Living on a peach farm in South Carolina with her harsh, unyielding father, Lily Owens has shaped her entire life around one devastating, blurred memory - the afternoon her mother was killed, when Lily was four. Since then, her only real companion has been the fierce-hearted, and sometimes just fierce, black woman Rosaleen, who acts as her "stand-in mother."

When Rosaleen insults three of the deepest racists in town, Lily knows it's time to spring them both free. They take off in the only direction Lily can think of, toward a town called Tiburon, South Carolina - a name she found on the back of a picture amid the few possessions left by her mother.

There they are taken in by an eccentric trio of black beekeeping sisters named May, June, and August. Lily thinks of them as the calendar sisters and enters their mesmerizing secret world of bees and honey, and of the Black Madonna who presides over this household of strong, wise women. Maternal loss and betrayal, guilt and forgiveness entwine in a story that leads Lily to the single thing her heart longs for most, a sense of belonging.

This book was recommended to me by a friend, but I was a little hesitant at first as I read The Mermaid Chair and did not enjoy it that much. This book was fantastic and did not disappoint! I loved the storyline and the charcters; I had a hard time putting The Secret Life of Bees down!

I enjoyed this book, but the end became awfully idealistic and predictable. Until that point, though, it was a great story. I thought the story did an exceptional job of gracefully discussing race issues of the '60's and '70's.

This book takes place in during the turbulent times of the 60's. It is amazingly well-written. I can't say enough about this book. Highly recommended by me.

A quick read full of ups and downs and new experiences meshed with familiar ones. I wouldn't say it is stellar writing, but she does have a great gift for description that allows you to really feel much of the book. A little gem.

I enjoyed this touching story very much.

An emotional journey involving a young southern girl whose mother dies at a young age. I don't want to say more...just read it!

A fantastic read filled with many emotional topics...The south, racism, the role of women in history and much, much more!

Fantastic! Fantastic! Fantastic!

This novel, tells the story of a 14-year-old white girl named Lily Owen who is raised by an elderly African American Rosaleen after the accidental death of Lily's mother. Following a racial brawl in 1960s Tiburon, SC, Lily and Rosaleen find shelter in a distant town with three black bee-keeping sisters. The sisters and their close-knit community of women live within the confines of racial and gender bondage and yet have an unmistakable strength and serenity associated with the worship of a black Madonna and the healing power of honey. Lily discovers the truth about her mother's past and the certainty that "the hardest thing on earth is choosing what matters." The stunning metaphors and realistic characters are so poignant that they will bring tears to your eyes. Among the best books I have ever read.

BLURB
Lily has grown up believing she accidentally killed her mother when she was four. She not only has her own memory of holding the gun, but her father's account of the event.
Now fourteen, she yeams for her mother, and for forgiveness. Living on a peach farm in South Carolina with her father, she has only one friend: Rosaleen, a black servant whose sharp exterior hides a tender heart.
South Carolina in the sixties is a place where segregation is still considered a cause worth fighting for. When racial tension explodes one summer afternoon, and Rosaleen is arrested and beaten, Lily is compelled to act.
Fugitives from justice and from Lily's harsh and unyielding father, they follow a trail left by the woman who died ten years before. Finding sanctuary in the home of three beekeeping sisters, Lily starts a journey as much about her understanding of the world, as about the mystery surrounding her mother.


REVIEW
This is about to made into a movie with the incomparable Dakota Fanning taking the lead. It sounds perfect and I can hardly wait.

The Lily of the novel is feisty, intelligent and at times desperately unhappy. Although not a particularly troublesome kid, she seems to exist in a ghost world, surrounded by the silent unforgiving oppression of her father. Her only companion is her Nanny Rosaleen, and though good-natured, the servant has a tongue that could skin a cow.

So, Lily decided one day that she has had enough, and she starts across the country, until she is taken in by three bee-keeping sisters. These odd, strong and independent women have problems of their own aplenty (one has mental health problems, beautifully described here as her personal cross to bear rather than as some axe-weilding lunatic fringe character), but they have a lot to teach about life and bees and honey.

As Lily grows under their care, she discovers the truth about her own past, parents and potential.

This book has all the potential to be a kiddy-friendly stinker, but Sue Monk Kidd possesses that wonderful albeit rare quality to create three-dimensional flawed characters that climb into your heart and don't let go. Never santimonious, never preachy, her books are simple and powerful and poignant.

The only tiny flaw I could find was that the father was a kinda unrealised character (though that might have been the point). But in a book celebrating the liberating power of sisterhood, that was hardly the shock of the century!

Read this in 2005. I remember the general outline of the story. I know I really enjoyed this and it was a book club selection.

This collection of short stories seemed quite different from other chicklit that I've read, in that none of it is light romance with happy endings. It was much darker and more involved. Some had hopeful endings- few had actual happy endings- and some were sad. All were bittersweet at best. Some were hard to listen to- stories about girls who never get over their fathers leaving or some jerk who left them. I just wanted to shake most of them and tell them to get it together and get over it.
Overall, a pretty strong collection of stories about women.

wierd compilation of stories that are disconnected. Not bad, just not really good.

Originally published on October 27, 2007 at Bits of Existence.

I keep picking up Jennifer Weiner’s books because even while they have yet to captivate me in the same way that Jane Green’s novels do, I still think they’re good books. I picked up The Guy Not Taken before my trip to see Johnathan in August. It stayed in my luggage, untouched because I napped rather than spending much time at reading.

The first thing that struck me while reading this series of short stories is that divorce is a heavily used theme, as is parental abandonment. I think in almost every story, some form of one or both themes manifests itself. I was comforted to see Weiner make comments about this very same thing in an interview that was printed in the back. Apparently most of these stories were concocted during her early college years, which occurred just after her own father left the family.

I think, inexplicably, my favorite series of short stories were those which were the most clearly autobiographical - those of Josie, Nicki, Jon and their mother. Even while Nicki was whiny and sour, Jon was sullen and Josie seemed to have very little backbone of her own, always afraid of making a wrong step, I found the family endearing. Throughout the whole thing, it’s clear they care about each other, to some degree. They also seem to be very bad at showing it. I really liked reading the trilogy of short stories about them that were interspersed throughout.

My least favorite had to be the story of Dora getting robbed in a manner of speaking by Amber and Dawn, two girls from New Jersey. None of the characters jumped out at me as characters with whom I could identify or at least find endearing features. It seemed a poor ending to a series of short stories that did keep me reading. I think the novel would have best ended with the last of the three autobiographical stories, which seemed to have the most realistic and final of the endings.

On the whole, it was a nice novel. Not a great one, but a series of short stories cannot be expected to compete with a longer, more cohesive novel. Still, it was a nice read. I look forward to the time when I have the money to pick up Little Earthquakes, which I believe is the last of her novels that I have not yet read.

Autobiography about a child that has a rough life. Inside look at orphanages in NYC. How a young boy learns to love.