Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview

£0.00 for first 30 days

Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Hokuloa Road

By: Elizabeth Hand
Narrated by: Kaleo Griffith
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Summary

A young man is drawn into the dark side of paradise in this haunting and "perfectly crafted" mystery (Grady Hendrix), about the eerie secrets of one Hawai’ian islandand the lengths some will go to keep them.

On a whim, Grady Kendall applies to work as a live-in caretaker for a luxury property in Hawaiʻi, as far from his small-town Maine life as he can imagine. Within days he's flying out to an estate on remote Hokuloa Road, where he quickly uncovers a dark side to the island’s idyllic reputation: it has long been a place where people vanish without a trace.

When a young woman from his flight becomes the next to disappear, Grady is determined—and soon desperate—to figure out what's happened to Jessie, and to all those staring out of the island’s “missing" posters. But working with Raina, Jessie’s fiercely protective best friend, to uncover the truth is anything but easy, and with an inexplicable and sinister presence stalking his every step, Grady can only hope he'll find the answer before it's too late.

Perfect for fans of Peter Heller and The White Lotus, and from award-winning writer Elizabeth Hand, a master of crime fiction known for her magnetic characters, seductive prose, and fearless excavations into the darkest corners of our world, comes a chilling and illuminating new novel about a place unlike any other—and the deadly cost of keeping it so.

"Set in a Hawaii so vividly imagined I'm still shaking sand out of my shoes."—Grady Hendrix

“Twisty and dark . . . easily one of the best thrillers I've read.” —Rachel Hawkins

“This is the perfect book for your summer beach bag—an evocative mystery set in a tropical island paradise . . . I was completely enthralled!” —Jason Rekulak

©2022 Elizabeth Hand (P)2022 Mulholland Books
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

Waking the Moon cover art
Dark River Inn cover art
And Then She Vanished cover art
The Girl from the Well cover art
Bearskin cover art
Lights over Cloud Lake cover art
The Wilderwomen cover art
The Manuscript cover art
The Winter People cover art
The Address cover art
In the Deep cover art
A Beautiful Poison cover art
The David Wolf Mystery Thriller Series: Books 1-4 cover art
When Things Get Dark cover art
The Ladies of the Secret Circus cover art
The Breakers Omnibus cover art

Critic reviews

“Elizabeth Hand has been one of my favorite authors since Wylding Hall, so when I opened Hokuloa Road I knew I'd get her signature mix of deeply evocative prose, sinister surroundings, and fascinating characters. I was right, but even as a long time Hand Fan, I was completely blown away by this book. Hokuloa Road is twisty and dark, easily one of the best thrillers I've read, but it's so much more than that, too. It's thoughtful and pensive, smart and scary, and exhilarating as you realize that you're in the hands of a master storyteller. After reading this book, I promise, Elizabeth Hand is going to become one of your favorite authors, too.”—Rachel Hawkins, New York Times bestselling author of Reckless Girls and The Wife Upstairs
"Set in a Hawaii so vividly imagined I'm still shaking sand out of my shoes, Elizabeth Hand's perfectly crafted ghost story is exactly the comfort-destroying read you need on a long, lonely night."—Grady Hendrix, New York Times bestselling author of The Final Girl Support Group
“This is the perfect book for your summer beach bag—an evocative mystery set in a tropical island paradise. The locals warn that Hokuloa Road is dangerous, but I was completely enthralled by its scenery and secrets!”
Jason Rekulak, author of Hidden Pictures

What listeners say about Hokuloa Road

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    6
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    1
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    5
  • 4 Stars
    1
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    5
  • 4 Stars
    0
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent

An unexpectedly enjoyable part of this hugely enjoyable supernatural mystery is its setting during the covid lockdown, something that will, I suspect, culturally appear across various artworks from that particular time in a way a forest fire can be detected in tree rings. The loneliness and desolation of lockdown, the practical difficulties and imposition of quarantine are all seamlessly part of life in this book as a young carpenter travels to a remote Hawiaiian island to work as caretaker for a billionaire. Mask etiquette is followed, spacing and eating outdoors, while the island's entire tourist industry has shut down, Text messages and chats rather movingly keep scattered family and friends in touch. It probably helps that Hand has written science fiction fantasy and horror to acquire the sorts of skills to write a pandemic-as-everyday-background novel, though maybe any writer could do it this well if they're good enough, and Hand is that good. Other timely themes are preserving the last shreds of an already-damaged natural environment and the strange, almost alien designs of the incredibly rich. It's a riveting thriller, with wonderful wrting about the flora and fauna and sights of Hawaii and some deeply lovable characters, as well as a chilly atmosphere of fear and slowly mounting worldly and otherworldly suspense. Narration is superb

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!