Extinction Capital of the World: Stories

by Mariah Rigg

Magnetic, haunting, and tender, Extinction Capital of the World is a stunning portrait of Hawai’i—and a powerful meditation on family, queer love, and community amid imperialism and environmental collapse.

In ten vibrant, affecting stories, Mariah Rigg immerses readers in contemporary Hawai’i. By turns heartbreaking and hopeful, these stories of love, longing, and grief are fierce dispatches from a state haunted by the specter of colonization, a precious biome under constant threat.

An older man grapples with the American-weapons research conducted on a neighboring island that reverberates through his entire life. A pregnant woman seeks belonging while poaching flowers in the rainforest with her partner’s mother. Two teenage girls find love during a summer spent on Midway Atoll. A young woman returns home to O’ahu following a breakup and reconnects with her estranged father and the island itself.

Linked by both place and character, Rigg’s stories illuminate the exotification and commodification of Hawai’i in the American mythos. Extinction Capital of the World is an environmental love letter to the Hawaiian Islands and an indelible portrayal of the people who inhabit them—marking the arrival of an exciting new voice in contemporary fiction.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Queer, Anthologies, Contemporary, LGBT, Literary Fiction

256 pages, Paperback

First published August 5, 2025

About the author

Mariah Rigg is a Samoan-Haole who was born and raised on the island of O‘ahu. She is the author of the short story collection EXTINCTION CAPITAL OF THE WORLD, which is forthcoming from Ecco/HarperCollins in Summer 2025. Her chapbook, ALL HAT, NO CATTLE was published by Bull City Press in 2023.

Mariah is the recipient of fellowships and awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, MASS MoCA, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, The Mount, Oregon Literary Arts, Carolyn Moore Writers’ House, and Lambda Literary. Her work has been featured in Oxford American, Electric Lit, The Common, Joyland, The Sewanee Review, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA from the University of Oregon and is currently a PhD candidate at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville where she teaches writing.

Reviews

[Lauren D'Souza · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm so blown away by this and would never believe that it's Mariah's debut work. Every story is united by an incredibly strong sense of place in Hawaii. Even if the story doesn’t directly take place in Hawaii, each protagonist is impacted by a childhood or a connection to this sacred, exploited, complex place. And Mariah embraces that complexity, not shying away from the fraught conflict around land rights, national identity, colonization, the isolation of the islands, and the endangered natural beauty.

Each story is individual, but they're also all fundamentally about relationships: an aspiring museum curator and her art-loving art museum custodian grandmother; two best friends with a fraught relationship worn by time; a mom threatened by her overbearing aunt’s relationship with her daughter; a burgeoning, innocent childhood romance on Midway; a man who wants to do his small part to erase the legacy of war on Hawaii for his granddaughter.

None of Mariah's stories fall into the two usual traps I see in short story collections: (1) a lack of a full plot arc or (2) placing an abrupt ending on a story that doesn’t really have an ending because you can get away with it in this form. Mariah doesn't use the short story as an excuse to avoid developing her characters fully and giving them real, rounded personalities and lives. There are no clickbait-y premises to reel you in. Every story is beautifully thought through, with strong narrative arcs, all told by main characters that feel real, flawed, and complex. Her writing is lyrical and memorable.

I can't wait to see what else she puts out! Thank you to Ecco for the early copy.

[Danika at The Lesbrary · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would recommend reading this slowly, spacing out the stories. They’re well written, thoughtful, and often melancholic. Relationships fall apart, parents are abusive or absent, families are strained. There are definitely moments of hope and beauty, but personally, I needed a bit of breathing room between stories.

There is a lot of casual queerness in this collection; not only do several stories centre queer relationships, but there are also stories where a woman references her wife on the mainland, for example, even though it doesn’t come up again. I always appreciate books where queerness is woven throughout, even when it’s not the central focus.

So, pick up this memorable story collection and learn more about “the extinction capital of the world” while immersing yourself in these characters’ lives.

Full review at the Lesbrary.

[Nuha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you Ecco and NetGalley for the Advanced Reader's Copy!

Available August 2025.

Whew - it's been a while since I read a collection of short stories as captivating as Mariah Rigg's Extinction Capital of the World. Told through a variety of narrators who are all interconnected, this collection attempts to capture the beauty and tragedy of modern life on the islands of Hawaii. What seems like one isolated tale slowly unfurls itself into a beautiful, colorful tapestry of domestic life and its political weight. Looming in the background is this ever present sense of loss - loss of parents, of children, of lovers, of land and history, of life itself. Yet Riggs balances it by showing us the new ways life carries on and on and on. Excellent work!

