Hawaii Books

The Police and the Community is the most comprehensive book on the market looking at community policing and its wide-ranging impact. It goes beyond a simple description of what community policing is. Rather, it provides a comprehensive view with reference to a wide range of social concerns and the police role and response. Interesting topics are included ranging from racism to police brutality to international perspectives.

Using my Western name, Brother Anthony of Taize, I served as one of the poetry translators for this volume, which is the first of an annually published series, and I am proud to share the following product information about an extrordinarily fine collection of translations of recent Korean fiction and poetry.

The Korea Institute of Harvard University announces the launch of a new literary journal--AZALEA: Journal of Korean Literature & Culture. The debut volume features over 400 pages of fiction, poetry, essays, and other writings.

The "Korea from the Outside" section of AZALEA features Robert Pinsky, Poet Laureate 2004-2005, writing on the poetry of Han Yong-un. Orhan Pamuk, winner of Nobel Prize for Literature in 2006, presents a short travelogue on his visit to Korea. The "Writer in Focus" section is devoted to Kim Young-ha, author of recent controversial works like I Have the Right to Destroy Myself, featuring three of his major short stories and an author interview.

In the "Another Perspective" section, David McCann, director of the Korea Institute, presents a new translation of Hwang Sun-won's "Cranes," following with a new interpretive essay on the work of this seminal modern writer. Also featured are Heinz Insu Fenkl's translation and discussion of "The Dreaming Beast," the little-known debut story by world-renowned director of Oasis, Lee Chang-dong. Other younger fiction writers include Yun Dae-Nyeong, Park Min-Gyu and Kim Aeran

The journal also includes 49 poems, highlighting the importance of poetry in contemporary Korean literature. Among the 10 poets featured are notable world poet Ko Un, a nominee for last year's Nobel Prize in Literature, renowned dissident poet Kim Chiha, the feminist poet Kim Seung-Hui, the physician Chonggi Mah, and the lyricist Lee Si-Young.

For anyone wanting to discover Korean literature today, this is the book to buy first.

We bought 3-4 different books about Hawaii before moving there, this one was our favorite. After living in Honolulu for 3 years, we still used this book often and found it to be quite accurate and helpful. We used it when visiting Kauai, and Hawaii ("The Big Island"), and were happy with the advice and recommendations.

The suggested tours were good, directions and maps were accurate and easy to use. The restaurant recommendations left a bit to be desired, they leave out many cheaper alternatives (though the suggested restaurants are fine, and other choices are easy to find once you're there). The beach section is great, and gives directions of some great "out of the way" beaches much quieter than Waikiki (plus shows some beautiful color photos!).

We've loaned this book to many friends preparing to visit HI, and they have liked it as well.

Lots of color photos distinguish this travel guide. Especially useful is an A-Z tour of all the significant islands, including at least one color photo for most of them.

I purchased this book after an extended period of research on Basho for a piece I was writing. The chapter on Furyu and Daoist Traits in Chinese Poetry contains the following sentence about fifteenth century priest-poet Ikkyu Sojun, "Having denounced the contemporary values of the Zen communities, Ikkyu turned to poetry and a furyu aesthetic for spiritual sustenance." This sentence confirmed my own research, and supported the idea that poetry and furyu have a capacity to nourish a person on her spiritual journey in a way that other disciplines and experiences can not.

If you are interested in Eastern philosophy, particularly Daoism, and its relationship to the artist's way, this book will provide you with solid scholarly material to ponder.

The 29 page glossary reveals Qiu's linguistic prowess and is extremely helpful both for reading this book and for studying Chinese or Japanese poetry, especially haiku.

I wasn't sure if I should spend the $63.00 for this book but it provided me with a deep and thorough study of Basho and the religious and philosophical underpinnings to his creative genius.

A magnificent survey and original interpretation of the concept of "women's literature" in modern Japan, demonstrating its significance in the life and work of twentieth-century Japan's most important woman writer, Hayashi Fumiko (1903-51).

Utilizing an impressive array of Japanese sources, Ericson interprets the crystallization in the 1920s of the category "women's literature" by considering both literary aesthetics and the social dynamics of authorship.

Two translations of Hayashi's work -- Diary of a Vagabond, and Narcissus -- demonstrates its originality and power, rooted in the clarity and immediacy with which Hayashi is able to convey the humanity of those occupying the underside of Japanese society.

