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hmcdade's review against another edition
5.0
Kwame Mbalia has created your next favorite hero with Tristan Strong! The folktales are alive again and I can’t wait for this series to continue retelling them. I loved all these tales growing up and reading Kwame’s version blew me away. Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky is absolutely going into our school’s library collection in October.
mariahistryingtoread's review against another edition
2.0
This book was making the rounds a couple weeks ago as part of a few 'books by black authors' rec lists. From the synopsis it seemed a little messy in terms of direction so I wasn't particularly interested. But, I needed an audiobook for work and this was available so I thought why not give it a try?
First off, I did like this book. The whole idea was super creative. I was immediately invested in the alternate world of Alke and as a black woman who is only vaguely aware of some of these folk stories I loved revisiting or learning about new tales through Tristan's eyes. The authors reverence for these stories was readily apparent on every page.
That being said I was, unfortunately, correct when I thought it would be messy.
There initially was a lot of back and forth with Tristan's character that made him feel very inconsistent. He would constantly make a decision only to, a few pages later, need to be convinced to do it because he's suddenly changed his mind. Rinse, repeat. I understand that indecisiveness was one of his character flaws to overcome, however, I feel like this hurt the overall narrative because of how repetitive it was. It was frustrating enough dealing with Tristan's refusal to help when he caused this whole situation in the first place. Retreading the same argument for/against aiding the war efforts in Tristan's head half a dozen times made it even worse. Thankfully, this only applies to like 9 or 10 chapters. Unfortunately, at that point not only was the damage already done but now there were other issues to contend with.
The inconsistency would have bothered me a lot less if the pacing were better. The book sets the stage really well at the beginning, kicking off the story rather quickly. Then it slows down once Tristan reaches Alke and the momentum is killed. Several chapters are just Tristan waffling, people reiterating the same information and nothing progressing. I feel like at most all that was needed was two chapters then the next phase of the book should have began. Instead it takes eight. I started slipping into passive interest over active investment. If they had started out on their journey immediately with Tristan being conflicted along the way I feel that would have been a better way of showcasing Tristan's internal struggle over whether he wanted to be involved or not. As it stands Tristan loses a lot of his charm due to how much time is spent dawdling.
It picks up somewhat after that, but it never quite reaches the high of that first quarter or so of the book.
Most of my dissatisfaction stems from how mishandled the emotional aspects - primarily in relation to Eddie - were.
The characters aren't super developed with Tristan being a slight exception. Despite my criticism, I did like Tristan. I just found him to be weak overall. My chief complaint being his lack of an arc. The strongest parts of his character are left in the first act. His self esteem issues, grief over losing his best friend, survivor's guilt, and irrational anger all drop off rapidly as the meat of the story starts up.
For example, on page 208 Tristan reminisces about Eddie and the memory sours because he still can barely think about Eddie without feeling his loss. I thought that his avoidance of even the good things because Eddie's death clouds even that was great. But, by page 300 (which is when I realised this) nothing related to this has happened at all. And it wasn't until 34 pages after that that Eddie finally came up again in the text.
Tristan's emotional instability due to Eddie's passing doesn't reflect at all on his actions going forward on their mission. His character growth has stagnated entirely. I don't need him to mention or think of Eddie constantly because part of his arc is learning to accept Eddie's death. That part makes some sense. But, my problem is that his choices do not reflect his emotional turmoil. He's not more rash, or more cautious, or more easily overwhelmed. There's a huge disconnect between these two elements.
Losing someone important to you especially at an age where you may not yet have the proper coping skills for it typically has some kind of impact on your psyche going forward. Now obviously I can't speak for everyone and everyone does grieve differently, but I expect a book that goes out if its way to establish its main character is a mess due to his grief very early on to actually have some follow through.
At first it seems as if Tristan is bottling his emotions up as evidenced by his short fuse when arriving in Alke. It appeared he was going to have random outbursts as a result of burying his feelings. It quickly became apparent that this was not the case as Tristan totally shrugs off almost all his negative behaviors in regards to Eddie's death after he begins his quest.
