8 Mystery Books Set in Hawai’i

Retired LAPD detective Mike Travis has started up his private yacht business on Kona. But old habits die hard when he’s asked by a good friend’s daughter to look into the disappearance of a classmate from their high school.

Her devout parents seem unconcerned and haven’t even gone to the police. Mike's detective sense tingles that something is very wrong, and he brings himself to investigate to try to locate the girl.

It’s the third book in the four-book Mike Travis series.

It’s not every day you have to save a naked woman from her ex-husband wielding a gun. But that’s what happens to private eye John Caine, who stumbles upon the scene on the street.

He comes to her aid and then moves on with his life. Until months later, the woman shows up at his door; her ex-husband has been found murdered and she claims that the people who did it are after her.

She wants to get off of the island Oahu and thinks John can help her. Of course, nothing is ever that simple, and John has to race against time and angry men with guns to save this woman.

It’s also the third in the four-book John Caine series.

Weddings are supposed to be happy events; the soon-to-be bridegroom is not supposed to be murdered in his bed.

But that’s what golfer Alan Saxon discovers on his supposed holiday to Hawai’i for his friend and rival golfer Donald Dukelow’s wedding to a Hawaiian woman.

Before discovering his friend’s body, tensions are high between Donald’s mother, his ex-wife, and the future bride’s own family. Now Alan has to find out who killed his friend without suffering a similar fate himself.

It’s the final book in the six-book Alan Saxon series.

This one is for folks who want to see 1950s Hawai'i. The book was originally published in 1951, but recently republished by Felony & Mayhem Press.

The Lily Wu and Janice Cameron series features amateur sleuth, Lily Wu, and her white roommate, Janice Cameron, a famous novelist. This book starts with Lily and Janice on the S.S. Lurline boat on their way back home to Hawai’i.

But the home they left is not the one they return to. Tourism is changing the island right before their eyes. 

Worse yet, a local woman is found murdered, with suggestions it was part of some ritual sacrifice. Now Lily and her proverbial Watson have to investigate and find justice for the young victim.

Author Eric Redman writes that Lily was “an undeniably unique creation; there was no detective like her in the Golden Age, or even later when Sheridan’s books appeared.”

Attorney and amateur sleuth Storm Kayama finds herself mixed up with big crime in the fourth book of the Storm Kayama series.

Storm finds herself in Kahului to finalize the paperwork for a friend’s scuba dive shop. But events seem to take a life of their own as a bombing and a murder-suicide quickly follow.

Now Storm is up against the Yakuza, who are at the heart of a horrible human trafficking ring and other crimes.

Can she find justice, or will she be yet another victim of organized crime?

Written by Hawaiian-born author Tori Eldridge, this is the first book in the Makalani Pahukula series.

Park ranger Makalani Pahukula has returned to Kaua’i for her grandmother’s birthday after spending 10 years on the continental US. But it might as well be an eternity; she doesn't quite feel at home anymore.

However, when she learns that two of her cousins have gone missing and a local body is found in a forest reserve, Makalani fears the worst for her family members and decides to investigate.

But some people want things to remain hidden…

The second book, Hawai’i Rage, just came out on May 19th.

In this stunning debut, journalist Maya Wong finds herself returning to Hawai’i after all of her writing gigs dry up.

Needing to pay the bills, she is hired to ghostwrite the biography of Parker Hamilton, a local land developer. But friends and family are displeased with her decision to take this work.

Parker is not well-liked for his business dealings. But someone else had a bigger beef with Parker; he’s found murdered.

Now Maya finds herself teaming up with her ex, a detective, to find out who actually killed the unpopular wealthy man.

Last but not least, we have a cozy mystery set on Hilo!

In crime shows and books, there’s a common refrain: no body, no crime. But retired caterer Valerie Corbin knows what she saw in the lava: someone’s leg and boot.

Valerie decides she has to investigate no matter what, even if that’s not what she and her wife Kristen had planned for their vacation.

Will Valerie figure out who the victim is and who might have been responsible for putting them in the lava flow? 

t’s the first of the three-book (so far) Orchid Island mystery series; book 3 Murder, Local Style, just came out in April.