[Matthew · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s rare that I find myself reading a collection of short stories, even rarer when it’s a collection by a single author, in which I loved every story. The stories are unique and beautiful, yet at times heartbreaking and tragic. The writing was so good; I could taste the salt water and smell the flowers. I loved walking, driving, and hiking around Hawaii with the characters who had real problems and fears. The stories left me wanting more, which is what a good writer can do.

I received an advanced review copy from the publisher. However, I will be purchasing a personal hardback when it hits shelves.

[KDub · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 🌟 rounded up

I've said this so many times this year, but I can't believe that this is a debut novel. It was incredible! These ten short stories paint a beautiful, moving portrait of Hawai'i, its people, and their struggles. It's rare for me to read an anthology where I like every single story. Mariah Rigg's ability to capture the beauty of the islands makes you feel like you're there with the characters, feeling their loss, their love, their pain, and their hope.

I got a bit lost in the overarching genealogy of the various characters, but it didn't take away from the book overall.

I do wish I had sat with each story individually to absorb it before moving on to the next one. That would be my recommendation to readers. Anyone who enjoys contemporary fiction anthologies with LGBT+ rep will love this one.

Jennifer Robideau did the narration for the audiobook. She has a lovely, easy-to-listen-to voice. I would gladly listen to her narration again.

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperAudio Adult for the ALC.

[Josie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book rocked my world. Get ready, people.

[Nic Anstett · Rating 5 out of 5]

A masterpiece by any measure.

[Aneesa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shh... I bought this galley proof from a used bookstore.

From the very first story, you get the sense this book will encompass generations, like the book itself is a kū'auhau. The future tense we encounter gives the coming-of-age stories a midlife-crisis feel. At least to me.

Once I realized the stories are linked (duh, this is in the back cover copy), I started drawing a family tree. Which was exciting but distracting. Most of the characters do not actually show up more than once, but their descendants do. They are so similar to each other I got them confused. This too is intentional, which I realized when I got to "(Partheno)genesis."

In the last story, when I looked up to find out what kind of Hawaiian flora a "phylogenetic tree (rooted and unrooted)" is, it came together even more. True to form, I loved that we were treated to first person plural. I won't give it away, but the end of the book brings the stories all together in a distinctive way that I haven't seen in a collection like this before.

Spoiler: There is one story in the middle of this book I had to stop reading until after I finished the book, because I was afraid something bad would happen to a child.

[Megan Johnston · Rating 4 out of 5]

I need to read more short stories.

[lucy · Rating 5 out of 5]

fire

[Debi Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I felt myself on my favorite beach, breathing in the salt air, driving the rural roads, looking out over Kalaupapa, and longing for home. Mariah Rigg weaves together poignant stories of growing, family, love, longing, friendship, breaking, leaving, returning, destruction, and discovery. The inescapable effects of colonization that we grow up with are ever-present in the stories, driving us together, apart, away, and back to each other and the āina. Her storytelling contains the power to pull up vivid memories of hanabata days, running around barefoot with my aunties & uncles on Moloka'i, then washing our feet with the hose before going inside with just the mention of watching water full of dirt go down the drain.

Cannot wait for what Mariah Rigg graces us with next.

[Charis · Rating 3 out of 5]

Individually, any one of these stories would have been good. But as a collection, they are unbelievably repetitious. I was tired of mommy issues and homosexual awakenings by story #3. After the halfway point I started skimming the ends of the stories because I felt like I've already read them and knew how they would end (and I was always right). Rigg is not a bad writer -- just please, please vary your stories if you're going to publish a volume!

[abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

i was very sad when it was over. i would have read 10 more of these stories. i loved the prescient narration throughout and how all the stories connected to each other. one of the negative reviews said that they were all too similar, but the variations on the same themes strengthened rather than diluted the essence of the collection. EXTINCTION CAPITAL is an exquisite love letter to home that embraces the difficulties and contradictions of being raised as a settler on stolen land rather than eliding them.

