When she read 'Palama' and 'Waimanalo' I had to pause to figure out where she was talking about. Like most mainlanders, she pronounces the name of this city, 'Hahnahlulu' instead of 'Honolulu'. What aspect of Ali Ahn’s performance would you have changed?Īli Ahn was a good reader, but her mispronunciation of Hawaiian place names drove me to distraction. Even after living in Hawaii for almost 40 years, I had not heard of 'Panama Dave' Baptiste and May Thompson, who were also real residents of Honolulu. Detective Chang Apana and Henry Kahahawai were already familiar names to me.

I was fascinated by the entrances of historical figures into the story. What was one of the most memorable moments of Honolulu?

If one cannot get these two primary pronunciations, what chance does something like Kawaiahao or Kahahawai have? Fortunately, I don't speak Korean, so I can't comment on any of those words, **for anyone who might think this is nit-picking, think of how it might be listening to a book if Penn-syl-VA-nia was constantly pronounced Pen-SYL-van-ia or FLO-ri-da was Flo-ri-DA or WASH-ing-ton was Wa-SHING-ton? It is grating and distracting, partly because it is so easily preventable. BTW, it's HO-NO-lu-lu (long O sound), not Hon-a-LU-lu (short O sound) and Ha-VA-ee, not Hs-WHY-ee. I do have to say, though, that she sings a couple of little tunes within the narration, and has a very sweet voice. Listening to Pa-LAH-muh mispronounced PAL-a-ma and LILY-ha used instead of Lee-LEE-ha, to point out only two simple examples of many, was very irritating It was distracting to the point of turning off the book several times and not returning to it for weeks. Especially in a historical fiction containing place names still in use, one ought to make an effort to pronounce words correctly. I found the narrator's mangled Hawai'ian very distracting.

This historical fiction contains many elements familiar to even a casual student of Oahu's history, while using a picture bride as his plot device emphasizes the cultural aspects of our local story.

Honolulu brennert