Lehua, Ka'ao a Ka Wahine [Lehua, the Story of a Woman] - A Hawaiian Noblewoman Comes of Age at a Changing of the Gods. (Paperback)

In the spring of 1819 King Kamehameha the first, died after reigning over the first unified Kingdom of Hawai'i. His young son, Liholiho, became Kamehameha II, but effective control of the government was inherited by the old king's favorite wife, Ku hina Nui Queen Regent], Ka'a humanu. That fall, Liholiho was forced to agree to the abandonment of the native religion in favor of Christianity. Five months later, the first contingent of Calvinist missionaries arrived. It was a death sentence to the 3000 year old Kanaka Maoli true people] culture in Hawai'i. Lehua lia kahu ama lio akalani pa'aka lole Lehua, the shiny haired questioner of the secrets], the fictitious young noblewoman of this novel, comes of age at this trying moment in Hawaiian history. Her ancestry gives her the right, responsibility and ability to be a leader of her people, but with the lifting of the kapu, she is suddenly bereft of her divine reason to be. Beset by doubt, alien temptations and a welter of rational, if frightening, options, she falls in love with a part-Hawaiian paniolo cowboy] and makes a life for herself, her ohana family] and her circle of influence, astride the divergent forces that will ultimately doom her culture. In 1893 local American businessmen overthrew the Republic of Hawai'i and traded the Islands to the U. S.