"Lost Kingdom," a History of Hawaii Until about 30 years ago, most schoolchildren in Hawaii learned a version of the state's history that went something like this: Christian missionaries came over in the early 1800s and handed the Hawaiians a single god, a written language and their very first muumuus. Later, American officials supported a group of well-intentioned gentlemen, many of them descendants of those missionaries, who replaced the monarchy with a democratic system. Eventually, the United States magnanimously annexed the tiny island republic. Sure, native Hawaiians gave the world entertaining things like the hula and surfboards. But really, they were the luckier ones, receiving the trifecta of monotheism, democracy and American appropriation. Hawaii's Last Queen, the Sugar Kings, and America's First Imperial Adventure By Julia Flynn Siler Atlantic Monthly Press. $30. The flip side of that story - how it all looked to the native Hawaiians - is much darker. Julia Flynn Siler's new book, "Lost Kingdom: Hawaii's Last Queen, the Sugar Kings, and America's First Imperial Adventure," recounts that tale using more than 275 sources, including contemporaneous Hawaiian newspapers and the letters and diaries of Lili'uokalani, the last Hawaiian monarch. After a brief synopsis of the initial settlement of the islands and their 1778 "discovery" by Capt. James Cook, Siler digs in at the beginning of the end with the arrival of the first missionaries in 1820. The cultural contempt of these New Englanders, though typical for the era, was no less heartbreaking in what it would mean for the islanders. "The appearance of destitution, degradation and barbarism among the chattering, almost naked savages, whose heads and feet and much of their sunburnt swarthy skin were bare, was appalling," the Rev. Hiram Bingham wrote. Can these be human beings? What followed was a slow-motion stripping of tradition, land, political power and health from the native Hawaiians over the next 70 or so years, which Siler details intricately: the shaming of traditional dress and dance, the gobbling up of property belonging to land-rich but cash-poor locals by American and British sugar planters, the "Bayonet Constitution," forced on King Kalakaua by, among others, a missionary grandson, which turned the monarch into a figurehead, gave voting rights to property-­owning whites and took them away from many native Hawaiians. And of course, there was the toll of foreign-borne smallpox and measles, which reduced the native Hawaiian population by a horrific 75 percent between Cook's arrival and 1853. The Kingdom of Hawaii's death march ended in 1893 with Lili'uokalani's forced abdication to a provisional government, dominated by missionary descendants and haole (white or foreign) businessmen. Five years later, the United States quietly annexed the eight main islands. During the overthrow, Marines landed in Honolulu and occupied points including Iolani Palace. While there, Siler tells us, a recruit "found Kalakaua's crown and pried off the jewels, which he then used as payment in a game of dice. He managed to avoid gambling them all away and kept one of the biggest diamonds, which he sent to his sister on the mainland, not realizing its value. This story is an apt metaphor for the annexation - capturing the disrespect American citizens and representatives often showed to the Hawaiian people, culture and government. That jewel the recruit sent home without realizing its worth? It might as well have been Pearl Harbor, the value of which would become incalculable in a few decades. To her credit, Siler does not hide the painful truth that the Hawaiians were complicit in their fate. For example, King Kamehameha III gave millions of acres to his friends and family without adequately ensuring the commoners would get their share. In the end, commoners held less than 1 percent of the lands distributed, and many ali'i (chiefs) sold out to foreign sugar barons to raise cash. Later, King Kalakaua spent lavishly on parties, pomp and travel, driving the kingdom into great debt, much of it held by a shrewd sugar baron named Claus Spreckels. From the outset, Siler faces certain credibility issues: she is nonnative and nonlocal. She is also working with a language - Hawaiian - that is highly nuanced, often making accurate translations difficult to come by. Yet her book is richly and diversely sourced, and she's able to color in many figures who had heretofore existed largely in outline or black and white. Lili'uokalani manages to keep her Christian faith, though she blames the missionaries for undermining her people. Kalakaua seems to be led by the nose by his mainland cronies, yet he is singularly responsible for reviving the deeply Hawaiian tradition of hula, which had been dormant since the 1820s. "Lost Kingdom" is not as gripping as it could have been, given the palace intrigue and double dealing it describes. But it is a solidly researched account of an important chapter in our national history, one that most Americans don't know but should. It will probably provoke missionary descendants and native Hawaiians alike, which is praise in itself. Sadly, though President Clinton apologized to native Hawaiians in 1993, a bill aiming to restore a measure of sovereignty has languished in Congress for well over a decade. And Siler underscores another bitter footnote to the story: while the Hawaiians vie for political recognition that may never come, many descendants of those who profited from what an 1893 New York Times headline called "the political crime of the century" remain some of the state's wealthiest and most influential landholders. Malia Boyd, a native of Honolulu, has written for Travel & Leisure, Food & Wine and other publications.