The Bees

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Here they find the home of the three Boatwright sisters - August, June and May. They run a beekeeping business and take on the two runaways. This book introduced me to Sue Monk Kidd's writing. I have all her books now, but Mermaid's Chair and don't need that one. I love her style, her writing and her last 2 books have been amazing. I read this in 2005 and it blew my mind wide opened. I wanted to review this book but weeks went by and I didn’t get the chance. However, upon reflection, I realised that I have nothing to say beyond the first 2 sentences.. it’s not a memorable book at all nor left an impression on me. It’s one of those that I’ll eventually only remember reading because of the title and the fact that this book is popular but not because of the story itself.

The Bees by Laline Paull review – ‘a richly evocative feast

Heroic Sacrifice: In the end, Sir Linden volunteers to mate with Flora's princess daughter to allow her to ascend to the Queen status, knowing it would end in his death. It's in drones' nature, after all. All Men Are Perverts: Drones are universally lecherous and hedonistic, with the exception of Sir Linden. Justified, as their sole purpose is to breed. Lily Owens' mother died when she was 4 from an accident with a gun and Lily has always felt responsible. Her mothers death left her in the care of her abusive father who she calls T-ray and their housekeeper Rosaleen - Lily's only friend. It was touching, well-written, beautiful, full of expression, insightful, anything you could want in a book and then some. It started off with a bang, that wasn't a bang... it grabbed you, but didn't startle you so much that the rest of the book was dull in comparison. There was romance, love, family, racial issues, religious experiences, and bees. I loved the feminist undertones, these women were strong, capable and gutsy. I love the part where August explains why she never married. I loved how the women's spirituality was dealt with an off-beat 'religion' and even though I'm atheist - I still thought that the way that these women had made sense of the world, was empowering and beautiful. It was rather pagan; peaceful yet powerful. I found most of the book to be highly original and kept reading not only because of Kidd's great use of words, but because I really have not ever read anything like this before! I love unique.And here is where my frustration lies. Nuggets like these are scattered around the text, but I don’t feel this book gives them serious attention and development thru the characters. The ideas of mothers, motherhood and feminine love and friendship are explored, but at a very surface level. There is no depth. This is made painfully obvious by the ending of the text, which is pure melodrama. With no plan other than to get away from her home town of Sylvan, Lily and Rosaleen headed in the general direction of Tiburon. The mystery surrounding the death of Lily’s mother, and the little bit she knew about her, pulled her in that direction. But where they would go from there was anyone’s guess. Defrosting Ice King: Initially, Sir Linden was harsh and rude to Flora, seeing her simply as a servant, but eventually he came to gradually warm up to her, even regarding her as a friend, complete with saving her and her daughter's life by removing the traces of the corpse of Sister Sage, who attempted to rat them out to the police in hopes to get them killed, only to get murdered by Flora. Another point of interest is the way that feminism is worked into the novel. I'm not a huge fan of I-am-woman-hear-me-roar overt girlpower in film or literature, but this book is populated with female characters and about eight different kinds of love and strength and mystery. Throw in some very well done race issues, and I was willing to forgive the almost insanely inappropriately happy ending.

The Music of Bees by Eileen Garvin | Goodreads The Music of Bees by Eileen Garvin | Goodreads

SUE MONK KIDD was raised in the small town of Sylvester, Georgia. She graduated from Texas Christian University in 1970 and later took creative writing courses at Emory University, as well as studying at Sewanee, Bread Loaf, and other writers’ conferences. In her forties, Kidd turned her attention to writing fiction, winning the South Carolina Fellowship in Literature and the 1996 Poets & Writers Exchange Program in Fiction. The book opens with Lily's discovery of bees in her bedroom. Then, after Rosaleen is arrested for pouring her bottle of "snuff juice" on three white men, Lily breaks her out of the hospital and they decide to leave town. Insect Gender-Bender: Averted. Aside from the level of sentience displayed by the bees, the novel is an accurate portrayal of roles within a hive, including the vast majority being female and the few males treated well but born only to breed. In a possible case of Writers Cannot Do Math, fully-grown drones are in the hive again only a day after the queen begins laying in the spring. Aside from Sir Linden, they aren't last year's drones either, as they were all killed or driven out into the cold before winter started so that the actual workforce would have enough food to last.This is probably unduly harsh. The Secret Life of Bees is not a bad book - it's an easy read, it's a comfortable read, even in its portrayal of the impact of the Civil Rights movement on a small town that is interacting with it mostly through the media. It's just the overall impact of the stories authors are choosing to tell, that publishers are choosing to publish, and readers are choosing to read. I find it humorous that many of the pseudo-reviewers / intellectuals (if I throw in some over priced words, I'm a big-time reviewer) love to sling review-speak but have no or little experience in hands-on experience: writing. Maybe it's writer-wanna-be frustration or other personal issues. There’s a lot to be said for freeing oneself of inhibiting characteristics / weaknesses and the success and release of open-mindedness. Nevertheless . . . Humans Are Cthulhu: The dreaded Visitation, a disaster bees can scarcely comprehend, is the gathering of honey from the hive. The problem[with people]is they know what matters, but they don't choose it. You know how hard that is, Lily? I love May, but it was still so hard to choose Caribbean Pink. The hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters." If you love southern literature, strong women who survive abuse and overcome the greatest difficulties for a better life, voices against racism and inequality and families (blood-bound or not), this book is definitely for you!

The Bees by Laline Paull | Goodreads

Laline Paull FRSL is a British novelist. Her debut novel, The Bees, was nominated for the 2015 Baileys Women's Prize for Fiction. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Her 2017 cli-fi novel is titled The Ice. [6] Her 2022 novel Pod was nominated for the 2023 Women's Prize for Fiction [7] and made the shortlist. [8] Biography [ edit ] The pacing is a bit too slow. For example, there are two big reveals that we know are coming. However, it took far too long to get there. There were too many times where Lily was going to reveal her secret and then changed her mind. The battle between conformity and rebellion rages in this ambitious, bittersweet debut in which the central characters are bees, striving to survive in their orchard hive. Allegorical in the tradition of Animal Farm and Watership Down, this dystopian novel begins with the birth of a bee, Flora 717, and her “violent struggle to hatch” as she is born into the lowliest sanitation worker class in a caste system ruled by the queen bee and priestesses.Ahhh! *gasp* *choke* *stammer* I can barely find the words to say how much I loved this book. Honestly, The Secret Life of Bees has to be one of the best books I've read in a while. I just want to give it several A+'s and a kiss!