Reviews tagging 'Death'

Hula by Jasmin Iolani Hakes

9 reviews

kshertz's review

emotional informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

What a fascinating way to tell Hawaiis history. The lineage of one family and hula. I learned a lot, but the story itself did not grip me. It was hard for me to pick it up and I frequently passed it up for more gripping books. It’s a slower more informative book so this is probably why. It’s not a big character book, more like a nonfiction with only a barely fiction family lineage. I think if it was mostly fiction with some nonfiction that would have gripped me more. 

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Content Warnings

Minor: Grief, Pregnancy, Alcohol, Death, Cultural appropriation, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Bullying, Alcoholism, Physical abuse, Blood, and Body horror

vedpears's review

dark emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

Excellent book - helps to have audiobook playing while reading the Hawaiian, if unfamiliar with the language. There were parts that characters spoke in Hawaiian, and the author did a great job to let unfamiliar readers get the gist of the meaning without writing out a direct translation, allowing for the novel to continue with ease.

The depicted relationships and family dynamics are realistic and dive deep without bogging the reader down. The very real occupation of Hawaii is both a backdrop and a nemesis in this book and I appreciate Hakes' willingness to lay out all the pain that comes with that here, without softening the language to make the invaders uncomfortable. I think Hakes does a fine job balancing fact and fiction to ensure the readers walk away being able to trust this view through a literary window of the ongoing theft of Hawaii from her people. 

The only thing that keeps this from being a 5-star is that I felt the first third of the book didn't fit as well or flow as nicely as the rest of the novel. The beginning didn't have the same raw emotion/depth that the remainder of the story did, and I initially found it very difficult to push on - glad I did, but that took effort to push through. 

Content warning: maternal estrangement, miscarriage, colonizers, bullying, cancer, car accident, death.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Abandonment, Death, Xenophobia, Toxic relationship, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Grief, Emotional abuse, Domestic abuse, Deportation, Car accident, Colonisation, Cancer, Bullying, and Body shaming

creativerunnings's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation, Bullying, Classism, Domestic abuse, Cultural appropriation, Emotional abuse, Cancer, Grief, Pregnancy, Racial slurs, Alcohol, Death, Miscarriage, and Terminal illness

Moderate: Drug use

aqtbenz's review against another edition

emotional reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Miscarriage and Pregnancy

Moderate: Death, Domestic abuse, and Cancer

Minor: Car accident

devynreadsnovels's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Cultural appropriation, Death, Child abuse, Racism, Colonisation, Grief, and Toxic relationship

Moderate: Miscarriage, Racial slurs, Alcoholism, Abandonment, Bullying, and Physical abuse

Minor: Pregnancy, Cancer, Misogyny, Police brutality, Domestic abuse, Terminal illness, Blood, and Injury/Injury detail

alexisgarcia's review

emotional reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

this was a very beautiful generational tale about 3 different Hawaiian women. this was really enjoyable.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Toxic relationship, Infertility, Bullying, Colonisation, Death, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, and Grief

brynpemery's review

emotional reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Colonisation and Miscarriage

Moderate: Cancer, Racism, Death, and Grief

careinthelibrary's review

informative sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.0

I learned a lot from Hula. I'm new to reading and learning about Indigenous Hawaiian culture so I appreciated how thorough this was. I really heard the sounds, tasted the foods. It was vivid because of how detailed it was. I've never been to Hawaiʻi or any tropical location so this was a great way to experience it from home (and not contribute to the destruction of Hawaii through tourism).

This never quite got off the ground. I kept waiting for the story to take off, the pace to pick up, and it continued to plod along. The book was overall too long for my liking, especially the beginning section which was weighed down with intermittent historical details that I think would have been more effective and less dry if they had been sprinkled throughout the novel rather than clumped at the beginning. I felt I was taken away from the main characters and plunked into historical detail just as I was beginning to understand their motivations and personalities. The historical detail was fascinating and helpful to understand the context of their actions and their current dispossession of their homelands, but the way it was dispersed in the story wasn't helpful to me.

I really wanted the approach to Hi'i's place in her community to be more dynamic rather than the stalemate we arrived at early in the narrative. For instance, her cousin is in her hula class and she is skillful and well-liked by many, including the teacher. It would have been more effective, in my opinion, if the two cousins could have overcome their rivalry and become friends, the divisiveness was irritating and after a point, didn't serve a purpose in the story. Instead, we see that Hi'i and her cousin fight and look down on one another and that seems to never be resolved. The girls never see the value in each other, only see one another as a threat. I thought this would have been a great opportunity to show character growth and interconnectedness of those raised in their culture, but instead it was a jagged seam in the story.

I liked the mirrored nature of mother/daughter relationships in the book, the way we, at first, think Laka isn't supportive enough of her daughter then realise the rationale from her point-of-view. Laka was a really interesting character, she tries to be a different kind of mother than her own but ends up making different and similar mistakes.

Hulali was a difficult character to like, though her cause is noble. I wish we'd seen more of her perspective and reasoning but instead she felt a bit like a two-dimensional villain. I thought the resolution at the end was unbelievable to me, Hulali was too easily won over after all the years of being against Hi'i. There are so many grudges and hurtful prejudices in this book and none of them felt realistically resolved to me.

This was probably my top anticipated release of the year, and it unfortunately didn't click for me like it seems to for lots of other readers. So while this was disappointing (I expected to really love it), I did get lots out of it and didn't mind the reading experience. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Classism, Emotional abuse, Blood, Colonisation, Death, Grief, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Death of parent, and Racism

Moderate: Alcohol, Physical abuse, Car accident, Cultural appropriation, Police brutality, Toxic relationship, Alcoholism, Bullying, Child death, and Domestic abuse

internationalreads's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark informative inspiring reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Abandonment, Addiction, Alcoholism, Cultural appropriation, Death, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Miscarriage, Pregnancy, Racism, Colonisation, Death of parent, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Terminal illness, and Cancer