[Trista Cremeans · Rating 5 out of 5]

Despite having never gone to Hawai'i myself, I find myself in love with the islands thanks to this collection. Rigg has such a wonderful way of translating the beauty to paper. Each story resonated with me and when I realized they were all connected I audibly gasped, and found myself more invested with each story. One story in particular had me quietly reflecting on my own similar experiences and feeling strange relief that much as in Pono's lesson we are all connected.

Thank You ecco books for sending me an advanced reader copy.

[Michael Dorgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I forgot how much I love short stories- maybe this is a bad sign for my attention span, but I find them so much more accessible! These ones were woven together so finely and intricately- spanning queer love and relationships, nature and destruction of it, active colonialism and its legacy. Well written and deeply sad. A good Max find yet again….

[Mariah · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great blend of culture, anti colonialism, and embracing identity!

[Briana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Highly recommend the audiobook.

[Ryleigh Wann · Rating 5 out of 5]

Told from a voice that is equal parts honest in the glory and brutality of messy relationships, Rigg’s debut brings a magnifying class to humans and their complications. Queer yearning, family dynamics, the environmental impact from colonization…. This debut is so stunning. I was particularly moved by “(Partheno)Genesis” which did highlighted my favorite thing about writing: how a story, character or moment can wipe a hazy window between the reader and a memory, and feel like they have been seen for the first time. It’s comforting and painful and that’s what makes me so glad to have read it.

[BookTrib.com]

We have a feeling we'll be thinking about this short story collection for days.

[Ailey | Bisexual Bookshelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you to NetGalley and Ecco Press for the eARC! This book will release in the US on August 5, 2025.

Extinction Capital of the World by Mariah Rigg is a collection that will easily make you feel cracked open. In ten interconnected short stories set across the islands of Hawai’i, Rigg weaves a haunting, tender, and politically charged tapestry of queerness, intergenerational grief, and the slow, quiet violence of colonialism and climate collapse. Her characters are often fractured—by family, by empire, by time—but never entirely broken. Whether it's Sam and Geri’s fleeting teenage love on a disappearing atoll, or a granddaughter weighing the cost of leaving the grandmother who raised her, each story pulses with longing—for land, for belonging, for a version of love that isn’t conditional.

Rigg’s prose is luminous and intimate, blurring the line between memory and present moment. She often shifts between second- and third-person narration, allowing the reader to inhabit both the ache of personal loss and the larger historical wound of settler colonialism. In stories like “Target Island” and “Poachers,” she shows how the destruction of ecosystems mirrors the unraveling of family, and how queer kinship can be a lifeline when blood family fails. Her writing is thick with sensory detail—salt air, scorched land, calloused hands—and yet never overwrought. The heartbreak is quiet, cumulative, and so very real.

What struck me most was how Rigg holds grief and love in the same breath. So many characters in this collection are searching for home—not just geographically, but emotionally, relationally, ancestrally. Queerness here is not always celebrated, but it is deeply felt, and often interwoven with tenderness, survival, and the hope of chosen family.

If you love queer stories that interrogate imperialism, if you’re drawn to the liminal spaces between land and water, memory and myth, then this collection will stay with you. Extinction Capital of the World is both elegy and love letter—to Hawai’i, to those who came before, and to what still might be saved.

📖 Read this if you love: anti-colonial environmental fiction, intergenerational queer narratives, and lyrical prose that holds both grief and tenderness.

🔑 Key Themes: Settler Colonialism and Cultural Erasure, Queer Love and Chosen Family, Climate Collapse and Ecological Grief, Motherhood and Generational Trauma, Belonging and Displacement.

Content/Trigger Warnings: Gore (minor), Child Abuse (minor), Alcohol (moderate), Cancer (minor), Death of a Child (minor), Miscarriage (minor), Infidelity (minor), Bullying (minor), Domestic Abuse (minor), Abandonment (minor), Alcoholism (minor), Drug Use (minor), Vomit (minor), Blood (minor), Animal Death (minor), Death of a Parent (moderate).

[Atlas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extinction Capital of the World
by Mariah Rigg
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Thank you to Ecco and the brilliant author for the ARC! 🌈📚💌

QUICK VIBE CHECK:
This is the kind of short story collection that wrecks you—in the most reverent, reflective way 🥺🌋🌊. From Hawaiian shorelines to haunted military legacies, each tale feels like it’s been passed down with salt on the tongue 🧂 and grief in the bones 🖤.

