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A review by evanaviary
The Trio by Johanna Hedman
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
August said it was Stockholm's fault that we all thought there was only one way to live; the city squashed anyone who didn't embrace that life, whether because they couldn't or because they didn't want to. I wasn't sure I agreed, but there was many a time that I had left Lydia and Julian's with the sense that other modes of life had been kept from me.
The Trio, Hedman's miraculous first novel, is the strongest case I've ever seen that vibes alone can carry a novel. This novel had no plot and largely unlikable characters, but instead curates a strong aesthetic of twentysomethings drinking coffee and going to museums and talking about literature and going to Paris. I think this is a matter of "the girls that get it get it, and the girls that don't don't." I loved this book. It also drove me up a wall.
The Trio follows three college students in their early twenties: the financially well-off Thora whose family is implicated in the Stiller conglomerate (a plot point which is poorly described and serves as a through-line to varying degrees of success) – Thora is described as a cold and severe person, someone who operates with a standoffish demeanor. Then there's August, a painter considering a day job in marketing – he's stuck between the capitalist ideals of financially "making it" and a sense of creative stewardship to live an authentic life as a painter, not to work in an office. Enter Hugo, a classmate at one of the university's literature classes and a boarder at Thora's parents' house. He sees Thora and August from afar, learning that they used to date, and slowly matriculating into their life as they travel to Paris and London and Berlin, their friendship crossing over boundaries from platonic to a love triangle. Early on, August comments: "The cynic, the realist and the romantic... This will never end well!"
The book's cover asserts that The Trio is about the path not taken and the people we might have become, but it might be more fitting to say that Hedman finally decided to write about a Challengers style friendship/romance about three people who might not even like each other very much. Thora and August previously dated, which leads to Hugo's distrust over whether there's any spark left; Hugo spends most of the novel trying to break through Thora's icy veneer, ultimately becoming intimate, though it remains unclear who is taking advantage of who in the situation; and Hugo and August form something of a friendship independent from Thora, though it's clear that August's loyalties lie closer with Thora than they do with Hugo. If this all sounds messy, that's because it totally is. These three have completely different personalities and communication styles, and maybe there's no world in which they could ever be good for one another. The amount of times I had to read "Why is this so hard?" or "What do you want me to say?" — like... literally anything would do, just talk to each other!! I began thinking of the Dakota Johnson interview on Ellen, the one where she says: "I didn't even know you wanted to be invited... I didn't even know you liked me." That's the story: three people who bonded together over discussions of literature and the political state of Sweden, but who ultimately had no idea how to talk to each other.
Make no mistake: Hedman's writing is beautiful. It allows itself to be insightful while also being meandering. It revels in the slow moments of a friendship. She writes each geographical stage of their friendship (in Stockholm, in Paris, in London, in Berlin, in New York) with detail and precision, allowing these three characters to exist in their wildly imperfect twenties. However, Hedman never changes gears – the vast majority of the novel in spent in these characters' heads as they think about and experience (and sometimes talk) about love and location, about the people they're becoming, about the people they wish they could become. This is a character study through and through. While there is a little tension towards the end, it's not enough to feel like the story is ever changing pace.
I think that there are several missteps at play here. Most striking is the fact that Hedman wrote a book called The Trio and only had two points of view. Johanna Hedman, please write more books, but also please write an August spinoff. For the good of the world, I beg you. I was also thrown by the sheer number of characters in this book, most of which held very little weight. (Consider August's dad who showed up for two scenes but never seemed to have a direct role in the story.) Many of these characters probably could've been written out or left unnamed so I didn't have to try to remember who Lydia was. Also, the Stiller conglomerate is glossed over way too quickly considering how often it's brought up. I still have no idea what it is. But what I'm left with the most is the realization that these characters face SUCH a small evolution. I wanted to see some transformation in Thora's character, but she feels just as closed-off every time we see her, reticent to be communicative with Hugo. She seems to end up in much the same position that she started out at, and there there surfaces a question of how much this friendship truly meant to any of them, or if they were all just young and lonely and using other people.
