Oh , Real Life. How Can Fiction Compete?

February 6th, 2010

In the New York Times Writers on Writing series, Miami novelist Carl Hiaasen wrote: "I can't tell you how often I get asked if Elian (Gonzalez) will turn up in my next book. The challenge is too daunting, and not because the real life drama defies satire. It is satire."

This quote came to mind as I read Wayfinding Through the Storm: Speaking Truth to Power at Kamehameha Schools 1993-1999. This book tells the story of the epic battle between Bishop Estate trustees and Kamehameha Schools faculty, students, and alumni in a series of quotes f [...]
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Gaming

January 6th, 2010

Spent much of winter break playing games on my PS3. Two games in particular: Dragon Age and Fallout 3.

I slip into game mode from time to time. And the games are getting better and better. Not only on the technical front--they're really well-written, too.

Like genre novelists, authors of these games need to find an original way to re-create old standards, like fantasy and post-apocalyptic worlds. Both games I played did so with smashing success. In Dragon Age, elves have been reduced to the house slaves of humans, while dwarves adhere to a strict caste system that removes the rank and status of any dwarf who dares leave the underground to mingle with the rest of the world.
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A Gift of Character

November 28th, 2009

I’ve always had a problem with the abundance of nostalgia in local literature. Because we live in such a beautiful place, it’s so tempting to write about Hawaii when it was even more lovely—less people, more fish. We witness nostalgia in songs, books, and hear it from our elders all the time. In Hawaii, it’s part of the culture.



The cover of Mavis Hara’s An Offering of Rice doesn’t have people on it. Just a painting of big leaves and flowers, so when I picked it up, I was thinking, oh dear, here we go again.

However [...]
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Tribute to Ian Macmillan

November 16th, 2009

In 1997, I took my first fiction writing class. Ian Macmillan was my professor. He was the first novelist I’d met. He wrote books about WWII and Hawaii--eight novels, five short story collections, over a hundred short stories published in magazines and journals. He won the O. Henry Award, a Pushcart Prize. He won the 2000 PEN-USA-West Award for Fiction for his novel Village of a Million Spirits.

As a writer, there are maybe one or two in Hawaii in his league. As a teacher of fiction, dedicating some forty years to University of Ha [...]
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Burn and Learn: New Book by Eric Shaffer

November 8th, 2009

Poet Eric Shaffer, whose publications include Portable Planet (2000), Living at the Monastery, Working in the Kitchen (2001), and Lahaina Noon (2005) just published his first novel, Burn and Learn.

He's holding a public book release party on November 14, 2009, at 2 PM at the Hawai‘i State Public Library, 478 South King Street (at the corner of Punchbowl Street).

When I asked Eric what his book was about, he said:

Burn & Learn is a wild tale of five friends attending college, drinking coffee at the Fr [...]
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When People Ask Me What I Do For A Living, I Tell Them I'm A Teacher

November 1st, 2009

When people ask me what I do for a living, I tell them I'm a teacher.

And it's pretty much true. I do spend about the same amount of time teaching as I do writing (well, that's only been true for the last couple of years--there was a five year long writing drought due to a computer game romance I'd rather not talk about). However, teaching pays more bills.

I'm neither ashamed nor proud. Writing is more of a hobby. The fact is, writing is more of a hobby for the vast majority of writers. The average book might sell five to ten thousand copies. Even if a writer earns 10% gross off those sales, that's still about twenty grand per book at the most (before taxes).

Since this is true, I thought it'd be interesting to discuss the most writing-hobbyist fri [...]
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Reading at UH Manoa This Thursday

October 26th, 2009

What: UHM English Department's Fall 2009 Reading and Colloquium Series
When: Thursday, Oct. 29 at 3-4:30pm
Where: Kuykendall 410, UH (Manoa)

Todd and Linda Shimoda will read for their new book Oh!: A Mystery of \'Mono No Aware\'.

Synopsis:

Oh! A mystery of “mono no aware” follows Zack Hara, a young Japanese American from Los Angeles searching for an emotionally meaningful life while traveling in Japan. Zack finds an ally in a professor and underground poet who introduces him to the concept of mono no aw [...]
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King Bull Nuts

October 14th, 2009

I'm ashamed to admit I never read a Paul Theroux novel. He is, after all, King Bull Nuts among writers living in Hawaii (yes, a highly coveted honorary title I just made up). So I checked out Hotel Honolulu from the Mililani Library.

Here's a passage:

"I sat and studied those big kindly waves rolling toward Waikiki, slowly rising from the smooth sea, dividing themselves into ranks, gathering shape near the shore to whiten in peaks before sloping and softening, just spilling and dying, declining in a fallin [...]
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I Don't Even Read Blogs

October 1st, 2009

I was all set to lavish praise on the 1,118 page Honolulu Stories

But I'm lazy this week, so I'll save it for another blog. Spoiler: it will include images of the damage a three-and-a-half pound book can do to  a roach and dry wall.

Instead, I want to point out that I don't even really read blogs. Well, that's not entirely true. I'll periodically check on the only two I have bookmarked:

johnaugust.com

and

The Best Page in the Universe

If  you have any interest in scr [...]
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Honolulu Cop

September 28th, 2009

I've always distrusted cops. I can't help myself. It's like the hiccups or gag reflex. They have guns. They pull people over for doing 65 on the H-1. I knew a number of them before they became cops, and at times my reaction was, "So-and-so is a cop now? I thought there was a psyche test." Did I mention they have guns?

(Obligatory Reno 911 pic)

Gary Dias's Honolulu Cop: Reflections on a Career With HPD is an autobiography by a retired major who was in HPD from 1971 to 1998. It's a straight-forward read full of anecdotes that are often a [...]
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Wait, Why Don't Our Kids Read and Write?

September 25th, 2009

So I'm kicking back and watching the news the day Hawaii public school teachers agreed to their new contract. Things I expected to hear, but didn't: Current statistics on Hawaii student aptitude and projections on how these numbers will be effected by 17 furlough days, which equals 10% less education. How much students can learn with 14 school days in October 2009. 15 school days in November. 11 school days in December. A justification for choosing Friday instead of Wednesday as the official furlough day (school ends at 12:45 on Wednesdays). Instead, I got a story on how the furlough will possibly effect OIA football.

Maybe our kids don't respect education because our adults seem not to either. The governor obviously does not. Nor does the DOE or HSTA leadership, which is [...]
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Watch Out, Louisiana

September 23rd, 2009

Back in college, a history professor told me that Hawaii is the second most corrupt state in the US, behind Louisiana. I believed him. Worse, I didn't care. An eighteen-year-old apathetic to local politics? In Hawaii? Yeah, not exactly a rare breed.

Now in my mid-thirties, I've been mulling over that statement. I've been toying with the idea of writing a novel that's partially set in the world of Hawaii money and politics, and how decades of backroom deals made the Hawaii we see before us. Probably watched too much The Wire, if it's possible to watch too much of the greatest show, ever.

Dabbling with research led me to George Cooper's and Gavan Daw's Land and Power in Hawaii.  It covers the rise of the Democratic Party from the mid-1950's to the mid-1980's. I [...]
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