Congressman Faleomavaega is pleased to announce that
with the publication of Where We Once Belonged, Ms. Sia Figiel has
become the first Samoan female author to have a novel published in the
United States.
“In another first for Samoan females, it is a real honor to bring
to the attention of my fellow Samoans yet another success story.
Ms. Figiel’s book was a best seller in New Zealand and is the winner of
the prestigious Commonwealth Prize.” said Faleomavaega.
The author has received critical acclaim in both New Zealand and
the United States, and is considered one of the most promising new voices
on the international literary scene. In Where We Once Belonged,
Ms. Figiel uses the traditional Samoan story-telling form, combined with
humor, to talk back to Western anthropological studies on Samoan women
and culture.
She is currently touring the United States with book readings in
New York City (April 10, 11, and 13), Philadelphia (April 12th); and Berkeley
(April 22nd). The professional critics have been giving rave reviews:
“Sia Figiel has written a passion, a song of longing and loss, a
song of fire.
The young woman in Where We Once Belonged and the world she seeks
to navigate are marvels of prose. I do not know from where
Sia draws her
insights and her language, but I’m as grateful for their existence
as I am
grateful for the sun.” – Junot Diaz, author of Drown
“A bold, accomplished and highly subversive first novel … Figiel’s
characters and language always remain lucid and powerful. Sia Figiel
is to
be congratulated on this complex, funny and richly rewarding novel.”
–
Courier-Mail, Australia
“Figiel’s unique, poetic voice demythologizes Samoan culture as
it
criticizes Western colonization” – Publishers Weekly
“Sia Figiel is a major literary voice ushering the vastness of Pacific
Rim
literatures into the millennium.” – Lois-Ann Yamanaka, author of
Heads
by Harry
“A sort of Samoan Puberty Blues, in which Gauguin is dead but Elvis
lives on.” – Vogue Australia
Ms. Figiel has had her second novel, They Who do not Grieve,
published in
New Zealand. She lives in Samoa.
Title: Where We Once Belonged
Author: Sia Figiel
Publisher: Kaya. Distributed by DAP (800-338-book)
Pages: 248 pages
Category: First fiction, Pacific Island literature
Price: $14.95
ISBN: 1-885030-27-4 |
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