Release Date: June 21, 2022
Paperback ISBN: 978-1-57869-091-6
Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-57869-092-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022900434
eBook: 978-1-57869-093-0
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SYNOPSIS

Sadira Doyle believes the best years of her life are behind her. A housewife and mother in a parochial town during the latter years of the depression, she yearns for more. Her husband is an alcoholic sinking into despair; her eldest son’s eccentricities make him the object of bullying; and her mother-in-law’s religious zeal runs counter to Sadira’s own spiritual sensibilities. The weekly radio show, Hawai'i Calls, offers her a chance to escape. When her husband Archie loses his job as a mortician, Sadira decides they will begin anew in Hawai'i. 

Archie and Sadira set forth from New York City with their two young sons, bound for a place where they know no one. While the fresh start in Honolulu doesn’t transform Archie, and the move exacerbates their son Lionel’s emotional struggles, Sadira discovers new possibilities with a job as the society columnist for a Honolulu daily, finding herself in the company of movie stars, politicians, and Honolulu’s most powerful players. 

This intoxicating, glamorous world soon proves challenging and flawed. The Japanese attack on Oahu changes the landscape once again, altering daily life for the islands and for Sadira. With the islands’ serenity shattered, its glory days as playground to the stars are over, and Sadira must recreate herself once more to survive with her family intact.

PRAISE

“Spanning the years from the influenza pandemic of 1918 until the aftermath of World War II in 1946, this story is a saga that earns its magnetism. A good story in a great setting that will draw in readers.”

–Kirkus Reviews

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“A compelling story of family, heartache and transformation told in prose as intoxicating as the 1930s and 40s Honolulu that is its indelible backdrop.” 

–Meg Lukens Noonan, author of The Coat Route

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“Hawai‘i Calls is the quintessential American story: a sweeping family saga of movement, change, reinvention and transformation, while the forces of history shape events and the characters’ own haunted pasts lurk in the shadows. Told through two voices – that of the ambitious Sadira, who dreams of a life that offers more than being a housewife and enabler for her feckless alcoholic husband, and that of her young son Lionel, who sees the world through a markedly different lens – Hawai‘i Calls reminds us that every family story has multiple narratives. Matthews presents Sadira, Lionel and the large cast of other characters with depth and empathy; there are no bit parts in this richly woven, fast-paced novel.”

–William Mark Habeeb, author of Venice Beach

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“Between the sway of lush palm trees and the steely core of its protagonist, Hawai‘i Calls is a novel that delivers a gripping paradox in paradise. . . . Author Nelson Matthews displays a remarkable mastery of storytelling, particularly in the way she intersperses chapters from Sadira’s point of view with narration by her sensitive young son, Lionel. This dual perspective moves the story along apace, but also provides a layered look into the complex natures of both mother and son, and how easy it is for good intentions to be misunderstood and resentment to foment. . . . A must read.”

–Joni B. Cole, author of Good Naked: How to Write More, Write Better, and Be Happier

Reviews & In the News

The Magazine of the Punahou School, September 16, 2022: Puns in Print for Summer 2022

EVENT VIDEO, June 22, 2022: Hawai'i Calls by Marjorie Nelson Matthews at Norwich Bookstore.

Kirkus Reviews, May 12, 2022: A good story in a great setting that will draw in readers.

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