"Fierce Heart": Oahu's West Side Story: Book Review

It’s been eight years since Honolulu-based author Stuart Holmes Coleman’s first novel, “Eddie Aikau” uncovered the man behind one of Hawaii’s most revered modern heroes.  Before Coleman’s 2001 biography, Eddie Aikau was known primarily as a pioneering lifeguard, a fearless surfer, and a Hawaiian hero.   An admirable profile, to be sure, but this simplistic view lacked the depth, struggle, and nuance that makes real people interesting.  Coleman countered this by writing a balanced portrait of Eddie Aikau’s triumphs and tribulations, his highs and lows.  While this biography took Eddie out of the Hawaiian heavens and brought him down to earth with the rest of us, it also solidified Eddie’s legacy by making him more real and more known to those who profess to revere him.  

For his second volume on modern Hawaiian surf culture, “Fierce Heart” Coleman has shifted away from the modern day North Shore “country” to the original Oahu country- the Wild West Side.  For both author and audience, the shift is as natural as Rusty Keaulana’s cross step.  Before any surfer braved the oversized waves of the North Shore, there was Makaha.  Indeed, from the Great Depression through to the assassination of Martin Luther King, Makaha was the epicenter of progressive surfing.  “Town” may have been the most inviting playground, but those pushing the boundaries of the sport refined their craft on the West Side.

In contrast to the previous bio-epic of Eddie Aikau, “Fierce Heart” is a multi-track biography.  Our characters are these: Buffalo Keaulana, the foundational figure of Westside surfing and the benevolent Godfather of Wainae; Rell Sunn, the spiritual mother and grace-filled champion wave dancer; Israel Kamakawiwa’ole (“Bruddah Iz”), the mischievous and too large for life maverick of island music; and Brian Keaulana, the powerful and passionate lifeguard prince who rises beyond the heights of his profession.  The book is an interwoven tapestry, and Coleman weaves these major plotlines with the stories of many other heroes and villains into a multicolored vision of the Westside.

Wisely, Coleman lets his compelling characters speak for themselves.  The author is not a pretentious academic trying to impose his view of the Westside on the people who live there (despite his claim in the acknowledgements that “this book is my own independent view of the world of Makaha”).  Coleman knows that Buffalo, Rell, Iz, and Brian can and should speak for themselves.  Speak they do, and during the swift reading of this book you will enjoy over one hundred insider stories of the wild West side.  It’s as if you are sitting in the shade of Uncle Buff’s lifeguard tower as the waves roll in and the bruddahs talk story, and you get to relax and listen.  

What Coleman did for Eddie, he has now done for the legends of the Westside.  He has bravely and honestly reported the stories of these people, who have likewise bravely and honestly offered the truth.  The author’s prose is clean, precise, and beautiful, like a single fin longboard smoothly slicing through wavy walls of glass.  The long wait for his second book is justified, and Coleman may now consider himself a mythmaker of sorts.  No doubt, these legendary figures have created their own reputations, but undoubtedly Coleman is polishing and preserving these perishable stories for the ages.

Coleman has gotten you an invitation to one of the most vibrant, conflicted, and important communities in Hawaii.  Even if you didn’t pick up this book for the waves, dive in if you want to know about the Hawaii you don’t know.   Twenty Five Bucks is a small price to pay to hear about these legends in their own words.  “Fierce Heart” is a wave worth riding.