Post #136318 by Satan's Sin on Wed, Jan 19, 2005 8:14 AM

I want to thank this thread for reminding me how good of a writer Michener was when he started out. And, imho, "Tales of the South Pacific" was one of the great pillars that gave rise to Polynesian Pop. Let's face it, it was the men who came home from World War II and started their families and careers who were the first patrons of tiki bars. "Tales of the South Pacific" surely reminded them of their brief but intense tastes of the Souh Seas, and tiki bars were surely a natural outgrowth of this. And then, when the movie "South Pacific" came along, it was time for their wives to join in on the action, and so Polynesian restaurants and hotels were born.

Michener's last novels I find to be absolutely dreadful. Long, long, LONG descriptions, like being stuck in a classroom again, and characters who were either dirty and wicked or brilliant and moral and courageous, nothing in between. Guess which characters triumphed. Ugh.