This creates a huge lack of depth to him so there's no foundation on which to build relationships with the people he encounters. Ayanna, Chestnutt, and Gum Baby are supposed to be his friends on the journey. But, they could have been literally anybody. Each had a gimmick but no substance. Chestnutt is the know it all who has recently lost her father figure yet she moves on like it's nothing. Ayanna is the girl who will most likely become the love interest (because again, she's the girl) who has no backstory at all. Gum Baby is a mascot character that vacillitates wildly from comic relief to a legitimate part of the squad. A whole other character gets added in like the last third and I literally cannot figure out why since you can probably count on one hand the amount of lines she had. And let me remind you this book is over 400 pages so there was plenty of time to flesh any of these people out.
Not enough happens to bond these characters together. They are essentially strangers on the trek from beginning to end. I don't know anything by the end of the book about any of them that I didn't already know when they were first introduced. The author tries to tell me these people are friends without showing me.
How could they possibly be friends when Tristan never once asks any of them anything about themselves? How are they friends when none of thembothers to ask him either? Shared experiences and anecdotes are the bare bones of a relationship. This book has neither. Sure, they go through hardships but the conflicts are often over so fast there's no time to endear each other to one another or the reader. I didn't care that much when things would happen because I was never sold on the characters before the major crises. The writing style also isn't particularly good when it comes to the action sequences so I didn't feel any tension. I wasn't bored but it was a pretty flat adventure. No puzzles, or riddles or clever reasoning to get out of situations.
Whenever there was the mere suggestion of an obstacle it almost immediately was solved especially in regards to the ending. I didn't feel like the ending was a culmination of all that Tristan learned over the course of the book. He quite frankly pulled the solution out of nowhere.
Ultimately a lot of this book felt foundational. The ideas were certainly strong yet it felt under developed in a lot of ways. Looking back the whole story was so simple I struggle to see why the book was so long seeing as there were so few events. This easily could have been streamlined to half its length. While that wouldn't make the characters stronger it would've at least tightened up the plot which felt very lackadaisical despite its purported 'high stakes'. The book also ends without properly resolving most of its themes.
The Eddie plot is central to Tristan's hangups and it does reach somewhat of a conclusion. As I said before a huge chunk of the book doesn't feature Eddie at all, so I was unsatisfied. I feel like it tied up all the emotions Tristan was feeling too quickly. It's barely touched on the entire book then at the very end Tristan just learns the lesson his therapist already told him at the beginning because someone else also gave him the same advice? I know people will begin to heal at different paces, but I felt like this book started out so realistic in how it was handling the situation only to abandon it when it got more difficult to maintain.
Related to that I also felt the whole Tristan being the Anansesem thing had so much potential to add to his character development that was wasted. It's established Eddie was the storyteller and Tristan did the art at the beginning. Yet that gets totally thrown away as Tristan becomes the Anansesem. Why wasn't Tristan upset because that was supposed to be Eddie's role? Why didn't he feel inadequate in comparison to Eddie? Why didn't he struggle to use his powers due to the misplaced guilt or lack of confidence? Why wasn't it a major part of his arc accepting his role as Anansesem in memory of Eddie? Instead he immediately takes to the position never stumbling once. He never thinks about how Eddie would have loved it. He never wishes Eddie was there to help him since Eddie was the one who was so invested in the stories (Tristan was too but it was clearly more of Eddie's special thing). He doesn't think about Eddie at all. And as someone who lost one of my closest friends last year, even taking into consideration how one of the themes was about Tristan avoiding the pain, it didn't feel true to me. I miss my friend all the time. I didn't get the sense by the end that Tristan missed his friend which honestly stung a bit because I was reading this in part for that extra connection.
I do not think this is a bad book by any means. It's a super intriguing, original concept that I did enjoy. I think that it's great that young Black kids will have a book that so zealously revels in our stories and history. I think it's so important that these stories are passed onto the next generations. I commend Kwame Mbalia for choosing to write this because it truly is a big deal that this kind of middle grade book was published. I just personally thought it could have done so much more.
I plan on reading the sequel (I've already got the book from the library) and I'm crossing my fingers that it blows my socks off.
First off, I did like this book. The whole idea was super creative. I was immediately invested in the alternate world of Alke and as a black woman who is only vaguely aware of some of these folk stories I loved revisiting or learning about new tales through Tristan's eyes. The authors reverence for these stories was readily apparent on every page.
