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The Secret Life of Bees (Audio CD)
by Sue Monk Kidd
| Category:
Fiction, Original books |
| Market price: ¥ 368.00
MSL price:
¥ 348.00
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| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Vivid chapters capture the South Carolinian summer, and the sweet and bitter realities of life, love and family. A great read for women, young and old! |
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AllReviews |
  1 2 Total 2 pages 16 items |
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E. Allerton (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-24 00:00>
Inspirational, Emotional, Uplifting, this cleverly written novel, by Sue Monk Kidd will have you reading up a storm. Set in South Carolina, 1964, The Secret Life of Bees will truly be a treasure in your reading collection. As you join Lily Owens, a small-town girl, on her journey though life, it is as if you have been swept onto a roller coaster ride full of unexpected twists and turns. Lily has been riding the loops ever sense the confusing day that she accidentally killed her mother. Kidd has slipped countless messages and important bits of advice into this cathartic novel.
Also focused on the marvelous female power of women, this novel strongly focuses on the fact that "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" (Kidd 288). And this is just one of the numerous bits of life-changing insight and advice. Another wonderful insight into life is given when June hears May telling her "Come on. Don't mess up your time to live" (Kidd 222). This is also an important theme that the novel supports. Kidd does a wonderful job of encouraging every person who reads her books to live life to the fullest.
Sue Monk Kidd does an excellent job of weaving an intricate story exploding with all sorts of different views on life, civil rights, first loves, death, religion, child abuse, motherless children, puberty, bee keeping, and even more. An excellent book about the joys, up, and downs of life, and how no matter how bad or chaotic it can get, somehow, everything manages to work itself out. Everything seems to come together in the end and all of the loose ends are as good as tied.
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L. Fowler (MSL quote), Oxford, MS
<2007-01-24 00:00>
The Secret Life of Bees is a superb story of a motherless young girl experiencing the South during the controversial Civil Rights Movement. Beautifully written, this tale follows 14-year old Lily as she runs away from a life of emotional abuse inflicted upon her by her dead-beat father. Lily's partner in crime in the escape is the family's African-American maid/cook/stand-in-mother Rosaleen. Their journey, and a piece of Lily's biological mother's past, leads them to Tiburon, South Carolina where Lily and Rosaleen find themselves taken in by three black sisters August, May, and June. August, who is a beekeeper, and Lily immediately share a deep connection. As the summer of 1964 drags on, Lily, although raised without a biological mother, finds her mother in the eccentric sisters she is living with and her dear old friend Rosaleen. She also finds a mother in the statue of the "Black Mary." The sisters and their friends center their religious beliefs around the statue forming a society called "The Daughters of Mary." The summer spent with the sisters in South Carolina, teaches Lily important lessons of life and love for any young girl.
Kidd is a master storyteller. She delightfully creates a warm atmosphere in the sisters' home in Tiburon, South Carolina. Being from the South, I can all to well relate to Kidd's descriptions of summer rain showers and hot, muggy summer days that can sometimes plague us but deep down we love it in an unexplainable way - the weather is a part of who we are. As is the food... The home cooking done by May and Rosaleen reminds me of the delicious meals my grandmother and great-grandmother would cook up when I was young. My mother and aunts still carry on the traditions that surround our meals. Apart from the weather and the food, I believe it is the people who make the South so unique. The characters developed by Kidd are all people whom I have encountered in the South during my 23-years of living here. The characters transcend racial, ethnical, cultural, and societal lines because, as I can attest, whether rich or poor, black or white, every town and family has touches of the characteristics that make up a "May" or an "August" or even a "T-Ray."
On the whole, I feel The Secret Life of Bees is an intelligent story about a young girl's search for identity. The story hits home with all of its readers because a search for the self is something that we all go through at some point in our lives. In what began as Lily's search for an understanding of her biological mother's past, ended in a revelation of who she truly was. The wonderful characters throughout the book help shape Lily's view of herself and allow her to take on her own identity through their influential personalities. Not only does she find a mother in these characters, she also finds herself. And, I believe that is what the book is truly about.
