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A review by charleyroxy
He Mele A Hilo (A Hilo Song) by Ryka Aoki
5.0
He Mele A Hilo: A Hilo Song by Ryka Aoki is a story populated with the most wonderfully diverse characters and voices. I was surprised that I did not need to take notes to keep all the characters straight, which has been necessary for so many of my other reads lately. What a breath of fresh air! It is a story of belonging, family, food, identity, spirituality, and hula all woven together with rain, ocean, lava and land. It is exactly the kind of beautiful soul escape I needed and perhaps many could use right now.
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I loved that it was written in Hawaiian Pidgin English with a glossary at the back. Before starting I read through the glossary but I caught on quickly and didn't refer to it often while reading. One thing that I didn't know about was all the terms referring to ethnicity in Pidgin. I think most people know 'haole' as the term for white folks, especially from the mainland, but there are many others. From what I gathered in further reading some could be seen as deragatory depending on tone and intent which in this book was not the case. They seemed to be more terms of endearment and identity than anything negative.
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Ryka Aoki has a talent for writing in the same way some of her characters do with hula, music, cooking chicken, fishing, and more. It is innate, it brings you to tears, and makes your face hurt because you don't even realize you have been smiling so hard while reading. I do not remember where I heard about this book, around this time last year, but I remember searching for Hawaiian Own Voice authors and this sounded exactly like what I was looking for. I would absolutely recommend to everyone!
~~~
I loved that it was written in Hawaiian Pidgin English with a glossary at the back. Before starting I read through the glossary but I caught on quickly and didn't refer to it often while reading. One thing that I didn't know about was all the terms referring to ethnicity in Pidgin. I think most people know 'haole' as the term for white folks, especially from the mainland, but there are many others. From what I gathered in further reading some could be seen as deragatory depending on tone and intent which in this book was not the case. They seemed to be more terms of endearment and identity than anything negative.
~~~
Ryka Aoki has a talent for writing in the same way some of her characters do with hula, music, cooking chicken, fishing, and more. It is innate, it brings you to tears, and makes your face hurt because you don't even realize you have been smiling so hard while reading. I do not remember where I heard about this book, around this time last year, but I remember searching for Hawaiian Own Voice authors and this sounded exactly like what I was looking for. I would absolutely recommend to everyone!