Ask the Author: Bill Fernandez
Answered Questions (4)
Bill Fernandez
Just sit down and keep on writing, even if it feels like junk! Read the genre for style inspiration.
Bill Fernandez
My new historical novel, John Tana, is likely to be ready for sales in a couple of months in 2016.
My hero is a Native Hawaiian teenage orphan whose inherited farmland is stolen by plantation owners who took advantage of a new law introducing private property to Hawai'i: The Great Mahele. The unfair clash between powerful Western business interests and Hawaiian ways creates turmoil which threatens his life. Because of his possible claim to regain his land, he is a marked man which causes him and family to escape by canoe to Oahu. Set amid the whaling era and burgeoning power of the plantations, the reader is carried along like his canoe on a powerful, destructive wave. A love interest conflict between Christianity mores and Hawaiian ways adds to his torment.
Did a lot of research on this period in the island history when the simple taro farmers and fishermen were helpless against Western domination.
My hero is a Native Hawaiian teenage orphan whose inherited farmland is stolen by plantation owners who took advantage of a new law introducing private property to Hawai'i: The Great Mahele. The unfair clash between powerful Western business interests and Hawaiian ways creates turmoil which threatens his life. Because of his possible claim to regain his land, he is a marked man which causes him and family to escape by canoe to Oahu. Set amid the whaling era and burgeoning power of the plantations, the reader is carried along like his canoe on a powerful, destructive wave. A love interest conflict between Christianity mores and Hawaiian ways adds to his torment.
Did a lot of research on this period in the island history when the simple taro farmers and fishermen were helpless against Western domination.
Bill Fernandez
I am writing a sequel to Cult of Ku. Ten years later, Grant Kingsley is married, has two children, and practices law. In 1931 a young Hawaiian man was shot by a Naval officer trying to scare him into admitting to the rape of the officer's wife. The Massie case is still in the minds of many Hawaiians as it led to the impression that the Caucasian power elite could do what it wanted to to the non-white people. I have fictionalized the case and describe it through the eyes of the ten year old son of Grant Kingsley. Race plays a big role.
Bill Fernandez
After writing three books about the island history, I decided the most interesting way to describe the complex multi-ethnic society and Caucasian power structure in the early 20th century was in a novel. I enjoy reading murder mysteries. Since the early 1900s the islands were inundated with sugar and pineapple plantations and floods of immigrant labor brought in to work on them. It seemed a perfect brew for a murder mystery! I chose the year 1920 because it was the centennial of the arrival of the missionaries. Many revere their arrival but some resent how it led to the plantations that usurped Native Hawaiians from their land. The tension between the workers and planters was at a peak then; violent suppression even led to murders. I decided who would be more in conflict with his own identity (planter vs. Hawaiian) than a part-Hawaiian, son of a prominent leader in island society and politics? I enjoy novels based on historical events and used this technique to tell the story of the islands instead of just straight history. Enjoy!
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