji Fung and Lin Bai perform in the Peking Opera. They fall in love, but first must escape the predatory advances of Master Lau. They meet a mysterious man named Perique and Ji Fung discovers that he has a very powerful family.

Hollywood, 1945: Nan Blake is a lesbian detective story writer who falls for a young starlet, who believes that Nan is actually a man. Ji Fung has changed his name to Jimmy and is now working as an actor. He falls in love with a troubled crossdresser named Victor, who reminds him of his tragic love for Lin Bai. The situation spins out of control and ends with violence.

In present day Los Angelos, Jake Ryan is an up and coming action star who represses his homosexuality. He meets Miki, a makeup artist who is also a drag queen. Jake is forced to choose whether he wants love or a movie career, and is haunted by the apparition of a mysterious Chinese man. Things come full circle, and several characters reappear.

"Triads" is a wonderfully written book. It really is a treat to read, filled with compelling characters and evocative writing. Don't miss out on this amazing book by two amazing authors.

I was skeptic coming into this book because Poppy is wonderful as she is on her own. Upon recieving this work i noted that the cover art looks alot better when actually seen then it does on the internet. the detailing alone is imaculate. then i started reading the stories. it was the first time in a long time that something was written so beautifully and heavy that it did actually make me cry at the end of each threeparts, all though the 3rd time was not in dismay. Would highly Recomend

This book is a gem, it should be required reading for the moral majority if for no other reason than to gain insight and understanding of the gay community while still enjoying a brilliant, compelling story. I did not rush thru this book as I have with so many ... Thanks to the imagination of these gifted authors I escaped to a place I have never visited. Love is just the greatest gift, thanks Poppy Z Brite and Christa Faust

Triads is a collaborative effort by Poppy Z. Brite, one of my favorite writers, and Christa Faust that's made up of three interrelated stories. In 1937, two young boys are slaves to the Peking Opera until they fall in love and escape together to Shanghai where they find themselves in the middle of a war with Japan. In 1945, a Hollywood writer named Nan Blake finds herself drawn to the beautiful actress starring in her latest film, and the feelings seem mutual, except the starlet still thinks Blake is a man. In the present day, an up-and-coming action movie star needs to decide if it's worth hiding his true feelings for his male make-up artist in order to save his career. All three stories are tied together by similar themes and the presence of Ji Fung, who alternates between being a main character, a secondary character, and a mysterious figure lurking in the background.

In Triads, the characters exist in a variety of times and places, and Brite and Faust do a flawless job at creating a strong sense of both. Whether they are setting the scene with a lush paragraph describing the streets of Shanghai, or just slipping in additional details about time-and-place-appropriate styles and objects, you never forget exactly where the characters are. I feel like each story wouldn't have ended quite the same if not for the influence of the specific time period and setting, and that's just how these kind of stories should be written. The stories themselves are very compelling, if a bit contrived in some places. The first story is the most original and exciting, but the other two stories aren't as predictable as the might seem.

Unfortunately, the characters don't stand out quite as well as they should have against such elaborate plots and backgrounds. The main characters are three-dimensional enough, at least to the point that I was able to sympathize with and relate to them, but the secondary characters are mostly based off of stereotypes that are overused even within the confines of this book. I mean, there are so many times that an actor/director turns out to be corrupt or abusive that I was beginning to feel bad for all the decent people in Hollywood that are left out of this story in favor of a plot device that gets tired after the first few uses. And that's just one example of all the clichés in this book.

Still, I enjoyed Triads enough to not regret buying it. If you read the first paragraph of this review and thought the stories sounded really interesting, or if you're on a quest for something new and different to read, then this is a good book to choose. It even has two bonus stories at the end that teach you more about the characters' dark pasts. But to anyone else, if the basic plot doesn't grab your attention, then you should probably pass it up for something better.

Poppy Z. Brite and Christa Faust, Triads (Subterranean Press, 2004)

Brite and Faust present three tales revolving around Ji Fung, later known as Jimmy Lee, a Hong Kong orphan with a troubled past. In the first, his mother has taken him to the Peking Opera and abandoned him to the predations of Master Lau, who creates the finest opera in Asia, but at a terrible price to his charges. Ji Fung and his best friend, Li Bai, find there is more to their feelings than friendship, but in order to express their love, they need to escape Master Lau's perversions. Taken in by a half-French decadent, Ji Fung and Lin Bai find, after getting away from the troupe, that life on the outside can be even more complicated. The second and third stories feature Jimmy/Ji Fung in a less central capacity, but he's still there. The protagonist of the second is Nan Blake, a dime-novel writer with the nom de plume Blake Blackline who finds herself embroiled in a web of corruption and murder. In the third, Jimmy is dying in the hospital, Blake is long-retired, and a rising, but closeted, gay action star has taken a room in Blake's house. When he meets the man of his dreams, will he sacrifice the relationship for his career or vice-versa?

