Alan Brennert

One of the main reasons I love to read is to be transported to a different time and place. This historical fiction about experiences in a leper settlement at Kaluapapa on the island of Moloka’i, beginning in the 1890’s (and continuing into the twentieth century), accomplished this feat in fine fashion. The story begins with a young girl, Rachel Kalama, living with her family in Honolulu. When she contracts leprosy (now called Hansen’s Disease), she is removed from her family and sent show more to Moloka’i. The narrative follows the major events of Rachel’s life, focusing on close bonds she establishes. It is based on the experiences of real people with Hansen’s Disease and what happened to them historically. It highlights the fear, stigma, prejudice, and inhumane treatment they endured. There are obviously lessons to be learned in how we treat those with currently incurable contagious diseases today.

This book contains a satisfying mix of characters, plot, and originality. The author manages to make Rachel’s life of exile into a remarkable story. After all, she’s living in a small community on an island. What could possibly happen to fill an entire novel? Well, plenty can and does, and I found it both sad and thought-provoking. Rachel is a strong likeable character and it is easy to root for her. She faces an abundance of adversity and finds ways to avoid being defined by her condition.

It is obvious Brennert has done extensive research. He provides information on the background and treatment of the disease, following a historical progression, which I found extremely enlightening. He also includes a good amount of the history of Hawai’i and how it has changed over the years. It serves as touching tribute to people of the past that suffered greatly and have generally been overlooked. Content includes vivid descriptions of the ravages of Hansen’s Disease, one extremely violent scene, and a small amount of sex and profanity. I found it captivating, emotionally moving, and tragic but ultimately uplifting. Highly recommended! show less

“A road need not be paved in gold to find treasures at its end.”
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I LOVED this story. It's so sincere and moving that it touched my heart deeply. The story is told by the Korean girl and I was fascinated by how truthfully the author - a man - managed to convey her feelings, fears, and desires. I felt as if I became her friend whom she trusted with all her biggest secrets.
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I got to know a lot about Korean culture. The author spent a lot of time doing researches on this topic.

The show more Hawaiian culture and history are described in many details too. Some real events and real people are mentioned in the novel, and they are skillfully woven into the main storyline. It was also interesting to come across the mention of W.S. Maugham. Although the author fictionalized the story, there were facts about him I hadn't known before.
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For me, this book is not about prejudices or asserting one's rights. It's a story about heartfelt friendship, true love, and strong family bonds that can withstand any life difficulties. show less

On one hand, Moloka'i is one of the most beautiful historical novels I've ever read, but on the other hand, it has treated a trans woman so poorly that I can't imagine myself ever reading it again . . .

Book content warnings:
- transphobia
- transmisogyny
- abuse
- lots and lots of (sometimes violent) ableism

In 1892, seven-year-old Rachel Kalama from Honolulu has a mark on her leg that won't go away. It's the first sign of leprosy, and when her sister accidentally spills her secret, Rachel's show more forced away from her family and sent to Moloka'i, a quarantined island. Her own mom won't even write to her anymore, and she thinks her life is over. But life on Moloka'i isn't the death sentence it seems to be, and her life--with all its heartache, joys, love, and everything in between--has just begun.

Rachel Kalama is the perfect main character for this book. She's spirited and full of life in a place that sometimes is painfully short of it. I never grow tired of hearing out her thoughts and dreams and hopes. It's also probably due to the book's emotionally gripping prose itself, even though at times it can be a bit stilted and pass over important parts of the narrative to later summarize over them (such as Rachel's father passing away).

I also loved learning about this part of history I'd never learned about before but really should have. It really wasn't that long ago that any of this happened. I even talked about this to one of my friends, and she was so surprised that any of this happened in the early 1900s because she'd been so sure that leprosy was one of those things that happened sooooo long ago! Again, the stuff in this book is something people like us really should have heard about before but didn't.

About halfway the book included a māhū, a third-gendered person in traditional Hawaii, and from what I understand . . . a trans woman by today's standards and to Hawaii today? In any case, I was thrilled for there to be a trans woman of color included in this important historical novel! Until . . . she was treated like shit. The way she was """revealed""" to be a māhū was by the all-contemptible shock factor method. AKA, have her genitals revealed to the main character before the trans person was allowed to "come out", so to say. And here, a violent reaction is combined! Leilani, the māhū, was beaten beforehand by a man who was "embarrassed" to have liked her, a trans woman.

All in all, yuck yuck yuck. If the author had done any research at all on trans people's feelings at all on the subject, he'd realize that wow! This is the most unfeeling way to go about introducing a trans person, especially a trans woman, who today are faced with the most violence and hate!

