A good, solid history of Hawai'i in the 19th century, almost entirely focussed on the time of the Hawaiian monarchy between contact in 1778 and the annexation by the US in 1898. It's a very detailed history of the experiences of the various kings, queens, and regents. With lots of detail from letters and personal stories of the time.

I enjoyed this remarkably personal view of the history of the rulers of Hawai'i. But in focussing on the rulers the book suffers from not giving more of a picture of what life was like for Hawaiians as a whole. I'm always curious what the experiences of basic laborers were, or townies, or immigrant laborers. Haley does discuss them a bit but only impersonally. OTOH the book is plenty long and detailed enough, and focussing that detail on the rulers makes sense for the story he wants to tell.

I also appreciated the slightly revisionist history. Haley doesn't romanticize pre-colonial Hawai'i, giving the context of the very limited feudal traditional life. But then he certainly doesn't apologize for the colonialists either, and only a little for the missionaries. I also liked reading a more subtle story of the politics than "sugar barons stole the country". That was part of it, but there's more too, and the deeper story is interesting.