Author, A. J. Llewellyn

By A.J. Llewellyn

I know I’m a prolific author but Vagabond Heart, my latest release for Total-e-Bound, has been waiting in the wings to come out this week and really is one of my favorite books – it has been a passion project since I got the idea. It’s also quite a departure for me.
This story, of a gay make prostitute working in Honolulu during WWII came to me after I saw a riveting documentary on TV: Sex in World War II: The Pacific Front, in which the lives of 200 women who lived and worked as prostitutes in Hotel Street, Honolulu, servicing US servicemen were depicted.
I’m an insomniac (just by the by) and caught this program at 3am one cold winter day. I kept calling my own voicemail, leaving myself messages since I was too tired to get up and grab a pen and paper and had no DVR at the time.
The details of these women’s lives staggered me. I could not BELIEVE that each one serviced at a minimum of 100 men a day, each, and that each man was given three minutes of time for three bucks. They were called Three Minute Men.
Apart from being working girls, these women virtually lived like nuns. They weren’t allowed to go out to bars, restaurants, Waikiki beach, couldn’t ride a bicycle (!!) or a street car. They couldn’t ride in – or own a car. They weren’t allowed to own a bank account OR send their money back home to the mainland.
Phew.
And the US military put them to take care of the men…but nobody really took care of them. Some women lasted only a few months. Rule-breakers or those crushed by the business, were shipped right back to the mainland and fresh workers would be shipped to the islands.
Of course, as I watched all this, my mind flew to the possibilities of…what if a man serviced the gay servicemen streaming in and out of Honolulu?
Every person I started talking to about the idea was haunted by these 200 women. Of course, I did a lot of research and the book took on a life of its own. In all my research I learned that there was a man dressed as a woman servicing some men – a WWII transvestite! – but I remain convinced somebody was secretly servicing men.
My character, Tinder McCartney, gripped my heart and wouldn’t let go. I’m thrilled my editor at Total eBound loved the character and the book and Vagabond Heart is the first in a three-book series called Pearl Harbor.
A month ago, I returned to Honolulu and spent time on Hotel Street to complete my research. Some of the hotels still exist, but most don’t. I was shocked how run down it was and it saddened me. I had my map of the Chinatown neighborhood from way back then with the hotels all listed. Almost all are gone. I also have photos and could visualize exactly where all those sailors lined up to “climb the stairs” to visit their favorite girls as they drank imitation gin, nursed fresh tattoos from the numerous parlors on Hotel Street.
Ironically, a few tattoo parlors remain.
Some people in Honolulu are ashamed of this particular piece of history and I think this is why Hotel Street is a shocking dump today. I don’t see this chapter of US military life as shameful. I think it needs to be told.
These 200 women were the first sexual experience most of these young soldiers had. From the oral histories of two of the men who went to them, I’ve learned that the women were often maternal and caring and when they could, talked to the boys…some of whom died in battle soon after.
When Pearl Harbor was bombed, these ladies of Hotel Street gave up their beds to injured men and worked side by side with the nurses in the hospitals, tending the sick.
I think they were quite heroic.
I read “Honolulu Harlot”, the autobiography of Jean O’Hara Hotel Street’s most famous sex worker and I must admit I adore her. She once got beaten up by the local cops who kicked her teeth in. She defied all the rules and bought a car and wound up in the poky.
And yet, she cared about the men and provided a service.
I’ve interviewed so many people who were in the islands then and wish I could have talked to her but her book tells quite a tale.
Jean O’Hara disappeared a couple of years after Pearl Harbor was attacked. I wonder where she is and hope she’s happy, rich and loved. I also wonder how she survived the damage down to her own…Vagabond Heart.

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Aloha oe,

A.J.