That being said I was, unfortunately, correct when I thought it would be messy.
There initially was a lot of back and forth with Tristan's character that made him feel very inconsistent. He would constantly make a decision only to, a few pages later, need to be convinced to do it because he's suddenly changed his mind. Rinse, repeat. I understand that indecisiveness was one of his character flaws to overcome, however, I feel like this hurt the overall narrative because of how repetitive it was. It was frustrating enough dealing with Tristan's refusal to help when he caused this whole situation in the first place. Retreading the same argument for/against aiding the war efforts in Tristan's head half a dozen times made it even worse. Thankfully, this only applies to like 9 or 10 chapters. Unfortunately, at that point not only was the damage already done but now there were other issues to contend with.
The inconsistency would have bothered me a lot less if the pacing were better. The book sets the stage really well at the beginning, kicking off the story rather quickly. Then it slows down once Tristan reaches Alke and the momentum is killed. Several chapters are just Tristan waffling, people reiterating the same information and nothing progressing. I feel like at most all that was needed was two chapters then the next phase of the book should have began. Instead it takes eight. I started slipping into passive interest over active investment. If they had started out on their journey immediately with Tristan being conflicted along the way I feel that would have been a better way of showcasing Tristan's internal struggle over whether he wanted to be involved or not. As it stands Tristan loses a lot of his charm due to how much time is spent dawdling.
It picks up somewhat after that, but it never quite reaches the high of that first quarter or so of the book.
Most of my dissatisfaction stems from how mishandled the emotional aspects - primarily in relation to Eddie - were.
The characters aren't super developed with Tristan being a slight exception. Despite my criticism, I did like Tristan. I just found him to be weak overall. My chief complaint being his lack of an arc. The strongest parts of his character are left in the first act. His self esteem issues, grief over losing his best friend, survivor's guilt, and irrational anger all drop off rapidly as the meat of the story starts up.
For example, on page 208 Tristan reminisces about Eddie and the memory sours because he still can barely think about Eddie without feeling his loss. I thought that his avoidance of even the good things because Eddie's death clouds even that was great. But, by page 300 (which is when I realised this) nothing related to this has happened at all. And it wasn't until 34 pages after that that Eddie finally came up again in the text.
Tristan's emotional instability due to Eddie's passing doesn't reflect at all on his actions going forward on their mission. His character growth has stagnated entirely. I don't need him to mention or think of Eddie constantly because part of his arc is learning to accept Eddie's death. That part makes some sense. But, my problem is that his choices do not reflect his emotional turmoil. He's not more rash, or more cautious, or more easily overwhelmed. There's a huge disconnect between these two elements.
Losing someone important to you especially at an age where you may not yet have the proper coping skills for it typically has some kind of impact on your psyche going forward. Now obviously I can't speak for everyone and everyone does grieve differently, but I expect a book that goes out if its way to establish its main character is a mess due to his grief very early on to actually have some follow through.
At first it seems as if Tristan is bottling his emotions up as evidenced by his short fuse when arriving in Alke. It appeared he was going to have random outbursts as a result of burying his feelings. It quickly became apparent that this was not the case as Tristan totally shrugs off almost all his negative behaviors in regards to Eddie's death after he begins his quest.
This creates a huge lack of depth to him so there's no foundation on which to build relationships with the people he encounters. Ayanna, Chestnutt, and Gum Baby are supposed to be his friends on the journey. But, they could have been literally anybody. Each had a gimmick but no substance. Chestnutt is the know it all who has recently lost her father figure yet she moves on like it's nothing. Ayanna is the girl who will most likely become the love interest (because again, she's the girl) who has no backstory at all. Gum Baby is a mascot character that vacillitates wildly from comic relief to a legitimate part of the squad. A whole other character gets added in like the last third and I literally cannot figure out why since you can probably count on one hand the amount of lines she had. And let me remind you this book is over 400 pages so there was plenty of time to flesh any of these people out.
Not enough happens to bond these characters together. They are essentially strangers on the trek from beginning to end. I don't know anything by the end of the book about any of them that I didn't already know when they were first introduced. The author tries to tell me these people are friends without showing me.
