KAUAI STORIES

Available in paperback & e-book 

356 pages

There are no actual roads to the small tropical island of Kauai.

No bridges, tunnels or ferries connect Kauai with anything. 

Discover the surprising – and unexpected – journeys people have traveled to become island residents, carried on invisible roads to their home in paradise.

Each story is a reminder that wherever your heart desires, you can find a road there — or perhaps a road will find you.

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19 stories of people finding their way to Kauai from Cambodia, Vietnam, England, Philippines and Mexico, the U.S. mainland – as well as Hawaii residents unexpectedly returning home after many years away.

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Thank you to Kauai artist Marionette Taboniar for her beautiful painting “A Whale’s Welcome” on the cover.

Available in paperback, e-book & audiobook

293 pages

8-1/2 hours audio
 

Enjoy the warmth, spirit and adventure of Kauai in 50 inspiring, humorous and touching personal stories told by the island’s people. 

Dance hula with an award-winning hula instructor who helps keep this cultural tradition alive.
 

Make salt the traditional way Hawaiians have been making salt for centuries.
 

Laugh with people as they recall growing up island-style in sugar plantation "camps," going barefoot until high school and making toys with whatever was on hand, like Frisbees from car-flattened, sun-dried toads.

Smile at humorous tales of acceptance and affection for members of the island’s wild chicken population.

Get to know patriotic Japanese American soldiers born on Kauai as they fight for the United States in World War II against Japan, the country of their parents' birth.

Journey thousands of miles across oceans in a voyaging canoe with sailors who navigate only by the stars, moon, sun and waves as their ancestors did when they discovered Hawaii more than 1,500 years ago. 

Feel the ocean spray as Kauai residents share their love of surfing, canoe paddling and strolling along secluded sandy beaches . . . often making the only footsteps in the sand. 

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Kauai Stories captures the sweetness and kindness of this island community with great detail, humor and grace.

— Robert Schleck, Director, Grove Farm Museum

Once you begin reading Kauai Stories, you will quickly understand what makes us say, “Lucky we live Kauai.”

— Sue Kanoho, Executive Director, Kauai Visitors Bureau

It's amazing to me that as a man who has never lived in Hawaii, I now have so many wonderful memories of Kauai. This is a book of magic.

— Floyd Jones, Colorado resident

Available in paperback, e-book & audiobook

302 pages

9 hours audio

Capture the spirit & adventure of Kauai in this collection of 50 new personal stories about life on the Garden Island.
 

Dance hula with teenage girls who were born to share this beautiful Hawaiian cultural tradition.
 

Discover how two English-speaking residents became guardians of the Hawaiian language.
 

String flower lei with ladies who keep this lovely art alive.
 

Ride waves with surfers who live to surf and surf to live. Meet people whose lives revolve around the ocean: swimming dangerous coastlines, making fishing nets and hunting for tasty, tiny “opihi” that live on the underside of ocean rocks.
 

Get chicken skin (Hawaiian goose bumps) while reading about “Night Marchers” and other spirits of the island.
 

Feel the magic of Kauai that allows people to do such diverse things as find their true love, establish a Hindu monastery that builds a worldwide publishing empire, and transform oneself from a heavy pot smoker to a respected substance abuse counselor and pineapple farmer — all on this tiny island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.
 

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I have been reacquainted with people and things that I love about Kauai: our ghosts, our artists, rip tides, old cars and entrepreneurs who helped develop this island. All the stories are fascinating!

— David Penhallow Scott

Kauai author, playwright, producer & director
 

I love reading these sweet, strange, funny, spiritual, haunting and soul-warming stories. They stick to my heart and feel like they’re my own memories. I absolutely love them.

— Floyd Jones, Colorado resident