| The Tattoo |  | Authors: Chris Mckinney, Chris Mckinney
Publisher: Mutual Publishing
Category: Book
List Price: $6.95
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Avg. Customer Rating:  20 reviews
Sales Rank: 1180087
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1
Pages: 226
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 7 x 4.3 x 0.8
ISBN: 1566473195
Dewey Decimal Number: 900
EAN: 9781566473194
ASIN: 1566473195
Publication Date: October 1, 1999
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Product Description
"A book about the sins of the fathers.' . . . A gritty, troubling book."-The Honolulu Advertiser "The other Hawai'i, the one tourists never get to see."-Ian MacMillan Ken Hideyoshi is the new guy in Halawa Correctional Institute. He's tough looking, a hard case, observes his cellmate Cal-the mute tattoo artist of the prison, a wife murderer. SYN, a gang symbol, is tattooed on his hand, and he has a Japanese emblem inscribed on his left shoulder. He asks Cal for a tattoo on his back, in kanji script, of Musashi's Book of the Void. While he is being worked on, he tells Cal his life story, a tale of hardship and abuse. Motherless, he was raised by a distant father, a Vietnam War veteran, in the impoverished hinterlands. In his teen years he hung out with the native Hawaiian gangs and was drawn into the Hawaiian-Korean underworld of strip bars and massage parlors. His ambition and proud samurai spirit seem, inevitably, to lead to his downfall. Chris McKinney is of Korean, Japanese, and Scottish descent. He was born in Honolulu and grew up in Kahaluu. He portrays the native Hawaiian experience from the inside, where children of mixed ethnicity grow up far from the clear water and pristine beaches of the rich visitors' resorts.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 15 more reviews...
 Great Social Commentary February 18, 2008
This book came as a real surprise, and in a very good way. For me, this was a book that I could honestly relate to and rung very true on so many levels. It not only gives the reader a look at one of the most unnoticed parts of Oahu: the east side of the island, but it also serves as an excellent social commentary on poverty and the problems facing today's youth. This book cuts to the heart of society, not only Hawaii, but also America as a whole.
First and foremost, I highly recommend this book. This will be one of the easiest books you will ever read, which is due to Mckinney's brilliant writing style. The character development is simply amazing and the story is near close to stellar. I have read reviews which had a problem with the delivery of the story: a local japanese criminal using perfect english versus pidgin to narrate his story. My answer to this is that, although hard to grasp for some, reading goes a long way. Raised in Hawaii myself, I grew up reading and as a result, primarily use proper english and am able to write as well as some of the best english majors. So is it such a far stretch that the narrator, Ken, in the story can speak well and descriptively due to the fact that he read books such as Hamlet since he was a child?
The fact that the protagonist, Ken, is well educated just further adds to the brilliance of the story. This isn't just a tale whose moral is that hate breeds hate, but it stretches further than that. It is a story of poverty, a story that exposes the social stigma that holds down and stunts the growth of the youth in Hawaii. It is a story that gives the reader a true glimpse at the basic mindset that runs through the local community living in Hawaii today, and effectively deals with an adequate resolution to the problem.
The brilliance of this story is that it not only taps into the heart of Hawaii, but also rings true to many of people living in the Continental United States. Mckinney gives the reader a view of the viscous cycle that traps many of today's youth. A cycle which, until broken, will continue to grow and infect everyone in it's path.
 Big Disappointment September 4, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I wanted to love this book, I really did. I was born and raised on Oahu's north shore and went to UH. McKinney's settings in Honolulu and on the windward side are my old stomping grounds. In addition, I've taught in prisons (and taught prison lit), and working-class and prison issues are among the themes I'm most interested in seeing dealt with in fiction. Based on the (overly) positive reviews here, I ordered a copy because I was anxious to see how a writer had combined those elements.
Unfortunately, this is not a great book, and it's not a great book because Chris McKinney is not yet a great writer. His weak points significantly mar *The Tattoo.*
First, McKinney's "framing device" - the felon, Ken Hideyoshi relates his life story to the "haole" tattoo artist, Cal, who can no longer speak because he "got his throat cut." Fair enough. If what we are reading is Ken's story, as related to (and presumably, later written down by) Cal, Ken's language should reflect speech. It doesn't. Ken's prose is literary, flowery, and sometimes even a little on the purple side. So why the expedient of Cal, who remains a silent, smiling, and essentially addle-brained cipher?
