Penny left a dark, rainy winter to start a new year and a new life in paradise. Would she have stayed--gutted out, if she'd known the hardships and loneliness she would face, that she would live in her car and an infested shack without power, or that she would move six times and have five jobs that year? If it had been somewhere not so stunningly beautiful, with not-so-perfect weather, maybe not--but Maui? The island rises out of an azure sea, the emerald mountains giving birth to innumerable waterfalls as they climb from palm-lined beaches to touch starlit nights.

Maui is like the too-handsome boyfriend who toys with your affections turning your heart inside out over and over again. And the second you decided he isn't worth it, he comes up behind you, moves your hair, kisses your neck, and turns you around to make love to you with his soulful eyes and beguiling smile.

Come on baby, he whispers, don't give up on us yet. "LAHAINA TOWN" is for anyone who has ever dreamed of ditching the job, selling everything, and running away to start a new life on a sunbathed island.

it is an honest look at paradise when it isn't so "paradisy. " It's a story of triumph and failure and humor and heartache.

It is for anyone who dwells in possibility, anyone who has a dream--and we all do. "LAHAINA TOWN, My Heart-My Home" touches the hand of history, the nonsense of politics, the shadows of culture, and the realities of life in the most remote place on the planet.

It is a book that pulls its readers away from the visions offered by glossy travel brochures and television imagery and into the lives of real people. .