WHAT I LOVED:
• Deeply interconnected characters across generations, told with both intimacy and distance 🌺👨‍👩‍👧‍👦
• Vivid, sensory descriptions that made me feel inside the land, air, and sea of Hawai’i 🌴🍃🌫️
• Stories that don’t just touch on colonialism—they interrogate it, quietly and powerfully ⚖️💔🏝️
• Lyrical, careful prose that never cheats the reader with easy outs ✍🏼🕊️📖
• The final story (first person plural 😭) pulled it all together like a cultural chant 🎶🔥🌺

WHAT MADE ME PAUSE:
• So many characters across timelines—at times I did get a little lost in the genealogy 🧬🤯
• One middle story was hard to get through because I feared for a child character 🫣👶💭
• This is literary fiction in short story form, not plot-driven—so if you're expecting clear arcs each time, be warned ⚠️🌀📚

TROPES / THEMES:
• Intergenerational storytelling 🧓🏼👩🏽👧🏽
• Environmental grief and reverence 🌱🌧️🦜
• Queer identity and community 🏳️‍🌈💕
• Cultural displacement 🌍🛶
• Found and fractured family 💔➡️💖
• Coming-of-age across a fading coastline 🐚🌅

FINAL THOUGHTS:
Mariah Rigg did something rare here: she gave us a Hawai’i that breathes—not as fantasy, not as postcard—but as ancestral land steeped in joy and sorrow 🫶🏼🏝️🖤. Every story stitched a thread into a greater tapestry 🧵🌺, and by the end, I felt like I’d read a novel made of waves 🌊📘💫. This is what modern literary fiction should be. And if this is Rigg’s debut? I am absolutely here for whatever comes next 😍👏🏼🔥.

[Steph | bookedinsaigon]

Thank you to Ecco Books and NetGalley for the free e-ARC in exchange for an honest review

DNFed at 17%. I wanted to like this debut short story collection that explores the ways in which lives are affected by the U.S.’ manipulative and illegal overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai’i and its continued occupation of the land for military, capitalist, and touristic purposes. Unfortunately, I think that Rigg’s prose and I do not get along.

The melancholic, at times portending, prose had a way of sucking the anticipation and forward movement out of the stories, by often explicitly stating what the outcome will be, not even just foreshadowing it. For instance, in the first story, “Target Island,” we find out when the main character, Harrison, will encounter his “last torpedo” as part of his volunteer efforts to clean up Kaho’olawe (the local island that the U.S. military completely took over to test out their combs) even before he encounters his first torpedo. In the second story, “Dawn Chorus,” readers are told of a storm, and of the significance of Sam and Geri’s relationship, before either has time to develop over the course of the story.

Maybe I’m a more basic reader, but I need writing that leaves room for plot and characters to unfold, rather than to tell me the ending before anything has happened. More immediacy, if you will.

Nevertheless, I think there is still something unique about the way in which Rigg backgrounds her stories against the very real present-day effects of attempting to carve out life for yourself on colonized and militarized land. If you like more literary short stories, don’t mind a distant/retrospective third person narration, and care about exploring the effects of colonialism on modern-day Hawai’i, give this one a go.

[Claire Binkley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This story has so much in it I couldn't share myself. It is entirely delivered in plain English, instead of the bewildering Hawaii'an language which they have on offer if you try the Duolingo app. The author mentions a bit of Japanese and Russian cultural aspects, as well, both languages which I have tried, with varying results.

In this book there is a little bit of cursing, but it is entirely in the dialogue, in the context of like a boy with an uncultured way of speech.

This book describes so much wildlife that I would probably have to read it for about a month to catch it all, since there is a distracting drama interwoven through the whole thing.

You have to read this to see what is in it instead of my describing it.
There are several islands in between continental US and continental Asia, and the several that this book's collection of stories are set on are called all together Hawai'i.
Wikipedia says there are 137 of them. It is a tropical archipelago. Personally I find that a little challenging to imagine but maybe you might have an easier time, depending on how you prefer to spend your time.

The story that I remember most clearly was set on Midway because my father likes a movie also set on Midway.
Overall, I thought very well of them, and you might, too.

[Ailin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book more than I think I did, and I think that is more about my state than the books. A set of interconnected short stories, all deeply rooted in Hawaiian culture, was well written and haunting, but I had a difficult time getting into the book. Unsure if it was because I've never been to Hawaii and so so many of the locations were foreign, or the style of collection of short stories. I enjoy the idea of interconnected short stories, have enjoyed them in the past, and thought Riggs did this well, but each short story felt like it was leading me to a novel. I kept feeling like I was caught in the middle -- a snip-it - of some character's life and should have more information than I did. Again, I think this says more about my own shortcomings than the book and I will recognize that Rigg's writes as if she's been doing it for a while, rather than this being a debut work. I know some people will love this collection, but it missed the mark for me.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for the eARC in exchange for an honest review. Check it out next month!

