A wild ride to the dark side of Americana The Curse of Lono is to Hawaii what Fear and Loathing was to Las Vegas: the crazy tales of a journalist's ""coverage"" of a news event that ends up being a wild ride to the dark side of Americana. Originally published in 1983, Curse features all of the zany, hallucinogenic wordplay and feral artwork for which the Hunter S. Thompson/Ralph Steadman duo became known and loved. This curious book, considered an oddity among Hunter's oeuvre, was long out of print, prompting collectors to search high and low for an original copy.