Brite has always been very good at drawing characters, and has improved over the years as she's made the transition from genre horror to human drama; Faust adds the perfect touch of dime-novel noir atmosphere, and the result is a good little book. I'm not quite as fond of it as I am of the works of the two authors on their own, but it's certainly worth your time. ***

Poppy Z. Brite and Christa Faust are amazingly talented writers, and the tapestry they weave from three distinct yet interrelated stories in this short novel is impressive. This is not to say I enjoyed every minute of the reading experience, however. In the hands of lesser writers, Triads would be nothing more than a shocking tale of sexual perversions that few readers would feel comfortable wading through. I certainly felt uncomfortable the whole time I was reading it, but I can't deny the power of the story.

Given the authors, you probably anticipate the existence of homosexuality in Triads, and you would be right in doing so. That barely begins to scratch the surface, however. This book has more homosexual encounters than should even fit in less than 200 pages: you've got men loving men, men loving boys, boys loving boys, women loving women and one woman loving another woman in the guise of a man. There are cross-dressers galore, including children. You can rarely go three pages without coming up on another secret tryst between anything under the sun. If this kind of explicit subject matter bothers you the least little bit, the odds are pretty good that you will toss Triads away in disgust very early on.

Those who do read the short novel (even those who -- like me -- were quite uncomfortable the whole way through) will find themselves looking back on a tale that emerges with a beauty all its own and a capability to move the reader on several occasions. This book actually started out as a short story published in Douglas E. Winter's anthology Revelations, and that original story is easily the most gripping and poignant link in Triads' three-link chain. An additional two stories, tied to the first one, were added to produce this short novel.

The saga begins in Hong Kong in the year 1937. A boy named Ji Fung is sold to an opera house by his mother, splintering the boy from his well-to-do father. Master Lau is a cruel teacher who succeeds in training all of his boys to perform, and perhaps no lad is more mistreated than Lin Bai. Lin Bai always plays the lead female role in the operas, and Ji Fung comes to love his only friend in a special way. Lin Bai finally puts a stop to his master's abuse, and the two lads escape the opera house. They are soon taken in by a wealthy man who enjoys watching the lads "perform," and both boys start dressing in women's clothes to avoid detection by the police. Ji Fung almost miraculously finds his way to his long-lost uncle, who tells him the true horrors that came about on the night Ji Fung disappeared and sends his nephew on a special, Triad-related (criminal) mission to Shanghai. Ji Fung and his two friends make the trip, only to find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time as the Sino-Japanese War heats up -- big-time. As bad as Ji Fung's life was up until this point, much deeper tragedy sinks its claws into his soul now.

The novel then jumps ahead to 1945 Hollywood, where Ji Fung has come to seek a career in the movies. Here we meet novelist and scriptwriter Nan Blake, whose professional name and public persona is that of Blake Blackline, a man. She falls head over heels with a seemingly innocent young starlet, from whom she goes to great lengths to hide her true female identity. Ji Fung, now known as Jimmy, sees shades of Lin Bai in a burlesque singer but eventually finds nothing but the same old tragedy. All of these characters come together in a miasma of gory murder, exacerbating the tragedy of Ji Fung. Then we skip ahead to the present day to meet Jake Ryan, an actor on the brink of success who is tormented by his private homosexual feelings. The story takes something of a spiritual or otherworldly turn at this juncture, as a mysterious Chinaman seems to haunt Ryan's vision as he tries to decide between a life of happiness with a man he truly loves or a career that could be ruined by public knowledge of his homosexuality.

While the three stories differ dramatically in terms of setting (both time and place), characters and situations, they come together to tell the life story of Ji Fung. It is a tragic tale of mistreatment, confusing gender and sexuality, pain, suffering, death and -- just perhaps -- love and release in the end. It seems to me all of this could have been achieved without tossing sexual perversions on every other page, but when you step back and look at Triads in an objective way, you see a well-crafted tale that succeeds admirably in communicating the themes the authors wanted to convey.