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The book that follows Natural Predators is a collection of short stories called Accidental Contact and Other Mahu Investigations.
Though the story that follows here is not the first in that collection, it follows quickly on the events of this book, and I felt that readers would want to see it next.
I wanted to write the story of the twins’ birth, and how that affected Kimo and Mike, but I didn’t want it to be part of a criminal investigation. As I mulled over this idea, I decided to explore more of Kimo’s family background through his father’s mother. Back when I wrote Mahu, I knew that I wanted Kimo to be an ethnic mix, and that he had to be at least 50% native Hawaiian in order to qualify for benefits available to those who could trace lineage back to the original inhabitants of the islands.
I decided, more on a whim than anything else, that his father’s father would be Hawaiian, and his father’s mother haole. That was all I knew about either of them.
I read James Michener’s Hawaii in preparation for my first visit to the Aloha State, back in 1992, so I knew a bit about the white missionaries and the difficult lives they led. Where, in there, was Granny’s story? What follows is my investigation.