I promised something a bit more frivolous this week, and Sarah Vowell delivered with Unfamiliar Fishes. This is the quirky, funny, yet well-researched history of the Americanization of Hawai'i.
The one thing that Vowell manages in all her books is to find something honorable and worthy of respect in every person, no matter how negative their impact on posterity. Unfamiliar Fishes is written decidedly in her voice. She conveys her opinions on the missionaries, the royal family, the sugar plantations, but those opinions are ambivalent. They are contingent on so many factors and what-ifs. You get the sense that Vowell genuinely wants everyone she speaks with to convince her they are right.
And you have to love a book that begins with macaroni and rice.
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