Red Sky
Over Hawaii: A Novel
by Sara
Ackerman
On Sale Date: June 9, 2020
Fiction / Historical / World War II
352 pages
MIRA Books
For fans of Chanel Cleeton and Beatriz
Williams, RED SKY OVER HAWAII is historical women's fiction set in the islands
during WWII. It's the story of a woman who has to put her safety and her heart
on the line when she becomes the unexpected guardian of a misfit group and
decides to hide with them in a secret home in the forest on Kilauea Volcano.
The attack on Pearl Harbor changes everything
for Lana Hitchcock. Arriving home on the Big Island too late to reconcile with
her estranged father, all she can do is untangle the clues of his legacy, which
lead to a secret property in the forest on Kilauea Volcano. America has been
drawn into WWII, and amid rumors of impending invasion, the army places the
islands under martial law. When they start taking away neighbors as possible
sympathizers, Lana finds herself suddenly guardian to two girls, as well as
accomplice to an old family friend who is Japanese, along with his son. In a
heartbeat, she makes the decision to go into hiding with them all.
The hideaway house is not what Lana expected,
revealing its secrets slowly, and things become even more complicated by the
interest of Major Grant Bailey, a soldier from the nearby internment camp. Lana
is drawn to him, too, but needs to protect her little group. With a little help
from the magic on the volcano, Lana finds she can open her bruised heart to the
children--and maybe to Grant.
A lush and evocative novel about doing what is
right against the odds, following your heart, and what makes a family.
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THE ROAD
December 8, 1941
WITH EVERY MILE CLOSER TO VOLCANO, THE FOG thickened,
until they were driving through a forest of white gauze with the occasional
branch showing through. Lana considered turning the truck around no less than
forty-six times. Going back to Hilo would have been the prudent thing to do,
but this was not a time for prudence. Of that she was sure. She slowed the
Chevy to a crawl and checked the rearview mirror. The cage with the geese was
now invisible, and she could barely make out the dog’s big black spots.
Maybe
the fog would be to their advantage.
“I
don’t like it here at all,” said Coco, who was smashed up next to Lana, scrawny
arms folded in protest. The child had to almost yell to be heard above the chug
of the motor.
Lana
grabbed a blanket from the floor. “Put this over you. It should help.”
Coco
shook her head. “I’m not cold. I want to go home. Can you please take us back?”
Goose
bumps had formed up and down her limbs, but she was so stubborn that she had
refused to put on a jacket. True, Hilo was insufferably hot, but where they
were headed—four thousand feet up the mountain—the air was cold and damp and
flimsy.
It
had been over ten years since Lana had set foot at Kı¯lauea. Never would she
have guessed to be returning under these circumstances.
Marie
chimed in. “We can’t go back now, sis. And anyway, there’s no one to go back to
at the moment.”
Poor
Coco trembled. Lana wished she could hug the girl and tell her everything was
going to be okay. But that would be a lie. Things were liable to get a whole
lot worse before they got any better.
“Sorry,
honey. I wish things were different, but right now you two are my priority.
Once we get to the house, we can make a plan,” Lana said.
“But
you don’t even know where it is,” Coco whined.
“I
have a good idea.”
More
like a vague notion.
“What
if we don’t find it by dark? Are they going to shoot us?” Coco said.
Marie put her arm around Coco and pulled her in. “Turn
off that little overactive imagination of yours. No one is going to shoot us,”
she said, but threw a questioning glance Lana’s way.
“We’ll be fine,” Lana said, wishing she believed that.
The girls were not the real problem here. Of greater
concern was what they had hidden in the back of the truck. Curfew was six
o’clock, but people had been ordered to stay off the roads unless their travel
was essential to the war. Lana hadn’t told the girls that. Driving up here was
a huge risk, but she had invented a story she hoped and prayed would let them
get through if anyone stopped them. The thought of a checkpoint caused her
palms to break out in sweat, despite the icy air blowing in through the cracks
in the floorboard.
On a good day, the road from Hilo to Volcano would take
about an hour and a half. Today was not a good day. Every so often they hit a
rut the size of a whiskey barrel that bounced her head straight into the roof.
The continuous drizzle of the rain forest had undermined all attempts at smooth
roads here. At times the ride was reminiscent of the plane ride from Honolulu.
Exactly two days ago, but felt more like a lifetime.
Lana’s main worry was what they would encounter once in
the vicinity of the national park entrance. With the Kı¯lauea military camp
nearby, there were bound to be soldiers and roadblocks in the area. She had so
many questions for her father and felt a mixed ache of sadness and resentment
that he was not here to answer them. How were you so sure the Japanese were
coming? Why the volcano, of all places? How are we going to survive up here? Why
didn’t you call me sooner?
Coco seemed to settle down, leaning her nut-brown
ringlets against her sister’s shoulder and closing her eyes. There was
something comforting in the roar of the engine and the jostle of the truck.
With the whiteout it was hard to tell where they were, but by all estimates
they should be arriving soon.
Lana was dreaming of a cup of hot coffee when Coco sat
upright and said, “I have to go tinkle.”
“Tinkle?” Lana asked.
Marie said, “She means she has to go to the bathroom.”
They drove until they found a grassy shoulder, and Lana
pulled the truck aside, though they could have stopped in the middle of the
road. They had met only one other vehicle the whole way, a police car that
fortunately had passed by.
The rain had let up, and they all climbed out. It was
like walking through a cloud, and the air smelled metallic and faintly lemony
from the eucalyptus that lined the road. Lana went to check on Sailor. The dog
stood up and whined, yanking on the rope around her neck, straining to be pet.