And then Rachel feels deceived and cheated. Later in the scene she comes around, to later refer to a group of girls and Leilani as "girls", whatever that means. And when Leilani dies about halfway through the book (her appearance in the novel as a whole is fleeting, unfortunately), Rachel makes a mention in her mind about she or Leilani not having revealed her "true gender" to everyone. ?? Again, whatever that means . . . except I know what it means. Alan Brennert doesn't consider trans women to be women.

There's a middle ground here, which is the māhū, the third gender of traditional Hawaii, but Leilani as a character always said she wanted to be a woman. Said she had always wanted to be a woman since she was a small girl! If you're an author, you need to remember who your audience is, and what many are going to take away from this is that "trans woman = 'not a girl' when Rachel says "girls" and 'not a girl' when Rachel says "true gender" ", which cannot be allowed.

I'm mad that this happened, because this novel is achingly beautiful, and I loved so much of it. As Rachel ages, Moloka'i and her community/town of Kalaupapa ages with her. And at the end, in 1970, a very important statement is made. One of the patients of Kalaupapa invites a tourist and others to the town, saying how the State of Hawaii is trying to turn Kalaupapa and Moloka'i into a resort because Moloka'i's land is too valuable. He says,

"To them it's just real estate, but to us it's a lot more. The government forced us to come here, and now that it's the only place we know, now that it's home, they want us to give it up? . . . We won't go without a fight, though. Not this time."

As of 2015, six patients still live in Kalaupapa. When they die, there's a plan to erect a monument dedicated to the 8,000 patients who lived there. The National Park Service currently has four proposals for the land:
1). Make no changes
2). Maintain the status quo, but develop a strategy to manage the area when the Department of Health operations end after the last patient dies
3). Open the park to visitors, allowing unrestricted access
4). Establish an entry-pass system and require orientation for anyone who travels to Kalaupapa. Under this proposal, which the NPS prefers, supervised visitation would also be expanded show less

I was born and grew up in Hawai'i. And now, decades later, even though I love living on the mainland and my life I have made here, I still have Hawai'i somewhere deep inside me. Sometimes I still deeply miss my paradise home: miss feeling warm, soft tradewinds scented of Plumeria, orchids and the smell of lush verdant growth that is distinct to Hawai'i. Sometime I long to feel the powdery sand beneath my bare feet or climb through deep mist-cloaked jungle of the Iao valley or look over a show more ciff into water so blue and clear that schools of fish swimming among the coral is visible. It was one of these poi-in-my-veins moments that made me buy Moloka'i.

I have to say, without a bit of hyperbole on my part, that this was one of the most enjoyable books that I have read in a long time. Aside from the comfortable feeling of being home again as I read through it, it was just a wonderfully crafted, story of the human experience that totally engrossed me and made me feel like I had lived another life.

It is a sad part of Hawai'i's history that leprosy was a disease that thrived in that paradise on the golden skin of the Hawai'ian people in the early years of the twentieth century. Long before the bombs fell on Pearl Harbor another enemy had landed on Hawai'i's beaches. It came with the arrival of the Haole from the United States and as the Hawai'ian native monarchy was overthrown many of Hawai'i's people paid the price with the creeping ulcerations and tumours which slowly ate away at their bodies and terrorized their minds.

The island of Moloka'i became a leper colony and people with leprosy were ripped away from their families and taken to this medical prison on this island of spiritual power for the Hawai'ian people. The verdant island where once Gods lived and played their games with humanity became where hapless victims of this scourge were banished and forced to live and die.

This is a story of a young girl named Rachel who comes down with a slow moving and slight case of leprosy and is sent to Moloka'i to live her life. This may sound like a horrible story, a tragedy... but somehow it becomes a story of what is best in life. Rachel grows up and learns about love and loss, learns to laugh and cry as a young woman. She finds a new, strong 'ohana (family) and eventually marries and has a child of her own (who is taken away to be adopted).

It is a terribly sad story... but it is also sweet and full of beauty. Rachel becomes not only a strong, unique individual but becomes an archetype of the strength and love available to humanity even in the harshest of situations. Like life there were moments of terrible sadness, but there soon followed moments of pure, unadulterated joy.

When I finished the last line tonight I realized that I was in love with Rachel. I was in love with a fictional character, but more than that I was in love with the life that I had lived as her. I miss the story already, I feel a little empty inside without Rachel in my life, but I also feel that I was granted a wonderful chance to live a life so different then my own that taught me a lot about what is important in the life that I find myself in after the book is closed. And really, that is the point of literature. Aloha wale, e Rachel, kaua, auwe. show less