Trail of Lightning

The lack of resources, particular the lack of energy sources, is a frequent motif in Trail of Lightning. When discussing the Fifth World, character often refer to the Energy Wars, in which people battled over hoarded natural resources. On their journey to Crownpoint, Kai and Maggie discuss their disapproval of this way of life, which continues with the hoarding of other resources, like water. In contrast with the rest of the Sixth World, Dinétah supposedly possesses an abundance of gasoline. However, as Maggie explains to Kai, the tribe sells this fuel elsewhere, leading to a notable lack in Dinétah itself. This is why Maggie has outfitted her truck to run on other forms of alcohol, which she can access more easily than regular gas.

Dinétah lacks other resources that defined much of the Fifth World, including access to permanent housing. Dinétah’s valley houses a number of small communities. In some, there are trailers or even common buildings, like the Lukachukai Chapter House that Maggie visits in the first chapter. Maggie herself lives in a small trailer, which she picked up after “the previous owner died in his sleep, and nobody else would live in it” (20). As another example, Tse Bonito, which is a “booming metropolis by Dinétah standards” (24), is “mostly made of tin-roofed shacks and old metal-sided trailers” (24). In other communities like Rock Springs, for example, people live in tents. Access to amenities from the Fifth World, like batteries, is limited, too. When Kai and Maggie research the tsé naayéé’ at Crownpoint, their research is interrupted when their CD player runs out of batteries. The lack of batteries does not surprise Kai, who tells Maggie, “I’m surprised we got that much juice out of the thing. It’s been sitting here how many years?” (80).

What ties all these instances together, besides the lack of resources, is the resiliency that characters show in the face of these struggles. Even without the amenities of the Fifth World, from gasoline to permanent shelter to even simple batteries, the inhabitants of Dinétah adapt to the challenges of the new era, finding new places to live and new sources of energy and conserving what they can.

Lightning is a symbol of power and divinity in the novel. Both Neizghání and Coyote are associated with lightning, using it to travel. When Coyote transports Kai and Maggie from Grace’s trailer to the Shalimar in Tse Bonito, he moves them across space through a lightning bolt. When they travel, “the smell of ozone fills [Maggie’s] nostrils and the world ignites in flame. Less than a second later, lightning strikes in Tse Bonito and there we stand” (202). Maggie also associates lightning with Neizghání’s presence. After the battle with monsters at Rock Springs, Maggie remembers “the lightning strike burns by the main camp, and a horrible suspicion begins to form” (187), at which point Maggie begins to suspect Neizghání might be the witch who created the tsé naayéé’. Just like both immortals, lightning is a dangerous and terrifying natural power. When Clive reports to Maggie about her fight with Neizghání, he says, “it was chaos at the end […] Lightning struck Mósí’s glass house. The bleachers caught on fire. The crowd panicked” (249). Here a lightning strike saved Maggie’s life, striking against even another immortal—Mósí. The lightning also terrifies the crowd in the arena, causing fire and panic.

The presence of lightning as a symbol of deadly power reflects the novel’s title, Trail of Lightning. In a way, Maggie tracks a trail of lightning throughout the book as she searches for the origins and maker of the tsé naayéé’ monsters. Near the end of the book, she begins to suspect one Holy Person associated with lightning—Neizghání. However, it is not until Coyote’s final revelation that Maggie realizes he was the one she tracked all along.