[Patricia · Rating 4 out of 5]

In her Goodreads review, Aneesa pointed out the similarity between the phylogenetic tree that Pono asks his students to draw and the way this story collection is constructed as a family tree. I wish I had seen that sooner! I love the idea, that interweaving of human beings and the rest of nature.

It was fun visiting some familiar parts of Oahu, and some defamiliarized ones. The very few surviving native snails are actually elsewhere than where Rigg puts them (maybe Rigg is protecting the location).

The last story was a daring and interesting experiment with the "we" who might be ancestors or sentient nature or something else. That last story was one of my favorites but also had some rough edges. What is it that Pono's killing the invasive chameleon is supposed to say about his character or what to do with invasive creatures? A little more information here, maybe on the impact the chameleon has, or more development of the different ways Pono and Kira see his action, would be a welcome development, not overly didactic.
3.5+

[NZ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Short story collection based in Hawai'i which unfolds with a sense of time, idyll, and space inseparable from the setting. The tensions within the mixed (race, ethnicity, SES) families spread across these ten stories evoke the struggle of an indigenous people to live their daily lives affected by American imperialism, both in past and present iterations. Connections to home, land, and mothers repeat with the specter of divorce, child abuse/neglect, and cancer lingering heavily.

The interweaving between generations is something you have to pay serious attention to because it's too easy to miss. And while the repetitions of families and circumstances are meant to bring certain themes to the fore, there is nonetheless an emotional constipation in this book which gives it an unfortunate blandness. This book reminded me of that Chekhov quote about how the Russian loves recalling life but he does not love living.

[Jamie]

One thing I love about EXTINCTION CAPITAL OF THE WORLD by Mariah Rigg is the integration of queer characters throughout. There’s many coming of age moments, struggle and hardship, but queerness is a home base, a normality.

Rigg’s characters navigate identity and loss in a multitude of ways, from complicated family structures to the questioning of self identity. These loosely connected stories are based in Hawai’i, many of the characters trying to find/build lives beyond their small island towns, afraid of what staying means for who they are.

The pacing of these stories took me a minute to adjust to, but there’s a rhythm to be found, slow in some moments, then a quickening, then sometimes time is not even there. There’s a floating-ness to be prepared for, which for me, aligned with many of the places the characters were mentally/emotionally.

[Nichole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extinction Capital of the World is a beautiful, melancholic exploration of life impacted by colonialism and imperialism. Once I picked up the book, I had a hard time putting it down. The writing is calming, even when the subject matter is heavy. These short stories, that are loosely connected by character or place, are honest in their humanity. The bring to life the multi-layered complications that is living in a place that has become so deeply intertwined with the very recent impact of colonization. The characters and storylines were relatable; the interactions and reactions that took place from character actions where believable. I find this is the type of short story collection I will be returning to.

Thank you to Ecco for gifting me a copy of this book.

[Hayden Roberts · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully written and poetic. These stories were unique, yet all of them were connected in a way that was subtle and poignant. I know that some people mentioned their irritation with how repetitive the stories felt, as most of them include the same themes (such as queer love or parental abuse); however, I think they are missing the point! These motifs are recurring for a reason! Furthermore, Riggs does a wonderful job of weaving the ever present threads of colonialism and environmental peril into even the smallest corners of our characters’ lives. There is rarely a moment where you don’t feel the discomfort of this reality. For a debut, this was impressive.

Thank you to Goodreads for the ARC!

[Cindy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Related stories about people who live, love, and work in Hawaii. They are slow and thoughtful stories about all different types of relationships: those of parents, friends, lovers, co-workers, etc. sometimes the characters were gay and other times straight. Some young, some old, from the male or the female POV. Yet they all seemed similar, as our struggles have many similarities.
The audiobook was well narrated. As a collection of stories, it would be better (as another reviewer suggested) to space out the listening or reading experience in order to savor each story individually.
My thanks to the author, publisher, @HarperAudioAdult, and #NetGalley for access to the audiobook for review purposes. It is currently available.