Chanticleer Book Reviews

Tag: Adoption

  • THE ALOHA SPIRIT by Linda Ulleseit – Hawaiian Cultural Fiction, World War II Historical Fiction, Women’s Divorce Fiction

    THE ALOHA SPIRIT by Linda Ulleseit – Hawaiian Cultural Fiction, World War II Historical Fiction, Women’s Divorce Fiction

     

    A blue and gold badge for the 2020 Grand Prize Winner for Goethe Post-1750s The Aloha Spirit by Linda Ulleseit

    In Linda Ulleseit’s novel The Aloha Spirit, we meet the plucky heroine, Dolores, as her father leaves her.

    “Dolores’s father deemed her useless when she was seven. Neither he nor her older brother, Pablo, ever said that, but every detail of their leaving told her so. Papa had tried to explain the Hawaiian custom of hānai to her. All she understood was the giving away, leaving her to live with a family not her own.”

    Her story starts in 1922; the place, multiethnic, multilingual Hawaii. Papa, a sugar cane cutter from Spain who worked in Hawaii, decides to take his son Pablo with him to seek his fortune in California. His wife died five years earlier. He leaves 7-year-old Dolores with a large family on Oahu in an arrangement called hānai, an informal adoption. Dolores doesn’t know the family well. She feels abandoned, with no idea when or if her father will send for her or return.

    There follow years of drudgery in which she works as an adult, laundering clothes for many people at least six days a week as part of her hānai arrangement. The hard-working couple she lives with struggles to survive. Befriended by Maria, an older hānai girl, Dolores escapes her situation when Maria leaves to marry Peter. Dolores goes to live with them, to help Maria through her pregnancy, and for a while, she gets to share their happy family and have some things of her own.

    At age 16, Dolores marries Manolo Medeiros, a boy she met on the beach and barely knows.

    She becomes part of his large, extended Portuguese family, which includes Alberto, a nephew four years younger than Dolores. She hopes the Medeiroses will be the family she always wished for. When she met him on the beach, Manolo gave his interpretation of the aloha spirit: “Aloha begins with love.”… “Love yourself first.”… “Love the land.”… “Love the people.”… “Aloha is the joyous sharing of life’s energy.”

    Dolores has her first child at age 17. But Manolo’s serious drinking problem, anger, and physical abuse of Dolores estranges him from her and the family, forcing her to take more control of her own life and protect her daughters. As Manolo’s behavior worsens, Alberto steps up to support Dolores, and they fall in love. But as part of a devout Catholic family, Dolores can’t possibly divorce Manolo.

    Novelist Ulleseit gives us a vivid picture of the life of a hard-working Hawaiian woman and her community in the early decades of the 20th century.

    Anyone interested in the history of Hawaii or in women’s history will enjoy this book. This book centers on abuse, overwork, and alcoholism as major themes, described in a matter-of-fact way. Dolores lives through interesting times, including the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the United States’ entry into the war, rationing, and the removal of Japanese Americans from Hawaii. Dolores goes to California and visits the World’s Fair, so we get to see the fair through her eyes. A glossary at the end of the book provides translations and a pronunciation guide for the many Hawaiian and Spanish words.

    Linda Ulleseit was born and raised in Saratoga, California, and taught elementary school in San José. In addition to The Aloha Spirit, she wrote Under the Almond Trees, another historical novel, which takes place in California starting in 1896. She has also written a series of Flying Horse books, young adult fantasy books set in medieval Wales. She has an MFA in writing from Lindenwood University, serves as marketing chair of Women Writing the West, and is a founding member of Paper Lantern Writers.

    Linda Ulleseit’s The Aloha Spirit won Grand Prize in the 2020 CIBA Goethe Book Awards for post-1750s Historical Novels.

    5 Star Best Book Chanticleer Reviews round silver sticker

  • The SPANISH CLUB by Danielle Burnette – Y/A, Fiction

    The SPANISH CLUB by Danielle Burnette – Y/A, Fiction

    Seven Chicago teens spend one eventful week on a chaperoned field trip to Mexico. Traveling with the intention of cultural immersion, they instead learn love, forgiveness, and some serious life lessons.

    St. Francis High School Spanish Club members Brianna and her BFF Dana, along with five other friends are on a field trip that they won’t soon forget. It’s the summer before their senior year, and adulthood—with all of its attendant major decisions—looms. Flying into Mexico City accompanied by teachers Mrs. Fritz and Miss Yancy, they meet Miguel the guide, who ushers them through La Ciudad’s myriad monuments, cathedrals, and markets, as well as Teotihuacán, Guanajuato, and Guadalajara. It’s quite the whirlwind trip, with Miguel’s impassioned recounting of history adding meaning and depth for students and readers alike. Indeed, the rich imagery of the hi about astorical landmarks blossom on the page, and the descriptions of the people, the food, and the art should fire the imaginations of teen readers and instill in them a desire to travel to Mexico City and beyond.

    That said, The Spanish Club is not a travel essay, but a young adult drama, stocked with classic teen yearnings, choices, vanities, and pranks. Author Burnette does a marvelous job of imbuing the narrative with colorful angst: “At once, every blemish on Brianna’s body itched and squirmed for Enrique’s attention, and she stiffened under the weight of all her imperfections.” Her characters embody every emotional high and low – especially protagonist Brianna Garrett.

    Brianna is inseparable from her BFF, Dana Tate, until she discovers, with equal parts shock and delight, that heartthrob Enrique has shared her distant admiration since freshman year. A rift grows between the girls, and not only because of Enrique. Dana is jealous of Brianna’s growing friendship with dance team leader Stacia.

    But boys and BFFs aren’t the only things commanding Brianna’s attention.

    Before the trip, Brianna needed to acquire her passport. What she soon discovered forces a rift between the parents she always counted on for the truth. Brianna was adopted. And her parents never once disclosed the information. Now in Mexico, she rages against them and shuns their long-distance calls. But what brings eventual forgiveness is not her identity but her friend Dana.

    Throughout the story, the World Cup serves as a foreboding backdrop, with the alarming zeal of local news reports of fan-related tragedies. This culminates in a frightening confrontation that departs from the story’s general lightheartedness to make a sobering point, but also, brings Brianna and Dana back together, making The Spanish Club a very good summer read for Y/A audiences.