A review by prideandasparagus
Unfamiliar Fishes by Sarah Vowell

4.0

A history of Hawaii, giving particular focus to the relationship between Hawaiian peoples and the WASP missionaries who colonized the islands and eventually orchestrated a political coup to overthrow the Hawaiian monarchy and institute US control. Vowell's narrative voice is entertaining and wry, which helped ease the tough subject matter throughout the book (particularly for a reader like myself, who is an inheritor of the legacy of white Christian imperialism). Rich imagery and minute attention to historical detail are the sugar that helps the medicine of the dark history of US conquest go down.