🔖 American authors and journalists Hall (1887-1951) and Nordhoff (1887-1947) both served in the Lafayette Flying Corps during WWI and, though neither man had known the other during the war, were asked to collaborate on a history of the unit published in 1920. They then rented a house together back in the US until commissioned by Harper's Magazine to write travel articles set in the South Pacific. They travelled to Tahiti for research and inspiration and ended up staying there, Nordhoff for 20 years and Hall for life. This book, their second collaboration, was serialized in Harper's in 1920-21 then published in book form. The pair are best remembered for their jointly written Bounty Trilogy (Mutiny on the Bounty,1932; Men Against the Sea,1933 and Pitcairn's Island, 1934).