Believe the Hite
Michael Hite has penned a work of historic island fiction that even old Nantucketers can love
BY MARLI GUZZETTA INDEPENDENT ARTS EDITOR
The idea came to Michael Hite while he was helping Linda Loring renovate her house - a work of historic fiction that could capture all walks of old Nantucket characters.

TERRY POMMETT

"While my wife and I were helping Linda renovate, she'd tell us stories of all these larger-than-life people, and that piqued my curiosity," said Hite, author of "The Last Boat."

The self-published novel is a work of historical fiction based on Nantucket in the early 1900s. The story follows a woman who wakes up on her 100th birthday, knowing she will be dead by the end of the day. The woman is "haunted" by an event that happened 80 years prior and wants to set the record straight before her time is up.

The author, who also penned the script for the film "The Dinner Party," will be reading from his book and signing copies at Mitchell's Book Corner this weekend.

"There are a dearth of historical novels on Nantucket, and this fills a need for good, accurate, historical fiction set on Nantucket," said Mimi Beman, owner of Mitchell's Book Corner. "The book has been selling really well. People who have been reading it have been comparing it to 'Ahab's Wife.'"

Hite set the novel in the early 20th century because he was interested in the way the technological advances of the day changed American life.

To get the period down, Hite said, he spent "hundreds of hours" researching at the Atheneum and the Nantucket Historical Association's Research Library.

The book is an interesting read for the history alone - including everything from a coconut oil spill, to the price of eggs, to where people got their baseball scores.

"The most amazing discovery was how the phrase 'The real McCoy came about,'" Hite said. "It was based on rum runners of the time. Captain McCoy had a ship outside the waters of Nantucket, and it was lined with rum and other spirits from Jamaica. People would always search for his liquor because it was 'the real McCoy' and not something mixed with water."

Hite also went through old Macy family scrapbooks, trying to acquire some of the vernacular of the era.

Recreating such a dynamic period was thrilling but also intimidating for the author. "In the back of your mind, you're saying, 'Oh my gosh, I hope I get it right.' Because I have such a love and a fascination for this time."

Hite, who self-published the novel through Barnes and Noble's self-publishing imprint, iUniverse, runs the Foundation for Better Health Care with his wife. Though his training is in screenwriting (he earned his M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Columbia), Hite said that writing a novel proved a new and challenging artistic endeavor.

"Writing screenplays, you use a different muscle," he said. "With a screenplay, you cut to the action, immediately. With a novel, you can slow down and smell all the flowers."

Or coconut oil, as the case may be. I

BOOK SIGNING: MICHAEL HITE, "THE LAST BOAT"

When: Sat., Aug. 25, 10 a.m. - noon
Where: Mitchell's Book Corner, 54 Main St.
Cost: Free
For more information, call 228-1080.