Juliet Kono

Juliet Kono (born 1943) is a Hawaiian poet and novelist.

Early life and education Kono was born in 1943 in Hilo, Hawaii to Yoshinori and Atsuko Asayama; her grandparents were immigrants from Japan. One of her earliest memories is from the April 1 tsunami resulting from the 1946 Aleutian Islands earthquake; her family lost their home, which was near the water's edge where Liliuokalani Gardens is today, and were forced to live near her grandparents, who operated a small sugar cane plantation in Kaiwiki. She is married to David Lee, Kono has also taught at guest workshops for universities and colleges including Wellesley College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

She is considered a member of the Bamboo Ridge group of writers

Awards Kono received a Creative Artist Exchange Fellowship from the Japan-United States Friendship Commission in 1998 Her novel Anshu: Dark Sorrow received the 2011 Ka Palapala Po'okela Book Award for Literature.