Kirby Michael Wright

Poet, Fiction Writer

Author's Bio

I was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. I am a graduate of Punahou School in Honolulu and the University of California at San Diego. I received my MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University. I have been nominated for five Pushcart Prizes and three Best of the Nets. I am a past recipient of the Honolulu Weekly Nonfiction Prize, the Jodi Stutz Memorial Prize in Poetry, the Ann Fields Poetry Prize, the Redwood Empire Mensa Award for Creative Nonfiction, the Academy of American Poets Award, two Browning Society Awards for Dramatic Monologue, and Arts Council Silicon Valley Fellowships in Poetry and The Novel. BEFORE THE CITY, my first book of poetry, took First Place at the 2003 San Diego Book Awards. I am also the author of the companion novels PUNAHOU BLUES and MOLOKA’I NUI AHINA, both set in Hawaii. I was a Visiting Fellow at the 2009 International Writers Conference in Hong Kong, where I represented the Pacific Rim region of Hawaii and lectured with Pulitzer Prize winner Gary Snyder. I was also a Visiting Writer at the 2010 Martha's Vineyard Writers Residency in Edgartown, MA, the 2011 Artist in Residence at Milkwood International, Czech Republic, the 2014 Resident Scholar at the Earthskin Artist Colony in Auckland, New Zealand, and the 2016 Artist in Residence in the Åland Islands, Finland. Two of my plays have been performed at the Secret Theatre in Long Island City and a third at the Manhattan Repertory Theatre in New York. My most recent play appeared at the 2019 PlayBuilders Festival in Honolulu. My latest book is THE QUEEN OF MOLOKA'I, a work of creative nonfiction based on the life and times of my hapa haole grandmother. 

Publications & Prizes

Fiction

Anthologies:
Foliate Oak Literary Magazine (University of Arkansas Press, 2013)
,
The Understanding between Foxes and Light (Great weather for MEDIA, 2013)
,
Fast Forward: Flash Fiction Anthology, Volume 5 (Fast Forward Press, 2012)
,
FutureCycle 2011 (FutureCycle Press, 2012)
,
IMPACT: An Anthology of Short Memoirs (Telling Our Stories Press, 2012)
,
To Be Read Aloud (To Be Read Aloud Publishing, 2007)
Books:
SORROW TOWN: Selected Stories (Lemon Shark Press, 2021)
,
THE QUEEN OF MOLOKA'I Book 1: Based On A True Story (Lemon Shark Press, 2019)
,
At The Customs House (Lemon Shark Press, 2017)
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The Wounded Morning, Poetry and Flash (Lemon Shark Press, 2017)
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Square Dancing at the Asylum: Nouveau Noir Flash Fiction (Lemon Shark Press, 2013)
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The End My Friend: Prelude to the Apocalypse (Lemon Shark Press, 2013)
Chapbook:
Princess Cathy in the Land of Regret (Medulla Publishing, 2014)
Journals: ,
Alchemy
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Arabesques Review
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Artful Dodge
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Black Bear Review
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Black Heart Magazine
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Blue Fifth Review
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Blue Lyra Review
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Branches Quarterly
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Chaminade Literary Review
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Circle Magazine
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City Works Literary Journal
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Clare Literary Journal
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COG
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Connotation Press
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Crab Fat Magazine
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Drunken Boat
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Erosha
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Fairfield Review
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Fiction At Work
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Flash Fiction
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Flash Frontier
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Flash, The International Short-short Story Magazine
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Florida English Journal
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Foliate Oak
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Fox Cry Review
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Friction
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Horizon
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Howling Dog
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Icon
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Ignatian Literary Magazine
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In Posse Review
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Ink
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Into the Teeth of the Wind
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Kindling
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Landfall
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Mad Poets Review
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Marco Polo Arts Mag
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Maryland Poetry Review
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Mayday Magazine
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Meat for Tea: The Valley Review
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Meat Whistle Quarterly
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Medulla Review
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Megaera
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Melic Review
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Metonym Literary Journal
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Monkey Puzzle
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Muse Apprentice Guild
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Palo Alto Review
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Pieran Springs
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Pif Magazine
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Plainsongs
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Platte Valley Review
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Poetic Diversity
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Poetry Magazine
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Prose Poem
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Red Booth Review
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Red Noise Collective
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Red Rock Review
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Revolution House
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River City Review
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Rockford Review
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Rogue Scholars
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Salmon Creek Journal
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San Diego Reader
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San Jose Studies
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Santa Clara Review
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Scholars & Rogues
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Sein und Werden
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Sentence
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Shampoo
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Sheepshead Review
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Shenandoah
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Short, Fast and Deadly
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sidereality
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Slab Literary Review
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Sonic Boom
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Stirring
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The Coachella Review
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The Dos Passos Review
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The Foliate Oak Online Literary Magazine
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The Literary Bohemian
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The Medulla Review
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The Monarch Review
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The Prose Poem
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Third Wednesday
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Three Candles
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Thunder Sandwich
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Tight
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Trestle Creek Review
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Tryst
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Urbanus
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West Magazine
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West Wind Review
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Writer's Bloc
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Zing

