The Local Literary Scene
Isle Pages
New releases from
Hawaii authors
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"The Story of Hula" by Carla Golembe (Bess Press, $14.95) As usual, it's good to have an elder bless a Hawaiian-culture project, and here it's kumu hula Vicky Holt Takamine. Golembe, who wrote the soothingly rhythmic words and created the charmingly naive illustrations, understands that the tradition of hula is largely oral and inter-generational, and frames the story in that way. Bess Press has mastered the once-gimmicky addition of an audio disk inserted into a book, and here it works naturally.
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"Petroglyphs of Hawai'i" by Likeke R. McBride (Petroglyph Press, $8.95) This is one of many titles written about Hawaiian culture by the late scholar Likeke R. McBride and kept in continuous publication by Petroglyph, with small additions and corrections. This edition is more of the same, but features a rather nice piece of cover illustration by artist Edwin Kayton.
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"Creating Hawai'i Tourism -- a Memoir" by Robert C. Allen (Bess Press, $14.95) Bob Allen has led an extraordinary life -- adventurer, soldier of fortune, prisoner of war, captain of industry -- but you'll not read about it here. Allen, who knew everybody and was in the midst of everything relating to modern tourism in Hawaii, is more interested in brief, anecdotal memos about the industry. It makes for lightly entertaining, episodic reading. Nothing dishy, alas, and it peters out in the early '90s.
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