While I do have criticisms of this book, I absolutely adored it. The settings are perfect, the conversations are deep without being heavy, there's a dark academia-adjacent quality to the discussions of art and literature. And, yes, I could've used stronger narrative direction. I would've liked for there to have been some culminating event or realization that framed (or reframed) these relationships—platonic and sexual and blurring the divisions—but at the end, Hedman presents us with the story of three people who mattered to one another for a short period of time. Whether they truly loved one another, whether they truly saw a future within one another, or if it was just a friendship of convenience, the product of being young and in desperate, desperate search of connection... that's what Hedman leaves to the reader.
===
I'm just going to drop these quotes I bookmarked with no context and go:
Hugo said that [...] cynicism was the only reasonable way to relate to the world.
'All man-boys are cynics, unless they happen to be neoliberals,' I said. 'It's banal.'
'Ah, you were inspired then?" August said.
I shoved him. 'We can't all be detached artists.'
'The cynic, the realist and the romantic,' August said. 'This will never end well!'"
'It feels like I have to enact violence upon myself to love him in a way he's comfortable with,' I finally said. 'And I can't. I care too much about myself to do that.'
[...]
'Do you think that makes me a bad person?' I asked.
'No,' he said. 'Of course not.'
'But am I a severe person? Cold?'
He got up and stood in front of me. Softly, he placed his hands on my face, as if he was handling a fragile object.
I had a vague sense that everyone around me knew how things were done, how to navigate their lives and in what order, whereas I felt shut out from this knowledge. […] When [Olivia] talked about wanting to do work that made the world a better place, I found myself unable to explain the fatigue I felt without coming up against the idea that I was a bad person who doubted other people’s ambitions and intentions.
If I'd been a different type of person I would have stayed. I pictured another life, a Stockholm life with the water and the changing of the seasons as the backdrop, a life where I was a person who didn't recoil before everything that was bigger and stronger than me.
Imagining her new home was like cutting a vein to let out a stream of rejected possibilities. I could picture us – Thora, August and me – siting around a small kitchen table with wooden chairs, and though the scene made me ache, the sensation was strangely pleasant; it negated my other feelings.
The Trio, Hedman's miraculous first novel, is the strongest case I've ever seen that vibes alone can carry a novel. This novel had no plot and largely unlikable characters, but instead curates a strong aesthetic of twentysomethings drinking coffee and going to museums and talking about literature and going to Paris. I think this is a matter of "the girls that get it get it, and the girls that don't don't." I loved this book. It also drove me up a wall.
The Trio follows three college students in their early twenties: the financially well-off Thora whose family is implicated in the Stiller conglomerate (a plot point which is poorly described and serves as a through-line to varying degrees of success) – Thora is described as a cold and severe person, someone who operates with a standoffish demeanor. Then there's August, a painter considering a day job in marketing – he's stuck between the capitalist ideals of financially "making it" and a sense of creative stewardship to live an authentic life as a painter, not to work in an office. Enter Hugo, a classmate at one of the university's literature classes and a boarder at Thora's parents' house. He sees Thora and August from afar, learning that they used to date, and slowly matriculating into their life as they travel to Paris and London and Berlin, their friendship crossing over boundaries from platonic to a love triangle. Early on, August comments: "The cynic, the realist and the romantic... This will never end well!"
The book's cover asserts that The Trio is about the path not taken and the people we might have become, but it might be more fitting to say that Hedman finally decided to write about a Challengers style friendship/romance about three people who might not even like each other very much. Thora and August previously dated, which leads to Hugo's distrust over whether there's any spark left; Hugo spends most of the novel trying to break through Thora's icy veneer, ultimately becoming intimate, though it remains unclear who is taking advantage of who in the situation; and Hugo and August form something of a friendship independent from Thora, though it's clear that August's loyalties lie closer with Thora than they do with Hugo. If this all sounds messy, that's because it totally is. These three have completely different personalities and communication styles, and maybe there's no world in which they could ever be good for one another. The amount of times I had to read "Why is this so hard?" or "What do you want me to say?" — like... literally anything would do, just talk to each other!! I began thinking of the Dakota Johnson interview on Ellen, the one where she says: "I didn't even know you wanted to be invited... I didn't even know you liked me." That's the story: three people who bonded together over discussions of literature and the political state of Sweden, but who ultimately had no idea how to talk to each other.