One answer is the rather heavy-handed symbolism of "silencing" the haole so the "local" can speak. It's interesting, but the effect is the opposite of the one intended: Ken is permanently "mediated" by Cal--that is, he speaks always through the hated haole. But why can't Ken speak for himself? Why does the story require Cal to "deliver" Ken's memories when Ken is perfectly capable of doing it for himself?
As a corollary, McKinney's narrative choice necessarily means that we are "told" everything in the past tense and can never experience anything in the book's fictional present tense. (The only thing that's in the book's present is the creation of Ken's tattoo.) The result flattens and mutes the drama and tension. We know the important events are all in the past; we know that Ken came through them. The emotion that's recounted takes on a second-hand veneer.
Second, there's Kinney's rendition of pidgin, which is painful to read when it isn't simply odd. As a writer, I'll be the first to say that it is a devilish task to put Hawai'ian pidgin on paper in a way that isn't incomprehensible or that doesn't make it sound like baby talk. But McKinney (and his editors) needed to find a better way. The lexical system that McKinney hits on is neither phonetic, consistent, nor logical: "hea" for "here" (when heeah might make more sense) or "stranga" for strange-ah, in which the soft "g" sound is lost. In addition, McKinney's ear is sometimes tin, and there are half-pidgin, half "standard" English sentences that I'll wager McKinney never heard anyone say. For example, "You must be from da mainland," in which the speaker uses "da" for "the," but pronounces the "must" of "mus' be" correctly; or "I went arready put mine," in which the "arready" is accurate, but the "wen'" is lost in that grammatical "went." In the end, all of this becomes a huge distraction.
Third, there's a point-of-view problem that lurks in the background throughout the text but which stands up and shouts in the epilogue whose events neither Cal (nor Ken) can possibly know. Insisting on staying with Ken (or with Ken-through-Cal), in fact, means a limitation of POV that's a shame, and it creates situations in which Ken must explain, rather awkwardly, why he knows something that he didn't witness. Since the voices of the women in this story, especially that of Claudia, are as interesting as Ken's, the novel would have been opened up considerably via the use of alternating chapters or some other device that would have made her POV available.
Though Ken's story is certainly intriguing, the reader is left with the sensation that he's not the most interesting character (Koa, for that matter, is). In addition, his last-chapter philosophizing--which the novel's shape essentially requires--rings an extremely false tone.
The prizes and accolades that McKinney has garnered for *The Tattoo* come in part because he has written about something that no one else has. Perhaps he deserves them for that reason alone. We're anxious to see ourselves named in fiction in the islands, and not by outsiders but by our own. On the other hand, the arts scene in Honolulu is so inbred and so affected by "small pond" syndrome that it's difficult to know where merit truly lies. There was much in *The Tattoo* that resonated in my experience, but that could just as well be said about the scrapbooks I keep. Meanwhile, the great book about Hawai'i by someone who is of the culture and who knows it intimately is waiting to be written.
AMAZING! February 4, 2007
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
First off, I am a hardcore reader. I go through about eight books a month in a variety of genres. I read top authors like Evanovich, Margolin, Isles, Gerritson, etc. The Tatoo by Chris McKinney is the best book that I have read in half a year.
The story is rich, the conversation natutal, the scene description stunning, etc. I was a little worried that the local dialect would be painful to read as it is so many times, but it wasn't. It was totally authentic.
The Tattoo isn't just a book set in modern day Hawaii- it's a story that has the ability to reach people of all races and cultures. In a way, it kind of reminds me of "Once Were Warriors" in tone.
You won't be dissapointed!
Windward & OCCC action January 29, 2007
This is a really good book. I'm sorry I wasn't completely thrilled with the ending. I don't want to ruin it, but I like happier endings. But the authors chosen ending is realistic. Speaking of realistic, that is what this book is in the mood and characters it creates. The characters are so realistic that I think I know who they may be drawn from. If you've ever visited the Windward side of Oahu you'll enjoy this book.
Another Side of Paradise June 1, 2006
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
I read this book while I was on the beautiful island of O'ahu, May 2006. This was my 5th trip to the island, and each time I visit, it gets harder to leave. This book is a monumental read for everyone who thinks they "know" Hawaii, and for those who think they know about the plight of the poor and less fortunate in Anytown, USA.
I have several friends on O'ahu who are local-born, and they told me stories of how rough life could be for some people in Hawaii, but until I read this book, I only thought I understood. The problems that Ken Hideyoshi faced show the other side of the glitz and glamour of Honolulu, known for its' fabulous beauty and high-browed and expensive Kalakaua Avenue.
I highly reccommend this book to everyone. Let it get to you, listen to the story, feel the way Ken feels, and then let it change your life. In short, this is a wonderful story from a great author.
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