Honolulu

“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 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 show more 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

3.5***

From the book jacket: The rich, unforgettable story of a young "picture bride" who journeys to Hawai'i in 1914 in search of a better life. Instead of the affluent young husband and chance at an education that she has been promised, she is quickly married off to a poor, embittered laborer who takes his frustrations out on his new wife. Renaming herself Jin, she makes her own way in this strange land, finding both opportunity and prejudice. With the help of three of her fellow picture brides, Jin prospers along with her adopted city, now growing from a small territorial capital into the great multicultural city it is today.

My reactions:
I loved Brennert’s Molokai’i and wanted to love this one as well. My husband actually read show more the book a few years ago and thought it was good, but I just had never gotten around to it. A long travel journey prompted me to bring it along and I was glad that I did.

Regret / Jin is a marvelous character. She starts out a shy, subservient girl and grows throughout the novel into a strong woman. Yes, she still fills the traditional role of wife and mother, but she refuses to be held down by societal expectations. She finds a way to succeed and thrive, while still upholding the traditional ways she finds so hard to discard.

I’ve visited Hawaii several times and could picture many of the settings depicted in the novel, despite the vast differences in today’s Honolulu from that of 1914. I was fascinated by the history lesson and the glimpse into life during that time period. I also really appreciated the author’s note at the end, where he comments on the “real-life” May Thompson and how W. Sommerset Maugham used her life experiences in one of his novels. show less

I loved this book- maybe not as much as Moloka'i, but I still am completely enamored by the worlds that Brennert creates. What a brave woman Regret is- throughout the book, she is a force to be reckoned with, shedding like layers the ideals of her ancestors in order to live the life and be the woman she desires. I can't imagine how frightening it would be to leave my country, language, family, and way of life behind to marry a man I had only met through a photo as a "picture bride"- what courage you must have, and what determination. She had some serious guts, sparked initially by Regret's wish to learn and read. I love that she chose a new name for herself, to reflect her new life- Jin, meaning Gem.

I was surprised by the amount of show more racism and prejudice that existed in Hawaii at the time in this book - I never thought about, or really had anything bring this particular area and time frame (both Hawaii and Korea) into my thoughts. The problems at the time between the Koreans and Japanese, or between the native Hawaiian people and those of the newcomers to the islands - both lands invaded by another. I know that my husband's grandmother, a native Hawaiian, suffered at the hands of racism when she moved away from the islands in the 1960s to the southern United States, as did my mother-in-law and her siblings. Apparently I guess I thought the times between the missionaries trying to change the Hawaiian people and the 60s was a time of equality and peace. How naive and uninformed I feel.

This book was beautiful in every way- I loved the descriptions of the characters lives, their courage, their love and loyalty for their friends and family, the part with May and W. Somerset Maugham. Regret, such a sad and tragic name, made a wonderful life for herself, and made peace with her family at the end. I almost wish this book wouldn't have ended! show less

I LOVED LOVED Honolulu by Alan Brennert! (I think this book deserves 'loved' in capital letters). I received an advanced reader's copy and put off reading it for a while, and I am so glad I finally did. Honolulu is just one of those books that sucks you in - with its story, characters, great writing - and compels you to read just one more chapter, even though it's already 2am.

Honolulu tells the story of Regret , the only girl born to a traditional Korean family. (Korean families valued male children over females, and often gave their daughters names like Sorrow, Regret, etc.) As her name would suggest, Regret feels unwanted; while her brothers attend school, Regret is confined to small room where she learns domestic duties from her show more mother. Wishing to learn, Regret approaches her father, only to be beat down and berated. As a last resort, Regret secretly offers herself up as a picture bride (equivalent of a mail-order bride), only telling her parents once the match is complete. Disowned by her father, Regret travels to Hawaii to meet the rich, handsome husband promised by the matchmaker.

Stuck in steerage on a ship bound for Hawaii, Regret befriends her fellow picture brides. Upon arrival, the girls are all faced with a similar fate - the rich and handsome men they saw in the photos are really old, unattractive, and mostly poor. One of them catches the ship back to Korea, others are quickly married and carted off in different directions. Regret finds herself as a wife to a plantation worker with drinking and gambling problems, and a foul temper. Nothing she does is ever good enough, and she endures much physical abuse before choosing to leave her husband, and run away to Honolulu. In control of her life for the first time, Regret (now taking the name Jin) finds her way with hard work and the renewed friendships with the other picture brides. Through numerous tests and trials, Jin realizes the strength she never knew she had, and becomes a great immigrant success story. show less

Regret is a Korean girl so named to reflect her parents' disappointment that she was not born a boy. She is also not a child who is eager to submit to the life that has been mapped out for her choosing instead to sign on as a picture bride in Hawaii, a place where girls can attend school. Embarking on a ship with other picture brides, Regret, renamed Jin, quickly realizes that she has exchanged one drudgery-filled existence for another with an abusive, alcoholic gambler of a husband.

This tale of Asian immigrants and Hawaiian history is epic in scope. The story sweeps from pineapple plantations to the city of Honolulu in all its grandeur and debauchery in the early and middle years of the twentieth century. There are prostitutes, the show more detective who inspired the character Charlie Chan, the origins of the Hawaiian shirt, and so much more. And Jin's entirely possible story is woven throughout these historical events as she participates in the events and meets the people involved. The book is peopled with colorful characters but it still takes on difficult topics like discrimination and abuse. Jin is a strong and vibrant character who learns to direct her own life, celebrating the good and enduring the bad.

I enjoyed this one but wasn't wowed by it. In some ways it was a bit stereotypical. I appreciated the history woven into it but the weaving was perhaps not as skillfull and seamless as it could have been or perhaps there was just a little too much of it. The plot galloped along (a good thing when a book is a bit of a chunkster as this one is) and I liked the characters well enough. Those people enchanted by the setting in Hawaii or the exotic idea, and decidedly un-exotic reality, of picture brides will enjoy the storytelling here. show less

Man, Alan Brennert has some gorgeous prose. I loved his first novel, Molokai, for its touching and painful look at the life of a young girl banished to a remote Hawaiian island after coming down with leprosy. And this tale of Jin, a Korean girl who travels to Honolulu as a picture bride to escape a life of occupation by the Japanese and one where she will only ever cook and clean house, first for her father, then under her mother-in-law’s thumb. Her struggles and depiction of this strange new melting pot of Hawaii with its many new cultures, even as part of her remains firmly Korean, are so elegantly and movingly rendered. This was a really beautiful read for anyone who enjoys period pieces.

Please excuse typos/name misspellings. show more Entered on screen reader. show less

Named “Regret” by her parents, this little Korean girl so wanted an education but it was forbidden. As a teenager, though, she managed to get permission to travel to Hawaii as a “picture bride”. Immediately upon arrival, along with four other Korean girls she met on the ship, and now self-named Jin (meaning “Gem”), they married their new husbands before being allowed entry into their new country. Jin’s hope had been that her husband would be able to get her an education in Hawaii, but she was sorely disappointed (to put it mildly), not only with this, but with many other things, as well.

I really enjoyed this. I not only learned about the life of a picture bride, I learned about Hawaii in the early 20th century, and about show more Korea and the interactions with Japan that I really knew nothing about. I was impressed with how many real-life people Brennert brought into the story. show less