Reading and Conversation with Cathy Song ’77

All the Love in the World (Bamboo Ridge Press) is poet Cathy Song's debut collection of prose. The interconnected short stories affirm the power of memory to redeem, to bridge lives and find three generations in a timeless tale of love and its endurance. Beginning in the sugar plantation era of early 20th century Hawai'i, the narrative follows two oddly matched lovers, Eleanor Yee and Mahny Park, as they leave the small town of Wahiawa and embark on Mahny's dream of becoming a pilot, a journey which takes them to post-World War II Tulsa and Miami. Facing discrimination, the couple return to Hawai'i, where Mahny is able to become one of the first commercial airline pilots flying for Aloha Airlines, founded by Chinese-Americans. From the sacrifices of their immigrant parents toiling in the sugar cane fields, Mahny and Eleanor achieve the middle-class dream—raising their chlidren in the suburbs and treating themselves to tourist epiphanies in Spain, Costa Rica and New Zealand. The cycle of human existence explored through Mahny and Eleanor's long marriage looks unflinchingly at the impermanent nature of life—depression, dementia, death—before leaving us in an afterglow of compassion. This collection of short stories explores what it means to be human, to love, to grow old and lose what you love. 

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