How could they possibly be friends when Tristan never once asks any of them anything about themselves? How are they friends when none of thembothers to ask him either? Shared experiences and anecdotes are the bare bones of a relationship. This book has neither. Sure, they go through hardships but the conflicts are often over so fast there's no time to endear each other to one another or the reader. I didn't care that much when things would happen because I was never sold on the characters before the major crises. The writing style also isn't particularly good when it comes to the action sequences so I didn't feel any tension. I wasn't bored but it was a pretty flat adventure. No puzzles, or riddles or clever reasoning to get out of situations.
Whenever there was the mere suggestion of an obstacle it almost immediately was solved especially in regards to the ending. I didn't feel like the ending was a culmination of all that Tristan learned over the course of the book. He quite frankly pulled the solution out of nowhere.
Ultimately a lot of this book felt foundational. The ideas were certainly strong yet it felt under developed in a lot of ways. Looking back the whole story was so simple I struggle to see why the book was so long seeing as there were so few events. This easily could have been streamlined to half its length. While that wouldn't make the characters stronger it would've at least tightened up the plot which felt very lackadaisical despite its purported 'high stakes'. The book also ends without properly resolving most of its themes.
The Eddie plot is central to Tristan's hangups and it does reach somewhat of a conclusion. As I said before a huge chunk of the book doesn't feature Eddie at all, so I was unsatisfied. I feel like it tied up all the emotions Tristan was feeling too quickly. It's barely touched on the entire book then at the very end Tristan just learns the lesson his therapist already told him at the beginning because someone else also gave him the same advice? I know people will begin to heal at different paces, but I felt like this book started out so realistic in how it was handling the situation only to abandon it when it got more difficult to maintain.
Related to that I also felt the whole Tristan being the Anansesem thing had so much potential to add to his character development that was wasted. It's established Eddie was the storyteller and Tristan did the art at the beginning. Yet that gets totally thrown away as Tristan becomes the Anansesem. Why wasn't Tristan upset because that was supposed to be Eddie's role? Why didn't he feel inadequate in comparison to Eddie? Why didn't he struggle to use his powers due to the misplaced guilt or lack of confidence? Why wasn't it a major part of his arc accepting his role as Anansesem in memory of Eddie? Instead he immediately takes to the position never stumbling once. He never thinks about how Eddie would have loved it. He never wishes Eddie was there to help him since Eddie was the one who was so invested in the stories (Tristan was too but it was clearly more of Eddie's special thing). He doesn't think about Eddie at all. And as someone who lost one of my closest friends last year, even taking into consideration how one of the themes was about Tristan avoiding the pain, it didn't feel true to me. I miss my friend all the time. I didn't get the sense by the end that Tristan missed his friend which honestly stung a bit because I was reading this in part for that extra connection.
I do not think this is a bad book by any means. It's a super intriguing, original concept that I did enjoy. I think that it's great that young Black kids will have a book that so zealously revels in our stories and history. I think it's so important that these stories are passed onto the next generations. I commend Kwame Mbalia for choosing to write this because it truly is a big deal that this kind of middle grade book was published. I just personally thought it could have done so much more.
I plan on reading the sequel (I've already got the book from the library) and I'm crossing my fingers that it blows my socks off.
rebeccabadger's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
inspiring
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
crosswarrior7's review against another edition
3.0
For Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky, I think I’m going to go with a 3.5 out of 5. It sucks because I wanted this book to be a 4 or even 5, because I have gained a new love for exploring the less-explored mythologies and cultures in books, and the idea of African American folklores becoming gods was really interesting to me.
This had a lot of things I wanted to love… And I really did like it, but I didn’t quite love it, and that all falls to the execution. But I’ll get there. Let’s focus on what I did like first.
Well, obviously, the lore, as I just said. And as a person who adores stories, I really loved the care and passion this story showed for storytellers, and it did a great job capturing the joys and essence of what it feels like to create while conveying it in a MG type of writing.
Tristan may make me wanna whack him at times, but overall, he was a very enjoyable character to follow along. He was crafted well, and you could see a lot of the difficulties and pains he was dealing with. It tied in very well with the message of not ignoring and shoving down the stuff that wasn’t liked. Pain comes with joy, and we have to face that, and Tristan was a great central player to move that along.
