Rating: 
Summary: An amazing novel, moving, yet enlightening and educational.
Review: A view of the chaotic world of the native Hawaiian during the horrible period of the Second World War.While the primary theme is the atrocities inflicted on the "comfort girls", it carries the message of the author's love of Hawaii and its native people. Very carefully researched and almost poetic in portions. The love of jazz music is perhaps dealt with to an extreme,yet presents an educational tertiary theme. Highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: enthralling saga
Review: I am not quite through this magnificent novel as I write this, and in fact am reluctant to reach the end, for it is a marvelous story, rich in imagery, vivid (very) in tales, and it reads like sensitive poetry. Any true fan of Hawaiiana should love this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Get Shark Dialogues instead!
Review: I don't know what happened here, but Ms. Davenport's earlier book was much better. This one was such a disappointment. There are two very big flaws in this book. First, there are far too many ridiculous and totally implausable coincidences. Coincidentally meeting old friends and enemies in different parts of the world? Several times??? It's lame. I can't believe how weak this book is... Enough already with the textures and colors again and again...The constant sex dialogue is RIDICULOUSLY graphic and INCREDIBLY uninteresting. Really, the text could have been so much better without having to read the minutae about hairs, girth, etc. Follow me?"Shark Dialogues" was much better. I recommend that or, better yet, "In the Time of the Butterflies" by Julia Alvarez. Also has an island feel, beautiful scenery, interesting culture... revolt and revolution...it's one of the best books I've ever read. And it's based on a true story.
Rating:
Summary: Get Shark Dialogues instead!
Review: I first became acquainted with Kiana Davenport's work with "Shark Dialouges". The writing and imagery took me back to in time to when I was a little girl, sitting in my grandmother's kitchen in Makakilo, listen to her and my aunties "talk story" as they cooked, laughed and remembered. I loved that book, but I have to say I loved "Song of the Exile" even more. Kiana has managed to do what I have never seen before and what I wish that I could do: present the Hawaiian experience to a mainstream audience not as the "aloha-sterotype" that many people have, but life as it really is, with all of its struggles and its everyday conversations and rhythms. I only wish that her work would receive the recognition that it deserves. It truly is "He wahî pa`akai" ("Just a packet of salt"), an old Hawaiian saying that proves that gifts made by the giver are the best ones of all.
Rating:
Summary: True to Life
Review: I first became acquainted with Kiana Davenport's work with "Shark Dialouges". The writing and imagery took me back to in time to when I was a little girl, sitting in my grandmother's kitchen in Makakilo, listen to her and my aunties "talk story" as they cooked, laughed and remembered. I loved that book, but I have to say I loved "Song of the Exile" even more. Kiana has managed to do what I have never seen before and what I wish that I could do: present the Hawaiian experience to a mainstream audience not as the "aloha-sterotype" that many people have, but life as it really is, with all of its struggles and its everyday conversations and rhythms. I only wish that her work would receive the recognition that it deserves. It truly is "He wahî pa`akai" ("Just a packet of salt"), an old Hawaiian saying that proves that gifts made by the giver are the best ones of all.
Rating:
Summary: Amazing!
Review: I heard of this book from a friend living in Hawaii who highly recommended it. Although I rarely read fiction, this book left me breathless and wanting to read more of Davenport's work. Each sentence is so well crafted, I could not put the book down, and often dreampt of leaving work early to go home and race through it. As I was pulled into the lives of the characters, I found myself constantly amazed at Davenport's poetic prose. I am recommending this book to all my friends and family.
Rating: 
Summary: Vivid depiction of WW2 Hawaii
Review: I picked up this novel on a hunch, attracted to the beautiful cover and intriguing title. I am happy to say that the inside was as interesting as the outside. The story covers a broad scope of time, beginning in pre-World War II Hawaii. Two families are brought together when Sunny, the daughter of an abusive father and submissive mother, and Keo, the son of a loving family, fall in love. Keo's musical talents lead him to Paris, right before German invasion. Sunny, searching for her long-lost sister, meets up with Keo and from there, things get out of control. They are both taken prisoner, and when Keo returns to Hawaii, he is faced with a new life, without Sunny. If you are interested in the history of Hawaii and its role in World War II or just want a great love story, I think you will really enjoy this novel.
Rating:
Summary: Vivid depiction of WW2 Hawaii
Review: I picked up this novel on a hunch, attracted to the beautiful cover and intriguing title. I am happy to say that the inside was as interesting as the outside. The story covers a broad scope of time, beginning in pre-World War II Hawaii. Two families are brought together when Sunny, the daughter of an abusive father and submissive mother, and Keo, the son of a loving family, fall in love. Keo's musical talents lead him to Paris, right before German invasion. Sunny, searching for her long-lost sister, meets up with Keo and from there, things get out of control. They are both taken prisoner, and when Keo returns to Hawaii, he is faced with a new life, without Sunny. If you are interested in the history of Hawaii and its role in World War II or just want a great love story, I think you will really enjoy this novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Not a perfect day in paradise
Review: I was an ambivalent reader of Shark Latitudes. The writing and imagery in her previous book were wonderful, but the allegories just a bit far fetched. Thus, I read Kiana Davenport's new book with the hope that she would use her considerable writing skills "for good". Unfortunately, I think she went the wrong direction. This book was unidirectionally depressing. While this is certainly acceptable (consider any novel about China or Ireland in the 1900's), where was the moral or redeeming outcome to make it worthwhile? I did not find it here.
Rating:
Summary: A Compelling Universal Tapestry
Review: I will not recount the story; the other reviewers do it, and for my money, the story is marvelous. Like so many, I did not want this book to end, and rationed reading it for that reason. I cannot think of any other writer I have ever read who can capture in concrete, substantial, palpable images abstractions like jazz, or pain, or love, or wistfulness. The visuals her words sculpt are staggering. Hardly essential to an appreciation of this magnificent work, if you have lived in Hawaii, ever had an appreciation of either or both of its indigenous and diverse cultures, been entranced by music, felt the power and mystery of natural things, it will resonate with you on innumerable levels. You will learn a fair amount of Hawaiian along the way if you care to, and you should, as it is a beautiful and evocative and incredibly musical language. The book is more than poetry--it is, in many ways, a great mele. It speaks of essences, of life's value, its challenges, its losses, its pain. There are parts as profound and compact in that as any philosophy one could want (the small chapterlet recounting Malia's last visit with Pono may be the best piece of writing in that regard I have ever read). The political material through the book is, if you read closely, not polemical, but balanced if with a clear but hardly simplistic preference. And on a societal level, it is a magnificent paean to the power of women, especially their power over men, wanted or not, and the consequences, marvelous and horrific, of that power. If you are a woman, or you truly love them as I do, you will hold this book fiercely to your heart. Those who say Ms. Davenport embraced too much in too complex a way--with which I totally disagree--would probably say the same of Thomas Wolfe, whose prose at times hers resembles, several of whose works I number among my favorites in the language. I would rate this book higher than any I have reviewed on Amazon to date, and among the best novels I have ever read--and I have read thousands.
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