Lushly written, this is a story of family ties, immigration, resilience and home.” — Ms. magazine
“The Color of Air is quintessential Tsukiyama, generous in spirit, gorgeously written, and full of secrets and surprises. Every character in this ensemble novel is as compelling and appealing as the next and together they lead the reader into the beating heart of this tight-knit community. A stupendous work.” — Karen Joy Fowler, New York Times bestselling author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves and Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award
"With a piercing and authentic sense of place, Gail Tsukiyama brings to life a group of ordinary Japanese/Hawaiians with intertwined lives that are filled with love, passion, empathy, wisdom, and joy. Life is hard, but it is not hopeless and in the shadow of the volcano Mauna Loa, unforgettable individuals—drawn by the author with tenderness and in vivid detail—contend with the pain and confusion of the past and the fleeting moments of happiness in the present, letting go of both pain and fear in order to meet the future." — Elizabeth George, #1 New York Times bestselling author
"In The Color of Air , Tsukiyama has created a community with characters who meet difficulties and persist with grace and endurance; whose dependence on one another is, in fact, their greatest strength. A rich historical novel that illustrates why connection is more important and more vital than ever.” — Lisa See, New York Times bestselling author of The Island of Sea Women and The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane
“Tsukiyama’s beautiful telling of an island son’s homecoming had me under a spell to the last page. The Color of Air pulls you in gently and takes you deep.”Nancy Horan, New York Times bestselling author of Loving Frank and Under the Wide and Starry Sky
“Through tragedy and joy, Tsukiyama crafts characters whose reliance on each other is their greatest strength, with many strong women leading the way. The dialogue flows easily, and the landscape is rendered with such vibrance that the reader will become fully immersed in the sensory details. Well-paced and lush, this is a captivating historical novel that shows the power of love and human resilience.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Writing with supple and entrancing grace, Tsukiyama has each of her caring, charismatic characters share their memories and heartaches…..Tsukiyama also evokes the wild, opulent beauty of the island, the harsh lives of migrant workers, racist and domestic violence, mystical connections, the repercussions of a love triangle, and the tolls of age. As the volcano erupts, long buried secrets and guilt surge to seismic effect. Tsukiyama’s dramatic yet discerningly congenial novel confronts the precariousness of existence and celebrates the healing power of generosity and love.” — Booklist (starred review)
“An intoxicating blend of historical events and fiction, The Color of Air is a richly rewarding reading experience perfect for fans of Lisa See or Isabel Allende, or anyone looking for a magical love story that transcends time.”BookPage
"Tsukiyama’s rich and beautifully written exploration of the uncertainty of life and the power of community has timeless appeal." — Publishers Weekly
“Readers in search of stories about the complexity of fellowship, and how it is made and unmade over time, will find much to admire in Tsukiyama’s lush novel.” — San Francisco Chronicle
"Rich with sensuous detail of island life....In this sumptuous novel, a Depression-era sugar plantation community faces a threatening volcano in the lush seaside town of Hilo, Hawai'i." Shelf Awareness
“In Gail Tsukiyama’s The Color of Air, characters reel in the wake of the Mauna Loa volcanic eruption….Tsukiyama uses this real-life event to great effect, weaving in the beliefs of her characters who think the goddess Pele’s anger caused the eruption…. We see that the traditions of Hawai’i need not be subsumed by modernization; Western medicine can coexist with indigenous remedies. We also see that some forms of modernization aren’t simply niceties. In The Color of Air, the beauty is in finding the balance.”Washington Post
“The Color of Air is quintessential Tsukiyama, generous in spirit, gorgeously written, and full of secrets and surprises. Every character in this ensemble novel is as compelling and appealing as the next and together they lead the reader into the beating heart of this tight-knit community. A stupendous work.
An intoxicating blend of historical events and fiction, The Color of Air is a richly rewarding reading experience perfect for fans of Lisa See or Isabel Allende, or anyone looking for a magical love story that transcends time.
Tsukiyama’s beautiful telling of an island son’s homecoming had me under a spell to the last page. The Color of Air pulls you in gently and takes you deep.
Writing with supple and entrancing grace, Tsukiyama has each of her caring, charismatic characters share their memories and heartaches…..Tsukiyama also evokes the wild, opulent beauty of the island, the harsh lives of migrant workers, racist and domestic violence, mystical connections, the repercussions of a love triangle, and the tolls of age. As the volcano erupts, long buried secrets and guilt surge to seismic effect. Tsukiyama’s dramatic yet discerningly congenial novel confronts the precariousness of existence and celebrates the healing power of generosity and love.”
Booklist (starred review)
Lushly written, this is a story of family ties, immigration, resilience and home.”
Readers in search of stories about the complexity of fellowship, and how it is made and unmade over time, will find much to admire in Tsukiyama’s lush novel.
"With a piercing and authentic sense of place, Gail Tsukiyama brings to life a group of ordinary Japanese/Hawaiians with intertwined lives that are filled with love, passion, empathy, wisdom, and joy. Life is hard, but it is not hopeless and in the shadow of the volcano Mauna Loa, unforgettable individuals—drawn by the author with tenderness and in vivid detail—contend with the pain and confusion of the past and the fleeting moments of happiness in the present, letting go of both pain and fear in order to meet the future."
