I just realized yesterday that I could actually celebrate my work and books for Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month!

This is the first May where I have two books about Hawai’i that showcases my love for the islands and my struggles as well.

Whenever I see suggested book lists for this month, I rarely see any native Hawai’ians (kanaka maoli). I know that I won’t make any of the lists, because my books are not “traditional”-ly published. No BIG 5 (or their offshoots) for me. So I thought why not promote myself!

If you haven’t had a chance to read my short story collection “Hard Skin” - I hope you consider picking it up. You can buy it at Amazon or from my publisher, Juventud Press.

Here is a wonderful blurb from Amy Cipolla Barnes:

Melissa Llanes Brownlee’s debut collection of a dozen stories is at once exotic and familiar, identifiable and personal. Llanes Brownlee immerses readers in the lives and backdrop of her characters with an often-poignant and always-believable voice. From the titular “Hard Skin” to stories like “Pele’s Daughter,” “Any Kine Boy,” and “Talking Story about Kilauea,” each one is like listening to a master storyteller sharing stories. Cultural aspects, family connections and sensory details shine under Llanes Brownlee’s hand with a lyricism that is infused throughout. The powerful closing line looks forward: “I pick up my pencil and trace it over and over, making a space for myself.” It becomes the culmination of the characters’ and Llanes Brownlee’s life journey through the creation of a well-deserved space for herself and these memorable stories.

If you are wanting something shorter and a little more surreal, please check out Kahi and Lua: Tales of the First and the Second!

Here’s another awesome blurb from Sarah Freligh:

In Kahi and Lua, Melissa Llanes Brownlee drops her titular characters into the late capitalism of 21st century America, a Hawai’i of fast-food deliveries, 24/7 reality shows on a big-screen TV in a home with a lanai and a couple of adopted cats who promptly let them know who are the real gods in the household. Lua yearns to take a walkabout around the world while Kahi is content to study humanity from a rear seat on a Honolulu bus. Amidst this quotidian existence, they reflect on past catastrophes and a growing awareness of an approaching apocalypse in which they’ll have to make a decision: to stay godlike and eternal or join the human race— “who they have been pretending to be for so long.” These are sharply-observed stories that are at once lyric and funny, profound and provocative.

And if you want to hang out with some cool people and talk about Kahi and Lua, and then ask me some questions, please consider signing up for Shorter is Better Book Club event!

What better way to celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month then to come talk story with me?!?!

And of course, if you haven’t read my most recently published pieces set in Hawai’i, here they are:

• “They Would Have Told You” in Fractured Literary

• Rumpus Original Fiction: Six Micro Stories: “When the eye of Hurricane ‘Iwa is passing over us,” “Bitter over Sweet,” “go get da fish bat,” “daddy, he wen put limu in the fish’s belly,” “White wine spritzer,” & “the mongooses of Pahala” in The Rumpus

As always, sending you all light and love and creativity! Mahalo Nui Loa!