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Summary: The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Review: Truely a masterpiece! This book not only kept me wondering, but it also touched a place in my heart that I didn't know was able to be reached by literature. Sue Monk Kidd did a wonderful job writing this story as though she was the little girl doing everything possible just to find out what her mother was really like. Throughout the book the girl had to deal with an abusive father,the blurred death of her mother,running away from home, fighting racism, and growing up all at the same time. Along with is understandable storyline and amazing plot, the story was incredibly interesting. The book was extremely hard to put down. I would recommend this book to anything who has a sense of adventure or just simply has children. (perferably women.)
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Summary: A pocketful of wisdom.
Review: For a first novel, Sue Monk Kidd has quite outdone herself. A daughter, desperate to find the truth behind her late mother's shadowed past, ends up discovering so much more. The main character Lily struggles to uncover a mystery that is wholly linked to her childhood. With the gentle guidance of a wonderfully unusual family of women (and a showering of divine intervention), she becomes the woman her mother would have always wanted her to be. It is a tale about devotion, struggle, racism, the conditions of love, the wisdom of life, and most of all the unbreakable courage of sisterhood.
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Summary: a virtual treasure
Review: I picked this book up at an airport store and then got so absorbed that the plane could have gone down and I'd still be reading to find out what became of Lily and the incredible surrogate family she finds in the bee keepers house. I was worried that the bee keeping theme would become too cliched, but the author manages the metaphor perfectly without overdoing it at all. The portraits of the south are so vivid that the book does evoke such classics at To Kill a Mockingbird -- in fact, Lily is just as scrappy and recourcefull as Scout. Unlike TKAM, there are few male heroes -- this is a book about women and their mothering capability. The writing is lyric throughout and the portrayal of the south spot on. It's hard to believe this is Kidd's first novel as she writes with an aura of experience that is hard to fabricate. An excellent read.
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Summary: Sweet
Review: Sue Monk Kidd's The Secret Life of Bees is a sweet story an engaging little read that doesn't quite make it to greatness. The novel concerns Lily Owen a young teenage girl in a Southern town in 1964. Her mother died years ago under circumstances Lily barely remembers and her father is somewhat lacking in empathetic parenting skills. Lily and her black babysitter, Rosaleen, escape from their small town in search of the truth behind Lily's mother's life. They wind up in Tiburon, South Carolina, living with three black sisters who keep bees where Lily ultimately learns the truth about her mother. The novel is reminiscent, somewhat, of To Kill a Mockingbird, The Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood, among others. There are no surprises here, nothing that makes it stand out. Still it is a pleasurable gentle read that I think most will enjoy.
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Summary: Just Like Honey, Sweet, Gooey and Good for the Soul
Review: This was a wonderful fiction debut for Sue Monk Kidd. The way she mixed all the issues that surround our world past and present; racism, death, family, prejudice, strength, weakness, courage and forgiveness had a profound effect on me. This book has wonderfully drawn out characters and more importantly an underlining message that any warm blooded person can learn from. I strongly recommend this book to people who are ready to look inside thier selves and come to serenity. ... Again A Wonderful Book. A sequel would be bittersweet, I would love to see how the characters are in ten years, however sequels usually tend to stray from their original messages. Regards, Chasity
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Summary: The Hot Zone
Review: Richard Preston's novel The Hot Zone looks at the inner workings of the government's CDC branch and military department. His plot line follows the history of the viruses Marburg, Ebola Zaire, Ebola Sudan, and HIV. Through out Preston's novel, he uses many creative techniques to educate ignorant humans of biology and chemo biology while entertaining them. Three devices Preston utilizes in his novel are imagery, metaphors, and allusions. Preston uses imagery to paint the walls of the jungle and monkey houses for his readers, so they can receive the full effect of the viruses' outbreaks. The second technique instrumental in Preston approach is his creative use of metaphors. His use of metaphors allows his audience to put into perspective the occurrences in the jungle and monkey houses. The final device utilized by Preston is allusion; he uses this device to enable ignorant readers to grasp some basic biological understandings. I found Preston's novel to be a high paced adventure, which entertains and educates his readers about the past and emerging viruses.
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Summary: Place a beehive on my grave
Review: I picked this book up on a whim and I am so glad for whim's. Reading this book was soothing to my soul. I have never been to the South, never been around beehives, nor do I know sisters as strong as the Boatwrights. Yet while reading this book I could feel the heat of the South, smell honey and feel soothed by the women in this book. I don't think I have been as touched by a book in awhile as I much as I was by this book. It was as if I went to my boxing corner "where somebody dabbed mercy on my beat up life." Thank you Sue Monk Kidd.
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Summary: How sweet it is...
Review: Sue Monk Kidd's novel was full of complex, tortured characters - each with his/her own emotional/psychological baggage. I thoroughly enjoyed the story - it was swift yet dense with detail. The male characters were a little flat, and at times the three sisters (May, June and August Boatwright) seemed a bit stereotypical (the quirky, supernatural black woman who has all the answers). But it was a good novel.
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Summary: Motherless daughter reviews 'Secret LIfe of Bees'
Review: Author, Sue Monk Kidd goes inside the mind and depth of yearning a motherless adolescent girl feels. I know, I too lost my mother when I was a year older than Lily. I was 5 and the year was 1959. My mother died of lupus (SLE) not violently by my own hand as in this story. I used to imagine my mother...that she wasn't really gone.....what my life would have been like if I'd have had a mother like the rest of my friends and classmates did. I BECAME the mother I imagined. But to this day at 50 years of age, I still yearn for her and miss her. It IS like August says, "You have to find a mother inside yourself. We all do. Even if we already have a mother, we still have to find this part of ourselves inside." This is a beautiful constructed, intricately thought out and naturally told, a book you can and want to read quickly, then share with your good friends. You will grow in knowledge and understanding (emotional intelligence) in reading and being open to absorbing the lessons skillfully told in "The Secret Life of Bees". I highly recommend it, a very enjoyable read.
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Summary: Nice prose but 100% predictable
Review: Lily runs away from her ornery pa with her sassy black nanny and finds herself at a hot pink house where three sisters live. One sister is the master beekeeper; she is the oldest and the wisest. The next sister is a talented cellist but is inexplicably mean to Lily. She was jilted once when she was young, but she has had a devoted suitor following her around for years whom she obviously loves but keeps rejecting because she is proud. The last sister is a wonderful cook but somewhat simple-minded, and she feels the grief of others as if it were her own. Oh, and there's a teenage guy who comes by to help with the bees and who is black, handsome, and just about Lily's age. Pop quiz: What happens to each of these characters? If you honestly don't know, then go ahead and read this book; I'm sure you will find it life-affirming and touching and powerful and it will make you want to call your mother and tell her you love her. Fine. But if you've ever read an Oprah book or seen a made-for-TV movie or read a Hallmark card, you know exactly what will happen to each character two or three pages into meeting him or her. This book has some beautiful prose and it's a quick read, but really, I would have loved to have seen a drop of originality. Instead, I found myself rolling my eyes whenever yet another character succumbed to his or her totally predictable fate.
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