“It can sometimes be unusual to picture an educator outside their position in the classroom. Students see their instructors as vessels of knowledge for wisdom and inspiration. But where does this wisdom and inspiration come from? And what do you do with it once you have it?

To answer these questions, one can look to the life and career of Susan Wackerbarth, instructor of English and creative writing coordinator at the University of Hawai‘i at Hilo. Her journey to publishing her first novel, No Place Like Home, is nothing short of wisdom and inspiration and one that reflects the long and winding road that travels between her experience as a writer, editor, and educator.”

Read the Full Article at UH Hilo Stories

“No Place Like Home, wherever that may be, takes the reader to Hilo, Hawai‘i, my home town, with a focus on haole residents, both, as the author writes, home grown & flown, who for various reasons, live in East Hawai‘i. Among them, Griff lives over a lava flow in Puna; teen-age Mahina hangs out in pricey Sunrise Ridge with her mother Iris. George has a house further up the mountain that he shares with his partner Cal. Desiree and her children perch in a hot, tiny apartment in downtown Hilo. Additional characters wander through the pages to fill out the cast for the Palace Theater’s fall musical production The Wizard of Oz.”

Read Sandra Wagner-Wright's Review