Book Sixteen

Standing Fast

1941

A black-and-white photograph of 1941: an ornate palace of arched verandas and columns in bright sun, the flag of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, a union flag in the canton and horizontal stripes, flying from its roof, a man in a dark suit standing alone at the top of the front steps and a guard in uniform at their foot, and beyond the palms and the low roofs of the city a great column of black smoke rising from the horizon under two small aircraft. Crown on the Potomac Standing Fast Book Sixteen 1941

December 1941. Kamehameha V has been King of Hawaiʻi for three years and an heir for twenty, in a Kingdom the Realm has paid very little attention to. On a Sunday morning, as he waits on the steps of ʻIolani Palace to walk across to the cathedral, aircraft come in over Oʻahu, the anchorage at Puʻuloa begins to burn, and then the city.

Standing Fast follows one day at the palace, hour by hour: the reports that never agree, bombs at the gate, the Realm's officials who ask the King to leave and are refused, a list of names, a message to a frightened city, and a King who learns, by midnight, what a Hawaiian sovereign is for.

Each chapter opens with a short extract from the Universal Register, the encyclopedia of the world the book is set in. The extracts are quoted from the Register as it stands; the chapters show what happened in the rooms it was not in.

Begin reading: Chapter One, The Palace Dawn → Characters

Part One: The Quiet Morning (Six to seven in the morning)

  1. 1 The Palace Dawn Kamehameha V. 17 min.
  2. 2 The Rites of the House Kamehameha V. 13 min.
  3. 3 The First Bell Kamehameha V. 14 min.

Part Two: The Storm (A quarter to eight to half past ten)

  1. 4 The Sound of the Skies Kamehameha V. 12 min.
  2. 5 Immovable Kamehameha V. 15 min.
  3. 6 The Resident Commissioner Kamehameha V. 16 min.
  4. 7 The Second Wave Kamehameha V. 17 min.
  5. 8 The Falling Shrapnel Kamehameha V. 11 min.

Part Three: The Smouldering City (Eleven in the morning to five in the afternoon)

  1. 9 The Kuhina Nui Kamehameha V. 13 min.
  2. 10 The Silence of Puʻuloa Kamehameha V. 12 min.
  3. 11 The Afternoon Request Kamehameha V. 12 min.
  4. 12 The Subject List Kamehameha V. 13 min.
  5. 13 News from the Mainland Kamehameha V. 11 min.
  6. 14 The Kamehameha Regiment Kamehameha V. 10 min.

Part Four: The Night Vigil (Six in the evening to midnight)

  1. 15 The Cable from London Kamehameha V. 12 min.
  2. 16 The Blackout Kamehameha V. 11 min.
  3. 17 The Watch Kamehameha V. 13 min.
  4. 18 The Midnight Resolve Kamehameha V. 11 min.