Poetry

Anthologies:
Element(ary)...My Dear (Kind of a Hurricane Press, 2015)
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Empty Mirror (Empty Mirror Books, 2013)
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B: An Anthology of Barbie Poems (Kind of a Hurricane Press, 2012)
,
Best of Branches (Uccelli Press, 2002)
Books:
THE QUEEN OF MOLOKA'I, Book 1: Based On a True Story (Lemon Shark Press, 2019)
,
Hong Kong Man (Lemon Shark Press, 2015)
,
Notes Above Water, Selected Poems (Lemon Shark Press, 2014)
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The Widow from Lake Bled (Moon Pie Press, 2014)
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Moloka'i Nui Ahina, Summers on the Lonely Isle (Lemon Shark Press, 2007)
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Punahou Blues (Lemon Shark Press, 2005)
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Before the City (Lemon Shark Press, 2003)
Chapbooks:
The Girl With the Green Violin (Etched Press, 2015)
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Permanent Damage (Last Automat Press, 2013)
,
Life Extension (Lemon Shark Press, 2001)
Journals: ,
Anti-Heroin Chic
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Ascent Aspirations Magazine
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Asia Literary Review
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Blinking Cursor
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Caper Literary Journal
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Caveat Lector
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Clare Literary Journal
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Dead Flowers
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Emerge Literary Journal
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Floorboard review
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Florida English
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Fox Chase Review
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FutureCycle Poetry
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Gold Man Review
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High Plains Register
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Howling Dog
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Interstice
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Landfall
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LEVELER Poetry Journal
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Line Zero
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Ludlow Press
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Marco Polo Arts Mag
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Maryland Review
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Mayday Magazine
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Moonshot Magazine
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Muses Workshop Online
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Out of Our
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Pig Iron Malt
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Pisgah Review
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Poetry for the Masses
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Poetry Repair Shop
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Poets Against the War
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Prime Mincer
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Printer's Devil Review
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Psychic Meatloaf
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Pudding Magazine: The International Journal of Applied Poetry
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Quarterly Literary Review Singapore
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Red Ochre Lit
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Red River Review
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River Poets Journal
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Riverbabble
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Riverrun
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Sonic Boom
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Subtle Tea
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The Blue Moon Literary & Art Review
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The Broadkill Review
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The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature
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The Fiddleback
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The Foliate Oak Online Literary Magazine
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The Green Tricycle
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The Kerf
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The Prose-Poem Project
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The Quotable
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The Shit Creek Review
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Tributaries
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Vine Leaves Literary Journal
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Writer's Forum
Prizes won: 

2018 Redwood Empire Mensa Award for Creative Nonfiction, Resident Writer at the The Åland Islands Residency (Finland), Resident Scholar at Earthskin Muriwai (New Zealand), Official Selection for the 2016 One Act Festival at New York's Secret Theatre, New York Mills Cultural Center Artist in Residence, Ad Hoc Flash Fiction Award, Second Place Brilliant Flash Fiction Award, Jodi Stutz Memorial Prize in Poetry, Ann Fields Poetry Prize, Academy of American Poets Poetry Prize, Browning Society Award for Dramatic Monologue, Arts Council Silicon Valley Artist Fellowships for Poetry and The Novel, Visiting Writer Fellowship for International Writers Conference in Hong Kong, First Place in Poetry by San Diego Book Awards Association, First Place in Alsop Review Fiction Competition, Editor's Circle Award in Poetry Magazine, First Place in The Political Poet Poetry Competition (in Honor of Walt Whitman), Finalist in The Bevel Summers Story Prize, Honolulu Weekly Poetry Prize, Honolulu Weekly Essay Prize, Second Place Prairie Schooner Nonfiction Award, Finalist in The Tony Quagliano International Poetry Award, Muses Review Poet Neophyte of the Month, Featured Writer of the Month at Crack the Spine Literary Magazine, Featured Writer at Embodied Effigies Magazine, Ka Palapala Po'okela Book Awards Honorable Mention, Seven Certificates of Excellence from the San Diego Book Awards, Five Pushcart Prize Nominations, Short List Bath Flash Fiction Award, Featured Writer of the Month at Kona Public Library, Certificate of Recognition by the California State Assembly, Who's Who in the West, Who's Who in America, Who's Who in the World.

Personal Favorites

Favorite authors: 
Joyce, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Crane, Goethe, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Rimbaud, Kafka, Plath, Eliot, Purdy, Kawabata, Mann, Sam Shepard, Tennessee Williams, Albee, Salinger, Dostoyevsky
What I'm reading now: 
The Bridge by Hart Crane, The Sufferings of Young Werther by Goethe, Djinn by Alain Robbe-Grillet, The Candles of your Eyes by James Purdy, Thousand Cranes by Yasunari Kawabata

More Information

Gives readings: 
Yes
Travels for readings: 
Yes
Identifies as: 
Pacific Islander
Prefers to work with: 
Adults, Seniors
Fluent in: 
English
Born in: 
Honolulu, HI
Hawaii
Raised in: 
Honolulu, HI
Hawaii
Please note: All information in the Directory is provided by the listed writers or their representatives.
Last update: Dec 21, 2023