The world itself was very alive and magical and rich with symbolism and tie ins. I mean, the monsters themselves were chains, and a little on the nose or not, it felt powerful to me, someone who is a white American, so I can only imagine how it must have felt for those very aware and affected by our horrible past interactions with African Americans.
So if I liked all of this stuff, and I thought the message and lore was well crafted and well delivered, why didn’t I fully love it?
For one, as alive as these felt, the characters… Not really. I get this is Middle Grade, but a lot of the characters just felt two dimensional to me outside of Tristan. It could have just been Tristan and Gum Baby on the trip and I wouldn’t have noticed too much of a difference. I wanted to like all of the characters, but they just didn’t feel real to me, and that really sucked. A few of the folklore characters felt like they were half way there to three dimensional, but not quite to the amount they should have been.
The story also just felt so much longer than it needed to be with a good bit of it feeling repetitive. Lots of the same things being said and done but in a different spot. Yes, to a point, each added new characters, but given the complaint I just made about the characters… It just felt like more could have been done in each area to make it feel more separate from all the previous location.
I did really like the ending though and it all tying tying together, and I already own the second book, but if I didn’t, I would have wanted to read more from this world. I just… I really wish the story had more oomph and life to it, because from certain spots I can definitely see it possible, it just didn’t.
Recommend this? Yes. Just be prepared if you’re like me for the read to feel longer than it should be.
This had a lot of things I wanted to love… And I really did like it, but I didn’t quite love it, and that all falls to the execution. But I’ll get there. Let’s focus on what I did like first.
Well, obviously, the lore, as I just said. And as a person who adores stories, I really loved the care and passion this story showed for storytellers, and it did a great job capturing the joys and essence of what it feels like to create while conveying it in a MG type of writing.
Tristan may make me wanna whack him at times, but overall, he was a very enjoyable character to follow along. He was crafted well, and you could see a lot of the difficulties and pains he was dealing with. It tied in very well with the message of not ignoring and shoving down the stuff that wasn’t liked. Pain comes with joy, and we have to face that, and Tristan was a great central player to move that along.
The world itself was very alive and magical and rich with symbolism and tie ins. I mean, the monsters themselves were chains, and a little on the nose or not, it felt powerful to me, someone who is a white American, so I can only imagine how it must have felt for those very aware and affected by our horrible past interactions with African Americans.
So if I liked all of this stuff, and I thought the message and lore was well crafted and well delivered, why didn’t I fully love it?
For one, as alive as these felt, the characters… Not really. I get this is Middle Grade, but a lot of the characters just felt two dimensional to me outside of Tristan. It could have just been Tristan and Gum Baby on the trip and I wouldn’t have noticed too much of a difference. I wanted to like all of the characters, but they just didn’t feel real to me, and that really sucked. A few of the folklore characters felt like they were half way there to three dimensional, but not quite to the amount they should have been.
The story also just felt so much longer than it needed to be with a good bit of it feeling repetitive. Lots of the same things being said and done but in a different spot. Yes, to a point, each added new characters, but given the complaint I just made about the characters… It just felt like more could have been done in each area to make it feel more separate from all the previous location.
I did really like the ending though and it all tying tying together, and I already own the second book, but if I didn’t, I would have wanted to read more from this world. I just… I really wish the story had more oomph and life to it, because from certain spots I can definitely see it possible, it just didn’t.
Recommend this? Yes. Just be prepared if you’re like me for the read to feel longer than it should be.
kaikai1618's review against another edition
5.0
I’m in disbelief that is masterpiece is a DEBUT??? What an incredible story, balancing grief and darkness with laughter and hope. Beautifully done.
lfsalden's review against another edition
4.0
Definitely going on the list of YA Fantasy With World Myth In Written by Someone With the Right to Write That Mythos
paula_nico's review against another edition
4.0
It was a very good book! I enjoyed reading it and it made me cry so much when Tristan was saying how Eddie died. It hit my hard because I put myself in Tristan's shoes. Other than that it was an amazing book. One of my favorites of this year.
alexisdoingok's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
morganly's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
inspiring
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
marieintheraw's review against another edition
4.0
this was actually really interesting and fast-paced