About
We are a newly formed publishing company composed of a Native Hawaiian family based in Kalihi Valley. Take a look at our members below:
Skye LaRosa
creative writing director
Skye is the lead Creative Writing Director for the Witches Three series, which focuses on providing stories and narratives to teach valuable life lessons that encompass the joys of siblinghood, as well as navigating challenges children may face today, such as bullying, grief, unhealthy comparisons and insecurities just to name a few. Skye is a Native Hawaiian writer and lover of all magical things. She has a background in medical sciences and followed her passion of helping people through healthcare with a career that began at Queen’s Medical Center . Since then, she has moved on to becoming a successful entrepreneur that travels all over the country and dedicates her time helping adults overcome many of the challenges you find in her books. Skye is a social butterfly and enjoys meeting people, she has a lifelong love for singing and her absolute favorite pastime is getting lost in conversations and the company of her family.
Siera Makanani Snow
creative illustration director
Siera is the Creative Illustration Director for all projects of Seastars Publishing --a truly remarkable endeavor. Her mixed media artwork breathes our stories to life in ways that words cannot. Siera is a Native Hawaiian artist who has been developing and honing her craft since childhood. When she is not creating, she is kept extremely busy and entertained by her two littles, Leo and Luna. Siera has a bachelors of science degree from UH Manoa and loves making things with her hands, reading, traveling, exploring nature and spending time with her family. On rainy days you can often find her curled up in a book or working on her next project.
S. K. Mundon
Product director
S is the Product Director behind the Seastars Publishing book series. She too is a writer and contributes stories when needed. S helps develop the product series from thought into fruition through careful planning and budgeting. S is an engineer by trade with both a Mechanical Engineering bachelors of science degree and Master's degree from Boston University. While she spends a considerable amount of time developing products at tech startups, she has a passion for writing and is currently writing a novel, which has been an ongoing 8-year endeavor. We are looking forward to its completion, but we are firm believers that good things take time. When S isn’t working, she can be found trying new recipes in the kitchen, buried in a book, dying from a hot yoga session, wandering around outside or on to her next hobby obsession.
Kalei Makali'i
Supply chain and marketing director
Kalei is the original voice and founder of Seastars Publishing. He has substantial knowledge in the business world as a serial entrepreneur, from creating custom furniture to organic farming, and general contracting to name a few. Other than the specialized heavy construction techniques taught by his father, he was basically self-taught in the various ventures that he embraced but he also credits the pre-industrial preparation courses in high school (PIP) which included hands on framing methods and math & science courses geared towards the construction industry that gave him the basic skills for that trade. After High school he joined the Hawaii Air National Guard as an Early Warning Radar Systems Operator for 5 years. These past few years he has cultivated experience in sourcing products and developing supply chain methods and relations to help ease the initial startup costs for new business owners. Armed with certifications from Helium 10 Kalei manages the Amazon shop and also seeks to diversify Seastars Publishing's internal product lines. When he is not researching through copious news articles, business courses or the various financial sectors of the world, he busies himself in his garden where he is actively working towards a self-sustaining way of life and is looking forward to living with his family off the grid. You can also find Kalei's humorous handiwork and wit in some of the upcoming book projects, be sure to keep a lookout for those gems.
Vision
Our vision is to help engage children and make reading more exciting. Since we now live in a world where technology is quickly advancing, we know books have heavy competition when it comes to being a favorite past time. We hope to reignite that love-to-read spark by providing books with original stories and multimedia illustrations that children (and their parents) can get lost in. The children's book, "The Tiny Seed," is the first book of many that we are creating at Seastars Publishing.
Dedication
We dedicate our efforts to our precious children, Leo (8) and Luna (6), who have gone through so much change in their young lives, but are so resilient in all they do. We learn from them everyday, and we are challenged in teaching them about our world and wish to do so with our books. We hope our efforts with our children will be helpful to other parents as they encounter the challenging journey of raising up the future generation.
The Tiny Seed
This project is our first published book, The Tiny Seed, where we follow a seed’s journey and discuss life cycles and change.