Words and Wine

Each month Kona Stories hosts an event with local and traveling authors. This event happens the First Tuesday evening of the month starting at 6 PM. Authors are available to talk story while you are getting your plate of appetizers and glass of complimentary wine. Authors then give a 15 minute talk about their book and themselves, the writing and publishing process or a short reading from the book. After all the authors presentations there is a time for individual questions and book signings with the authors. Expect 2 - 3 authors to attend each month and the evening to wrap up around 8 PM. Dress is Aloha casual wear.

May Authors are:

Malama Honua Hokule'a, a voyage of hope by Jennifer Allen

Jennifer Allen is the author of Malama Honua: Hokule’a, A Voyage of Hope (Patagonia, 2017) and the author of two previously published books. She has been a journalist for over twenty years. Her reporting has appeared in various publications including Rolling Stone, The New Republic and The New York Times Magazine. She has also been an on-air reporter for the NFL Network and NFL Films. Jennifer feels deeply honored and humbled to witness and document the Worldwide Voyage of Hōkūle‘a.

After 3 years, the double-hulled canoe Hōkūle‘a has completed its Mālama Honua Worldwide Voyage—a 42,000mile open-ocean journey around the world using only ancient Polynesian wayfinding techniques—and returned home to Hawai‘i. From the launch in Hawai‘i in May 2014, around the world to Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and North and South America, the book chronicles Hōkūle‘a’s epic mission to raise awareness of and nurture worldwide sustainability. Interwoven with descriptions of Hōkūle‘a’s experiences in port are the voices of the master navigators and crew members, who guide the ship along the ocean’s trackless path, and the local pioneers – scientists, teachers, and children touched by Hōkūle‘a – who work tirelessly to weather the many environmental challenges in our modern lives. This is a story about our need to draw together into one global community. By respecting one another and nature’s delicate and intricate systems, this book captures the many ways indigenous cultures are committed to living in ecological balance. Mālama Honua means “to care for the earth.” Of the journey, Nainoa Thompson, the president of the Polynesian Voyaging Society, says, “Hōkūle‘a is a needle sewing a lei of flowers around the world as an act of peace . . . and that is why we sail.” In the foreword, Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu writes, “The Worldwide Voyage of Mālama Honua is a testimony to the human spirit—that human beings can be so courageous, that human beings can be so inventive that they are ready to sail around the world to share the message of the peace of sustainable living. It is a voyage of respect for each other, for our whole planet, and for all who live on it. The message is that we must care for each other and for all life on Earth, for it is only then that Earth can take care of us and our future generations.”

Jennifer Allen is the author of a collection of short stories, Better Get Your Angel On published by Alfred A. Knopf (1989), and a memoir, Fifth Quarter: the Scrimmage of a Football Coach’s Daughter, Random House (2000). As a journalist, her writing has appeared in Rolling Stone, the New York Times Magazine, The New Republic, George, ESPN.com, and PLAY.  Her personal essays have been anthologized in Because I Said So, Paris On The Mind, and The Library of America’s Football, Great Writing About the National Sport.” She has also written for HBO’s ARLI$$ and was an on-air reporter for NFL Network and Emmy Award-winning NFL Films.

From Exile to Eden: A Family Journal  By Jadwiga Szelazek Morrison

After living in Connecticut for the last ten years where she wrote and published From Exile To Eden, Jadwiga Morrison has returned to Hawaii once again. She retired from teaching in the Special Services Department of the regional high school in Burlington, Connecticut. She is currently working on her second book, This Life of Mine and other literary projects. Jadwiga has a Liberal Arts degree in English with a minor in History from Central Connecticut State University. She is also a certified Transpersonal Hypnotherapist (CHt) specializing in compulsions, phobias, and learning disabilities. Jadwiga has worked as a registered Behavioral Technician (RBT) working with autistic clients, as well as a substitute teacher in the Kamuela area.

From Exile to Eden: A Family Journal, is a true saga of one family’s epic journey during World War II. Deported from Poland as political prisoners of war and sent to a Soviet labor camp in Siberia, they began a 12-year struggle to survive. Drawn from memoirs and family journals, From Exile to Eden weaves history, adventure, romance, parapsychology, and inspiration; sharing the story of the Szelazeks’ exile, their battles with starvation, hardship, betrayal, death, and struggles for freedom throughout Russia, Europe, and the Middle East. Tadeusz and Helena Szelazek create an unforgettable story of love, loyalty, and courage. Helena, destined to be unusual from the moment of her birth, discovers her psychic awakening at the age of five when she is struck by lightning, followed by a second lightning strike as a teenager. Her abilities prove to be both a blessing and a curse for her and her family, and lead her on a journey to distant lands far from the land of her birth. Tadeusz follows a path of intellectual pursuits trying to unravel the meaning of life, in the end finding answers only within himself and from those he loves. A chance encounter with a world-renowned seer, leaves him in possession of predictions concerning his future. With logic and intellect battling the possibilities of predestination, he finds his life unfolding in patterns which he fights to control and change. Their many miraculous escapes, death-defying encounters on the battle field, personal encounters with famous political figures, and numerous paranormal incidents will keep readers on the edge of their seats.