In 1931 Bishop Museum sponsored the systematic translation of all of Samuel Kamakau's articles on Hawaiian history and culture that had appeared in the weekly newspapers Ka'oko'a and Ke Au 'Oko'a from October 20, 1866, to February 2, 1871. Two manuscripts resulted; one, containing his historical mamerial, was published in 1961 by The Kamehameha Schools, under the title Ruling Chiefs of Hawaii. It is prefaced by a review of the life of Kamakau. The other manuscript contains Kamakau's account of the material and social culture of the Hawaiians before and during the early period of acculturation to Western ways, and is in the library of the Museum.

As in the case of the history series, the culture series was translated piecemeal by a group of Hawaiian scholars and the translations were gone over by Mary Kawena Pukui, the main contributor, and Martha Warren Beckwith, Professor of Folklore, Vassar College. Their work was completed in 1934 and is a completely literal translation, worded and annotated by Miss Beckwith. The present volume is a revision of the portion of their translation that deals with the customs and beliefs of "the people of old," ka po'e kahiko....

Almost all the topics covered by Kamakau are expositions on aspects of the old culture. However, Kamakau was an ardent, vehement, and highly vocal Christian convert, and his own well-founded knowledge of the traditions of his people concerning their gods and their creation myths led him into willful interpretations and equations in his zeal to show a comparable background of beliefs between the Hawaiian and Christian concepts of god and man. He reiterates the theme of a supreme god, Kane, who with Ku and Lono becomes a threefold god, and who creates heaven and earth and "the things that fill them both," including "first man," Hulihinua (or Kanhuilihonua), and the "first woman," Keakahulilani. He alters the Hawaiian concept, similar to the Tahitian, of a nether region presided over by Milu, and displaces Milu with Manu'a, a "Satan" who rules over an underworld with strata comparable to the hells of the Christian teachings of his time.

David Malo, in the classic work Hawaiian antiquities (Moolelo Hawaii) (Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum. Special publication), gave a broad outline of the ancient culture; John Ii's personal experiences, recounted in Fragments of Hawaiian history,, revealed the functioning of that culture. Ka Po'e Kahiko now adds those details which give new depth and meaning to those two works. The three are a composite picture of Hawaiian beliefs and customs as they were in the ancient days and in the transitional period of acculturation to introduced thoughts and concepts.
--- excerpts from book's Foreword

I just got this book and I was so impressed with the writer's straight-forward style that I felt like an old friend was suggesting the best places to stay in Hawaii. It is honest and detailed and a must-have book for planners who want to make the most of their stay in Paradise.

Grant categorizes the many B&Bs, resorts, inns, condos etc. according different travellers' tastes and needs. Each island has her recommendations for "Best Romantic Hideaways," "Best Resorts for Wordly Elegance," "Best Family Resorts," "Best Resort Values," etc.

Based on her description and pictures we saw on the web, we are confident we have found exactly what we are looking for on the three islands that we want to visit on our honeymoon.

I can't say enough about it! If you are going to Hawaii and you don't want a cookie-cutter-travel-agent-planned vacation, but you still want value for your money, do yourself a favor and buy this book.

My wife and I used this book to plan our honeymoon to Hawaii. We stayed at one of the hotels Gayot's recommended, and it was better than described. This book is extremely accurate yet a little conservative, so you won't be disappointed by reality. The restaurant section is excellent. This is a superior guide without all the filler of other guide books.

Writer Janice Cameron and her foster sister Lily Wu have returned to their home of Honolulu, both with different agendas. Janice has just written a best-selling novel set in Hawaii, and she is working to find a Hawaiian location to film a movie of her novel. Her foster sister Lily is returning to visit her very large extended family, but the reader soon discovers that Lily is also on the trip to keep an eye on her friend Janice.

Janice has been invited to stay in the home of family friends Luther and Maude Avery. The Averys own a large estate near Honolulu, which includes a native Hawaiian village which is the location that Janice would like to use for her movie. Janice must keep her movie-making plans a secret, though, until she gets the Hawaiian villagers to agree. However, immediately upon her arrival in Honolulu, Janice is warned by her native friends that her host's home is a dangerous and unhappy place and she shouldn't stay there. On her second day in Hawaii, Janice discovers the body of a beautiful young hula dancer, apparently a drowning victim in a cove on her host's estate. A series of apparent mishaps gets the attention of amateur detective Lily Wu, who comes to the aid of Janice and identifies who was behind the drowning of the hula dancer.

This was an extremely enjoyable book, and it was hard for me to believe that the book was written more than 50 years ago. I especially enjoyed the descriptions of Lily Wu's Chinese family. "The Kahuna Killer" is the second novel in the "Lily Wu quartet", a group of four novels featuring Janice Cameron and Lily Wu. I am very glad to have discovered the Rue Morgue Press, which is publishing a number of "classic" murder mysteries popular during before 1960. This particular edition was a joy to read and well-edited.