Name: Trillium
ISBN: 9781401274528

Jeff Lemire

A space-age scientist and early twentieth-century English explorer. Two disparate souls separated by thousands of years and hundreds of millions of miles. Impossibly, they meet. Their love could bring about the end of the universe, but even with reality unraveling around them, nothing can pull them apart. Eisner Award-nominated writer/artist Jeff Lemire (SWEET TOOTH) tells an ambitious and mind-expanding love story in TRILLIUM--a thrilling saga of life and death, exploration and empathy that spans the far reaches of space-time and the depths of the human heart. This new hardcover edition features a never-before-seen sketch gallery from Lemire. Collects TRILLIUM #1-8.

Trillium

Award-winning and fan favorite comics creator Jeff Lemire spins the tale of two star-crossed loved through space in time in TRILLIUM! It's the year 3797, and botanist Nika Temsmith is researching a strange species on a remote science station near the outermost rim of colonized space. It's the year 1921, and renowned English explorer William Pike leads an expedition into the dense jungles of Peru in search of the fabled "Lost Temple of the Incas," an elusive sanctuary said to have strange healing properties. Two disparate souls separated by thousands of years and hundreds of millions of miles. Yet they will fall in love and, as a result, bring about the end of the universe. Even though reality is unraveling all around them, nothing can pull them apart. This isn't just a love story, it's the LAST love story ever told. Collects TRILLIUM #1-8.

b.andherbooks

Majestic and expansive, this was really wonderful. Two truly star-crossed (and not to mention time-crossed) lovers and their attempts to save humanity from a vicious, sentient disease called "The Caul." Just beautiful. I only wish that was longer so I could learn more about these worlds, and that I had more time to read it and decipher the alien language used (FYI there is an alphabet for that in the back of the novel).

Bryan Alexander

I'm a space opera fiend and also a comics reader, so anything combining these naturally draws my attention. Trillium succeeds on both of these counts as imaginative space opera and very well done graphic nvel.

The plot concerns an anthropologist of the 38th century, part of an endangered human species seeking to escape a killer plague. The surviving humans have paused on a lonely planet near a black hole. Nika's working on a curious temple and its caretaker aliens, until a crisis drives her to push things beyond the usual protocols.

As the same time William is a World War One veteran, hired in the early 1920s to hack through a South American jungle in search of a lost temple. His group is attacked, and William escapes by fleeing... right to the very temple they sought.

Beyond this is spoiler territory: (view spoiler)[Nika and William meet through the time- and space-warping nature of the alien temple. Despite differences in language and culture they connect, gradually falling in love. Then they fall back into each other's times, with modifications, and fight for their sanity and each other. The mystery of the caretaker aliens, their temple, and the black hole eventually comes clear.  (hide spoiler)]

As a comic Trillium offers good art and world-building on a panel level. What makes it better is the use of alternating sequences to explore the Nika-William relationship. Sections of the book have parallel strips, one upside down and running backwards to the other. There are useful connections and references across them, vertically. Looking for these connections while being able to read the book backwards and forwards nicely develops the story's timeline conceit.

A gender note: Trillium balances gender roles very well, a nice surprise for our often reactionary romance age. The characters swap places very symmetrically, pushing a kind of androgyny I'm most used to seeing from 1970s sf.

Overall, an exciting, thoughtful, and moving graphic novel. Recommended.

Trillium

Reviews

Highlights