Once upon a time ... a tsunami awoke from the sea. It was like a beast that jumped out and crept towards us, it moved like fire over the land ... Dozens of such stories - told by people who saw a giant tsunami rip through their villages, homes and kill family members - are being recorded in a book.

Samoan writer and teacher Lani Wendt Young has been commissioned to take down the stories of hundreds of people affected by the tsunami that killed almost 200 people in Samoa, Tonga and American Samoa on September 29 last year.

Ms Wendt Young, 36, has spent the past two months visiting villages on the southern coast of Samoa's Upolu Island, talking to survivors and hearing the devastating situations people faced that day.

She will travel to American Samoan and then to Tonga's Niuatoputapu Island in a few weeks to do the same.

Click to read full story in New Zealand Herald