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Hawthorne Wood (MSL quote), Santa Fe, New Mexico
<2007-01-24 00:00>
This book just didn't do it for me...and neither did her latest. I had a hard time getting into each, and by the end my eyes were crossed and I was flipping through to get to the point. I love literary novels, was impressed by some of the very fine writing, am Goddess-affiliated myself, and yet there's something about this book that was just "ho-hum" for me. Maybe it was just too slow...maybe it was the "white girl and her African American sisters" theme that seemed hokey to me...I note, for instance, that one African American-identified reviewer didn't like it, either. Something just didn't connect. I'm glad so many people had such a ball reading it, but - hey - even though I'm white, maybe I'm just too northern to love that cutesy-white- southern-girl- and- her-beloved- Mammy thing. I always find this kind of thing where whites make idols out of blacks a little insufferable...frankly, I like stories about very flawed black - and white - people. You know, I just couldn't "believe" it. Hey, wait a minute...I think I know the problem...Too much honey for my taste. |
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A kid (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-24 00:00>
Can you imagine having to deal with running away from your abusive father, meeting three beekeeping sisters, falling in love with a boy that the world wants you to stay far away from, and trying to hide from your past? Well, in The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, the main character, Lily Owens, has to deal with all these problems. And she's only fourteen!
As hard as it is living without a mom, Lily has even more trouble with her cruel abusive father, T.Ray, and having to live with the fact that she may have killed her own mother. When secrets from her past are revealed, she runs away with her loving stand-in-mother, named Rosaleen. Lily and Rosaleen run into many troubles, most of them because Lily is white, Rosaleen is black, and the book's setting is right in the middle of the early 1960s, right on the brink of the civil rights movement. Eventually, they find themselves at the doorstep of three bee-keeping sisters who agree to take the two in. It seems like Lily's troubles have ended, but when her past literally comes knocking at the door, Lily finds out the truth about her mother-and more importantly, herself.
This book is definitely going on my shelf of classics, right between Gathering Blue and Dovey Coe. If I remember correctly, there wasn't a single part in this book where I thought things were getting boring, confusing or slow. This book was a worthwhile read and well-written, and it's one of the best books I have read in a while. The author had a really strong voice in this book, but was able to keep Lily a believable character, and this book had deep emotions and a great end twist.
Like I said, I loved the author's voice through-out the book, especially in Lily. The things Lily says and the way she puts them make her sound like a real fourteen year old growing up in that time, not an author trying in vain to sound like their character. For example, I can really picture a fourteen year old girl, even now, saying what Lily says on page nine: "I worried so much about how I looked and whether I was doing things right, I felt half the time I was impersonating a girl instead of really being one."
I love the strong emotions in some parts of the book, whether it's comedy or empathy, because you can really connect more with the book when the emotions are strong. When I started reading this book, I thought it would be a `touchy-feely sisterly love novel', and it is, but it's so much more than I had guessed. It's got surprising twists and some action, too, plus a bit of humor in just the right places. The beginning of the book has very strong emotions, Lily mostly hating herself because of what she believed she had done to her mom. On page three she wishes the following: "That night I lay in bed and thought about dying and going to be with mother in paradise. I would meet her saying, `Mother, please forgive me.'"
Another thing that really made me enjoy this book was the twist at the end. I can't tell you much about it, but it's unexpected, frightening, and keeps you on the edge of your seats. It shows you how much Lily's new friends really love her, and you don't feel quite so much hatred towards T. Ray when it's over. It's a very exciting way to finish the book, and I think it's a really good ending that will make the reader put the book down, finished, and say, "Wow."
I recommend this book for sixth graders and up, mainly because there's a bit of language, but there are some other themes that come up too. This is a very good book for young adults and up, because it deals with some heavy topics like suicide, murder, and other references. Even though it had those themes, it's still great and should definitely be read by those who haven't read it, and re-read by those who have. And, my favorite quote in this book would have to be the quote on page fifty seven after Lily has just run away from home; "Day one of my new life, I said to myself. That's what this is."
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Gina L. Holmes (MSL quote), VA United States
<2007-01-24 00:00>
I read this book because of all the word of mouth I'd been hearing about it. As a writer I was curious. What a treat!
This beautiful story about heartache and love was written so well I cried with the characters, laughed with them and hoped for their futures. That's good writing.
This story of a teenager who is searching for answers, a place to belong and more than anything else love, can't help but touch any woman who reads it.
The descriptions Ms. Kidd uses are so wonderfully unique. The story left me feeling a little better about the world we live in. I recommend it highly for its story and literary merits.
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A reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-24 00:00>
This novel tried too hard to matter. The trying was so obvious it got in the way of the novel. Set in South Carolina in 1964, it attempted to explore serious race issues in the deep South. Almost everyone was a bigot in one way or another, except Lily, the teenage protagonist and a couple of the beekeeping sisters she found refuge with.
Sadly, Lily's character in this "coming of age" novel was cliche, down to the fact that she planned to be a writer when she grew up. The plot cruised along, however, making the novel very readable - unfortunately, the characters were two-dimensional, and the situations they found themselves in, largely contrived.
The parts dealing with beekeeping, on the other hand, were wonderful.
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