Liliuokalani mannerisms.

I have noticed that several of the posts have to do with the tone, diction, and emphasis Queen Liliuokalani uses while she narrates the story of her life and the annexation of Hawaii.

I suppose my reaction is to "jump to her defense," and offer up how I was impressed upon by her tone and choice of words.

She does seem to have her priorities a bit mixed up throughout the book: incessantly listing of the deaths and sufferings of loved ones with little more than a glance, while taking full paragraphs to go in to detailed descriptions of her jewelry, for instance. The only argument I can muster is that she had grown up during a time when death was plentiful in Hawaii (during the initial trips made towards the colonization of Hawaii, numerous new diseases were introduced in to the populace, and I think we have all by this point heard how the population had been devastated with the coming of "The white man."), and was simply an accepted facet of Hawaiian life.
It may also be the case that her nonchalance was granted (partly) for the benefit of the reader. Imagine how much longer the book would have been if she had described and re-described her emotions over the death of each and every character who had died... I think those of us who had a hard time finishing the book may not have succeeded. That is not to say that the queen was thinking of us specifically, but it is to say that we should remember who the audience was meant to be (powerful citizens and politicians of the USA), and remember that she had many, many instances to list.
While we are thinking about the audience that the queen had in mind, we should also remember that this book isn't meant to be read for pleasure; it is not a novel. I feel that as a member of Western society, I have one of two expectations while approaching a book: for it to be either a) instructional, or b) entertaining. If the book fails to do either, then that was a waste of some good page-space.
And since Hawaii's Story has the outward appearance of a novel, I think that maybe a lot of readers might be disappointed when it really isn't all that entertaining (informative, to be sure, but it is not a novel). Things like a lack of strong "voice" from the narrator, and a consistent absence of emotion during the listing of things that we have grown accustomed to think of as emotional (death).

Now the jewelry (almost done, I promise). How can she be so detached when it comes to instances of death, but clearly so infatuated by jewelry.

Well, the same way that we feel that romance movies are banal, but Pixar produces the greatest films of the decade. We become desensitized to things that we are repeatedly exposed to. Since death permeated Hawaiian life so deeply, it seems to lose its shock value to those people, whereas jewelry or gowns that have never before been seen by someone would very easily evoke a stronger response (even emotionally).

So I think while reading this book we should work very hard to keep it in context, and not treat the words, actions or people as if they happened recently, or were acted out by people whom we know and fully understand (I know that I had to shake myself from a "What the Hell was she thinking?" moment regularly while reading).