Poor thing was drenched and shaking. Lana had wanted to leave her behind with a
neighbor, but Coco had put up such a fuss, throwing herself onto her bed and
wailing and punching the pillow, that Lana relented. Caring for the girls would
be hard enough, but a hundred-and-twenty-pound dog?
“Just a bathroom stop. Is everyone okay back here?” she
asked in a hushed voice. Two low grunts came from under the tarp. “We should be
there soon. Remember, be still and don’t make a sound if we stop again.”
As if on cue, one of the hidden passengers started a
coughing fit, shaking the whole tarp. She wondered how wise it was to subject
him to this long and chilly ride, and if it might be the death of him. But the
alternative was worse.
“Deep breaths…you can do it,” Lana said.
Coco showed up and hopped onto the back tire. “I think we
should put Sailor inside with us. She looks miserable.”
“Whose lap do you propose she sits on?” Lana said.
Sailor was as tall as a small horse, but half as wide.
“I can sit in the back of the truck and she can come up
here, then,” Coco said in all seriousness.
“Not in those clothes you won’t. We don’t need you
catching pneumonia on us.”
They started off again, and ten seconds down the road,
Sailor started howling at the top of her lungs. Lana felt herself on the verge
of unraveling. The last thing they needed was one extra ounce of attention. The
whole idea of coming up here was preposterous when she thought about it. At the
time it had seemed like a good idea, but now she wondered at her sanity.
“What is wrong with that dog?” Lana said, annoyed.
Coco turned around, and Lana felt her hot breath against
her arm. In the smallest of voices, she said, “Sailor is scared.”
Lana felt her heart crack. “Oh, honey, we’re all a bit
scared.
It’s perfectly normal under the circumstances. But I
promise you this—I will do everything in my power to keep you out of harm’s
way.”
“But you hardly know us,” Coco said.
“My father knew you, and you knew him, right?” Lana said.
“And remember, if anyone asks, we tell them our story.”
They had rehearsed it many times already, but with kids
one could never be sure. Not that Lana had much experience with kids. With none
of her own and no nieces or nephews in the islands, she felt the lack palpably,
smack in the center of her chest. There had been a time when she saw children
in her future, but that dream had come and gone and left her sitting on the
curb with a jarful of tears.
Her mind immediately went to Buck. Strange how your
future with a person could veer so far off course from how you’d originally
pictured it. How the one person you swore you would have and hold could end up
wreaking havoc on your heart instead. She blinked the thought away.
As they neared Volcano, the fog remained like a curtain,
but the air around them brightened. Lana knew from all her time up here as a
young girl that the trees got smaller as the elevation rose, and the terrain
changed from towering eucalyptus and fields of yellow-and-white ginger to a
more cindery terrain covered with red-blossomed ‘ohi‘a trees, and
prehistoriclooking ha¯pu’u ferns and the crawling uluhe. At one time in her
life, this had been one of her happiest places. Coco reached for the letter on
the dashboard and began reading it for the fourth time. “Coco Hitchcock.
It sounds funny.” The paper was already getting worn.
Marie swiped it out of her hands. “You’re going to ruin
that. Give it to me.”
Where Coco was whip thin and dark and spirited—a nice way
of putting it—Marie was blonde and full-bodied and sweet as coconut taffy. But
Lana could tell even Marie’s patience was wearing thin.
“Mrs. Hitchcock said we need to memorize our new names or
we’ll be shot.”
Lana said as calmly as she could, “I never said anything
of the sort. And, Coco, you have to get used to calling me Aunt Lana for now.
Both of you do.”
“And stop talking about getting shot,” Marie added,
rolling her eyes.
If they could all just hold it together a little bit
longer.
There was sweat pooling between her breasts and behind
her kneecaps. Lying was not her strong suit, and she was hoping that, by some
strange miracle, they could sail on through without anyone stopping them. She
rolled her window down a couple of inches for a burst of fresh air. “We’re just
about here. So if we get stopped, let me do the talking. Speak only if someone
asks you a direct question, okay?”
Neither girl said anything; they both just nodded. Lana
could almost see the fear condensing on the windshield. And pretty soon little
Coco started sniffling. Lana would have said something to comfort her, but her
mind was void of words. Next the sniffles turned into heaving sobs big enough
to break the poor girl in half. Marie rubbed her hand up and down Coco’s back
in a warm, smooth circle.
“You can cry when we get there, but no tears now,” she
said.
Tears and snot were smeared across Coco’s face in one big
shiny layer. “But they might kill Mama and Papa.” Her face was pinched and
twisted into such anguish that Lana had to fight back a sob of her own.
Excerpted from Red Sky Over Hawaii by Sara Ackerman,
Copyright © 2020 by Sara Sckerman. Published by MIRA
Books.
About the Author
Photo Credit: Tracy Wright-Corvo
Sara
Ackerman is the USA
Today bestselling author of The Lieutenant's Nurse and Island of Sweet Pies
and Soldiers. Born and raised in Hawaii, she studied journalism and earned
graduate degrees in psychology and Chinese medicine. She blames Hawaii for her addiction
to writing, and sees no end to its untapped stories. When she's not writing or
teaching, you'll find her in the mountains or in the ocean. She currently lives
on the Big Island with her boyfriend and a houseful of bossy animals. Find out
more about Sara and her books at www.ackermanbooks.com and follow her on
Instagram @saraackermanbooks and on FB @ackermanbooks.
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