Kidnapping in Kaua’i by Ava Easter

A few weeks ago, I finished YA mystery, Kidnapping in Kaua’i by Ava Easter. I read it on Wattpad, but it’s also available on Amazon. Compared to the other books on Wattpad, it was a pleasant surprise. Some of the books on Wattpad are quite entertaining, but most of them are works in progress, subject to editing and revising and – hopefully improving. This book was more finished than that, more polished. It was also really good. Not just exciting, fascinating but also very well written. I give it four out of five stars.

The story is about fourteen-year-old Leilani “Lani”, who lives in Kaua’i (one of the Hawaiian islands). She lives with her ‘grandmother’ Tutu, ‘aunt’ Rita, who is an anti-GMO organic farmer, her 13-year-old foster brother, Pano, and four ‘cousins’ who are two sets of fraternal twins, Fred and Frank, 11 and Franny and Faye, 15.

Apart from wondering about her parents, who left her as a baby with Tutu and her family, Lani’s worst concerns is starting high school. That is until she finds a secret field with some strange unknown fruits and begins to have visions about the island’s ancient gods and legends.

The descriptions about Hawaiian mythology is one reason I found this book so fascinating. I knew practically nothing about this pantheon and the beliefs connected to it.

I also enjoyed reading the story from Lani’s perspective. We may not have that much in common, but Lani’s an interesting main character. It’s easy to relate to at least part of her situation. After all, I’ve been a teenage girl too. The other characters are nice too, especially Tutu and aunt Rita, though I really hate the fact that Pano sometimes hunts and kills animals. That’s one thing I do have in common with Lani.

The twin girls, Franny and Faye, use a sort of private language ‘twin speak’ that Lani has begun to understand and eventually, she lets the twins know that she does.

It’s been difficult for Lani and Pano to get along with the Fabulous Four, as the two sets of twins refer to themselves (the Frightening Four, according to Lani), but during the course of this story, eventually the kids come to understand each other better.