Linda Lee Chaikin, The Spoils of Eden

The Spoils of Eden

Linda Lee Chaikin

Moody, May 1 2010, $13.99

ISBN 9780802437495

In 1891, the Hawaiian Board of Health at Kalihi Leper Hospital sends nurse Eden Derrington to the coffee plantation owned by her fianc Rafe Easton. This is not a social call, as someone informed the Hawaiian Board of Heath that the baby Kip was a resident of the Kalawo leper colony before Rafe found him. Eden is to pick up and bring Kip back to the colony where he will be quarantined as the law forbids the adoption of leper offspring.

Still Rafe wants to adopt Kip and he and his fianc e argue heatedly over the infant and her work involving lepers. They end their engagement and she goes to assists her research scientist father Jerome who at Kalawo runs a clinic while seeking a medical cure for the disease.

Showing moxie by writing about Hawaii after James Michener's epic, Linda Lee Chaikin's first Dawn of Hawaii saga provides readers with a deep look at the archipelago less than a decade before the kingdom joins the United States. The story line is driven by the lead couple whose disagreement over her work with lepers threatens their relationship. Although the key support cast is never developed beyond thin role representation in conjunction with either of the two prime players, readers will relish this fine inspirational historical.

Harriet Klausner