Make no mistake: Hedman's writing is beautiful. It allows itself to be insightful while also being meandering. It revels in the slow moments of a friendship. She writes each geographical stage of their friendship (in Stockholm, in Paris, in London, in Berlin, in New York) with detail and precision, allowing these three characters to exist in their wildly imperfect twenties. However, Hedman never changes gears – the vast majority of the novel in spent in these characters' heads as they think about and experience (and sometimes talk) about love and location, about the people they're becoming, about the people they wish they could become. This is a character study through and through. While there is a little tension towards the end, it's not enough to feel like the story is ever changing pace.
I think that there are several missteps at play here. Most striking is the fact that Hedman wrote a book called The Trio and only had two points of view. Johanna Hedman, please write more books, but also please write an August spinoff. For the good of the world, I beg you. I was also thrown by the sheer number of characters in this book, most of which held very little weight. (Consider August's dad who showed up for two scenes but never seemed to have a direct role in the story.) Many of these characters probably could've been written out or left unnamed so I didn't have to try to remember who Lydia was. Also, the Stiller conglomerate is glossed over way too quickly considering how often it's brought up. I still have no idea what it is. But what I'm left with the most is the realization that these characters face SUCH a small evolution. I wanted to see some transformation in Thora's character, but she feels just as closed-off every time we see her, reticent to be communicative with Hugo. She seems to end up in much the same position that she started out at, and there there surfaces a question of how much this friendship truly meant to any of them, or if they were all just young and lonely and using other people.
While I do have criticisms of this book, I absolutely adored it. The settings are perfect, the conversations are deep without being heavy, there's a dark academia-adjacent quality to the discussions of art and literature. And, yes, I could've used stronger narrative direction. I would've liked for there to have been some culminating event or realization that framed (or reframed) these relationships—platonic and sexual and blurring the divisions—but at the end, Hedman presents us with the story of three people who mattered to one another for a short period of time. Whether they truly loved one another, whether they truly saw a future within one another, or if it was just a friendship of convenience, the product of being young and in desperate, desperate search of connection... that's what Hedman leaves to the reader.
===
I'm just going to drop these quotes I bookmarked with no context and go:
Hugo said that [...] cynicism was the only reasonable way to relate to the world.
'All man-boys are cynics, unless they happen to be neoliberals,' I said. 'It's banal.'
'Ah, you were inspired then?" August said.
I shoved him. 'We can't all be detached artists.'
'The cynic, the realist and the romantic,' August said. 'This will never end well!'"
'It feels like I have to enact violence upon myself to love him in a way he's comfortable with,' I finally said. 'And I can't. I care too much about myself to do that.'
[...]
'Do you think that makes me a bad person?' I asked.
'No,' he said. 'Of course not.'
'But am I a severe person? Cold?'
He got up and stood in front of me. Softly, he placed his hands on my face, as if he was handling a fragile object.
I had a vague sense that everyone around me knew how things were done, how to navigate their lives and in what order, whereas I felt shut out from this knowledge. […] When [Olivia] talked about wanting to do work that made the world a better place, I found myself unable to explain the fatigue I felt without coming up against the idea that I was a bad person who doubted other people’s ambitions and intentions.
If I'd been a different type of person I would have stayed. I pictured another life, a Stockholm life with the water and the changing of the seasons as the backdrop, a life where I was a person who didn't recoil before everything that was bigger and stronger than me.
Imagining her new home was like cutting a vein to let out a stream of rejected possibilities. I could picture us – Thora, August and me – siting around a small kitchen table with wooden chairs, and though the scene made me ache, the sensation was strangely pleasant; it negated my other feelings.