I am slowly getting my act together this week after my vacation and the period of recovery that inevitably comes with going out of town. Taking a break from winter and heading to Hawaii for a little break from winter was such a great idea, but I am thinking that returning to the cold after a week of summer in January is kind of a cruel thing to do to myself. The fact that it is still very much winter in our high desert makes me miss the palm trees swaying and the smell of the briny ocean air twice as much.
Fortunately for me – and, by proxy, you – I brought home a little bit of island love in the form of a good book like I so often do. “Hula” by Jasmin 'Iolani Hakes is a debut novel, but with her palpable love for her beautiful home and her depiction of a culture that runs deep, I doubt it will be her last. Set in Hilo on the big island of Hawaii, “Hula” is a sweeping family saga that touches on Hawaiian tradition, culture, and the complications of mothers and daughters. Hi’i is proud to be part of the Naupaka family, known for its contributions to hula and to the town itself, but there is a lot that she doesn’t understand. Hi’i has never known her grandmother - a woman who is a legend in her own right as a hula dancer – and her mother has never revealed who her father is. Living in a tight-knit community is complicated for all three of the women, as unspoken tensions within it create fractures that seem to be entangled with the Naupaka family’s history. Through the art of hula, Hi’i sees her chance to make up for the past and solidify her place within the family’s legacy - but to win, she has to turn her back on everything that she has ever known, possibly putting the very thing she is fighting for on the line. “Hula” is a love song written to Hawaii and the culture that is hula, as well as a testimony to how generations carry and pass on the baggage of their ancestors. Families are complicated for everyone, but when you’re on an island, you can’t just run away.
That’s all I have for this week. I took this picture in Hawaii because it seemed like a travesty not to snap a picture of a beautiful book near the beautiful place where it is set. Pop over to my Instagram @allison.the.reader for more pictures from my travels and my never-ending rambling and reading, and tell me what you think I should be reading and reviewing next.
Allison Diegel is the Executive Chaos Coordinator at the Diegel Home for Wayward Girls and Their Many Pets here in her hometown of Fallon. She has been reading since before she could talk, and now she likes doing lots of both.
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