"In The Color of Air , Tsukiyama has created a community with characters who meet difficulties and persist with grace and endurance; whose dependence on one another is, in fact, their greatest strength. A rich historical novel that illustrates why connection is more important and more vital than ever.”
In Gail Tsukiyama’s The Color of Air, characters reel in the wake of the Mauna Loa volcanic eruption….Tsukiyama uses this real-life event to great effect, weaving in the beliefs of her characters who think the goddess Pele’s anger caused the eruption…. We see that the traditions of Hawai’i need not be subsumed by modernization; Western medicine can coexist with indigenous remedies. We also see that some forms of modernization aren’t simply niceties. In The Color of Air, the beauty is in finding the balance.”
"Rich with sensuous detail of island life....In this sumptuous novel, a Depression-era sugar plantation community faces a threatening volcano in the lush seaside town of Hilo, Hawai'i."
Readers in search of stories about the complexity of fellowship, and how it is made and unmade over time, will find much to admire in Tsukiyama’s lush novel.
In Gail Tsukiyama’s The Color of Air, characters reel in the wake of the Mauna Loa volcanic eruption….Tsukiyama uses this real-life event to great effect, weaving in the beliefs of her characters who think the goddess Pele’s anger caused the eruption…. We see that the traditions of Hawai’i need not be subsumed by modernization; Western medicine can coexist with indigenous remedies. We also see that some forms of modernization aren’t simply niceties. In The Color of Air, the beauty is in finding the balance.”
07/13/2020
The 1935 eruption of Hawaii’s Mauna Loa volcano forms a suspenseful backdrop for Tsukiyama’s engrossing novel (after A Hundred Flowers ). The day the eruption begins, Daniel Abe returns to Hilo, where he was raised among the close-knit Japanese American community clustered around a brutal sugarcane plantation. Having overcome the prejudice against “Orientals,” Daniel studied and practiced medicine in Chicago for 10 years before his guilt over fatally misdiagnosing a four-year-old patient drives him to return home. His mother, Mariko, died two years ago of cancer, and while living in her bungalow Daniel reconnects with Hilo’s residents, including Koji, who drives the plantation’s freight train and whose love helped sustain Mariko and Daniel after they were abandoned by Daniel’s father; Mama Natua, a matriarch sliding into senility; and Daniel’s former girlfriend, Maile, who has returned to Hilo with shame of her own. As the lava flow creeps toward Hilo, the characters cope with their own and others’ secrets. Tsukiyama demonstrates a range of descriptive powers, depicting the island’s beauty and the oppressive plantation with equal skill. The story’s rich interconnections are captured through multiple third-person viewpoints and brief sections that revisit the past. Tsukiyama’s rich and beautifully written exploration of the uncertainty of life and the power of community has timeless appeal. Agent: Joy Harris, Joy Harris Agency. (July)
02/01/2020
Chicago-based doctor Daniel Abe is returning to Hawaii, where his uncle Koji eagerly anticipates revealing the truth about Daniel's father and his mother, Mariko, Koji's secret love. But Daniel's return coincides with the 1935 eruption of the Mauna Loa volcano. From New York Times best-selling Tsukiyama; with a 100,000-copy first printing.
It is 1935. The fearsome Hawaiian volcano Mauna Loa has erupted. And a prodigal son has just arrived home from the mainland in search of answers to family secrets. With tones of compassion and easy humor, Brian Nishii narrates the story of a hardworking, close-knit community of Japanese-American immigrants who came to Hawaii to work in the sugarcane fields. Narrator Natalie Naudus provides a breathless, longing voice to the “ghosts”—the characters and events of the past. Nishii and Naudus deftly pick up on the “island” inflections and sentence endings that make the dialogue in this historical novel so vibrant and unique. This audiobook is a sweet and authentic snapshot of Hawaii’s immigrant labor culture before WWII. B.P. © AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine
NOVEMBER 2020 - AudioFile
★ 2020-05-04
Tsukiyama delivers the reader to the lush landscape of Hawaii on the day in 1935 when a prodigal son’s return coincides with the eruption of Mauna Loa, a true event. Daniel Abe is a successful doctor in Chicago, but two years after his mother Mariko’s death, a secret drives him home to Hilo, Hawaii. As he arrives, the volcano erupts. In the weeks it takes for the lava to flow toward the town, Daniel’s childhood community comes together as they always have. With interludes of “ghost voices” and “island voices,” the book reveals characters and events from decades prior, deepening the richness of the community. Told in close third person from various perspectives, the narrative draws the reader into the family ties and abundant landscape of Hilo. Tsukiyama writes her characters into the fabric of a time and place where the sugar cane industry was king; people from all over the world are recruited as workers only to be exploited by the plantation owners, and attempts at unionization are violently extinguished. In Hilo, “a chorus of Portuguese, Chinese, Tagalog, and Japanese languages all melded into one indistinguishable song,” but people were kept “separated by ethnic groups, just as the owners planned.” Yet the mosaic of characters creates a family: “Not born to be, yeah…but chosen to be.” Through tragedy and joy, Tsukiyama crafts characters whose reliance on each other is their greatest strength, with many strong women leading the way. The dialogue flows easily, and the landscape is rendered with such vibrance that the reader will become fully immersed in the sensory details.
Well-paced and lush, this is a captivating historical novel that shows the power of love and human resilience.
