Tweet A few months ago I attended a book signing for illustrator Gael Abary. Funny story-Gael lives in Kailua and she asked me to meet her IRL at her signing at Book Ends in Kailua. Another funny coincidence, I met author and editor Amy Novesky online when I queried her publishing company Cameron books. Amy has always been super encouraging and kind to me. It’s because of her that I kept pushing myself to write through the loads of rejection I received. I was happy to attend the event and purchase their beautiful book. I also brought home a few…
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Tweet We read so many picture books at our home so when one is really good, my son and I really take notice. While our tastes may differ, books with heart seem to capture us both. Since my 8-year-old is quickly aging out of picture books, I really savor these moments. Why does the universe make us fall in love with our children only to wrench them from us so fast? But back to really good picture books. Our Kailua librarian is a genius at plucking unique picture books from piles and featuring them on the bookshelf. I’m not sure…
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Tweet Kao Kalia Yang’s The Most Beautiful Thing illustrated by Khoa Le and published by Carolrhoda Books, is the most beautiful book. The illustrations are art worthy. The story like a beautifully stitched quilt layered with meaning and yet, so fitting for a children’s book. What makes this one special is how specific and detailed the story is. The way the author writes about the grandmother makes you feel like you know her, as if she is a real person. Listen to the first sentence: “My grandmother is so old, no one knows how old she is.” Isn’t that a perfect line?…
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Tweet It’s near summer and I am finally on the mend. We still have sick people in our home, however. 2024 was definitely a year of multiple viruses passing through our doors. While I am sad that a quarter of the year is over and I’ve mostly been at home, I am super grateful to be recovering from long Covid, and for all the time I had and likely needed to rest. It also gave me many days of reflection, painting, and of course reading. I’m going to do a quick review of three picture books that left an impact…
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Tweet Brigid Delaney’s book *Reasons Not to Worry: How to Be Stoic in Chaotic Times, hit all the right notes for me. It was an easy read. It offered personal gut-wrenching stories of the author’s experience. It broke down the how tos in easily digestible nuggets that stay and helped me get through particularly debilitating flares with long-Covid. First of all, if you are not familiar with stoicism, it is a way of being that was created by philosophers a very long time ago like BC times. Seneda, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius are three stoics from the late period of Stoicism.…
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Tweet I started out the New Year with symptoms of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome or Long Covid (whichever one you believe in). At the same time, my picture book was finally announced in Publisher’s Weekly. 2024 has birth forth my greatest accomplishment and my lowest point health-wise. It’s a tenuous year-a back and forth switchboard of what’s going to happen next. I am also living in the place I’ve been dreaming of for a decade. So while my biggest unimaginable dreams have come to fruition, a few unexpected life changing setbacks as well. 2020s have really thrown me for a loop!…
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Tweet It’s been too long since I posted here. And hopefully I will have good news to share soon. I have a lot of plans for 2024. Do you? I’m going to redo this website, continue to write for kids and the environment. Personally, I’m also focusing on my health in 2024. You know how you always say that, but health is kind of the last thing on your resolutions list? After being hit with a lot of viruses these last few Covid years and then getting what appears to be Long-Covid, which I’m still recovering from, I’m not just…
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Tweet I just listened to a webinar about how there are a lot of picture books about trees lately. This doesn’t bode well for my own picture book which I’ve been working on for the last few years. But it’s better for the kids and hopefully the planet, so this makes me happy. This is another thing that makes me happy. The Tree and the River by Aaron Becker is a wordless picture book that takes children (and adults) on a journey from a fantastical past to the illusions of a future beyond our imagination. It’s cinematic in its illustrations…
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Tweet At this point, my interest in Hawaii sugar plantation life might be an obsession. I’ve been immersed in books, journal articles, phone interviews, maps and more. The history of sugar plantation workers in Hawaii is part of my ancestral history after all. It’s why I am a gosei, or fifth generation Japanese American born and raised in Hawaii. I got my BA in English and minored in Ethnic Studies because I loved to write, and even then had a fascination with this period in history. My mom, aunties and uncle were raised on a sugar plantation on Kauai but,…
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Tweet I started out my writing career trying to be invisible. I wrote as neutral as I could so that my words would come through. To be honest, so that my color could not been seen. This is the way it was supposed to be. It’s the way my culture survived WWII and the bombing of Pearl Harbor. It’s the way we were raised – to be good enough. Not so good that you stood out. But you didn’t want to shame your family either. For years, it went this way until I realized my writing was stunted by neutral,…