
The Secret Life of Bees
5 journalers for this copy...

A bit too cliche IMO. Maybe others will enjoy it more than I.

Journal Entry 2 by Rita-Booke at Cobblestone Coffees n' Cream - OBCZ in Southaven, Mississippi USA on Saturday, June 12, 2004
Released on Saturday, June 12, 2004 at Cobblestone Coffees n' Cream - OBCZ in Southaven, Mississippi USA.
meet-up
meet-up

Yay!! Caught at the MeetUp - thanks so much for bringing Becca-mo! You saved me from buying - woo hoo! :)

I loved this book. I wasn't sure what I was expecting but it definitely held my attention and although it didn't have many surprises, it was still poignant. Especially for someone that has lost their mother at an early age from less than natural causes. I lost mine weeks after being born and the hole it leaves - especially in teen years - is enormous. I definitely felt for this main character.
My daughter wants to read this and then I'll release. Thanks again Becca-mo for sharing!
My daughter wants to read this and then I'll release. Thanks again Becca-mo for sharing!

Finally getting around to getting this one out - I offered up on bookrelay and it's on it's way to CA!

I love coming-of-age stories, and as an ex-teenage girl, i always find some rapport with this kind of characters. But this book was a big disappointment. Right off the bat you get the picture: Lily yearns for a mother she accidentally killed as a toddler. Her father is a sadistic monster. She runs away from home after getting in trouble with her housekeeper Rosaleen. And here is where my troubles begin:
Rosaleen, who besides being grossly obese, is a black woman in South Carolina in 1964, dares confront and antagonize three racist bullies with Lily at her side. Of course she gets the beating of a lifetime. But i don't care how proud she was or how many times she may have traveled through time and space and listened to Bob Marley sing Get Up Stand Up, that's when my willing suspension of disbelief flew out the window.
It did not get any better from there. Lily and Rosaleen go on the lam and end up at the house of the Boatwright sisters. Lily says: "We ran away from home and don't have any place to go". And August Boatwright, a perfect stranger, replies: "Well, you can stay here till you figure out what to do". How realistic is that?!?! Even if it starts making sense later on in the story, when a reader is faced with such an absurd situation, it is very difficult to recover.
There were many other gaps for me. Lily, who started being quite a fun character (justifying Rosaleen's attack to Brother Gerald, or the whole escape scene), ends up being such a dud. Her attitude went beyond being a confused teen. This was just muddled writing. The whole core of the story, the truth about Lily's mom, ended up being nothing but a deflated story, recounted in just a few pages in such a drab environment. The Boatwright household was just like Disneyland, only with a whole bunch of weird mysticism and folklore thrown in. In a sense, the parts about the Daughters of Mary reminded me of How to Make an American Quilt. There was no subtlety of message here. Lily the orphan ends up with a dozen mothers at the end.
Some characters were just gratuitous. April and May, totally irrelevant. Rosaleen, who started as such a key figure in Lily's life, becomes wallpaper after glamorous and quasi-perfect August appears. June's fiery animosity is addressed in passing as almost nothing. And for a while it seemed like June was going to end up strangling Lily!
The ending was predictable and anti-climactic in the extreme.
To me it is amazing the incredible success that this book had. A novel with these many holes in it would have gotten a C+ in any self-respecting English Composition class of my day.
Rosaleen, who besides being grossly obese, is a black woman in South Carolina in 1964, dares confront and antagonize three racist bullies with Lily at her side. Of course she gets the beating of a lifetime. But i don't care how proud she was or how many times she may have traveled through time and space and listened to Bob Marley sing Get Up Stand Up, that's when my willing suspension of disbelief flew out the window.
It did not get any better from there. Lily and Rosaleen go on the lam and end up at the house of the Boatwright sisters. Lily says: "We ran away from home and don't have any place to go". And August Boatwright, a perfect stranger, replies: "Well, you can stay here till you figure out what to do". How realistic is that?!?! Even if it starts making sense later on in the story, when a reader is faced with such an absurd situation, it is very difficult to recover.
There were many other gaps for me. Lily, who started being quite a fun character (justifying Rosaleen's attack to Brother Gerald, or the whole escape scene), ends up being such a dud. Her attitude went beyond being a confused teen. This was just muddled writing. The whole core of the story, the truth about Lily's mom, ended up being nothing but a deflated story, recounted in just a few pages in such a drab environment. The Boatwright household was just like Disneyland, only with a whole bunch of weird mysticism and folklore thrown in. In a sense, the parts about the Daughters of Mary reminded me of How to Make an American Quilt. There was no subtlety of message here. Lily the orphan ends up with a dozen mothers at the end.
Some characters were just gratuitous. April and May, totally irrelevant. Rosaleen, who started as such a key figure in Lily's life, becomes wallpaper after glamorous and quasi-perfect August appears. June's fiery animosity is addressed in passing as almost nothing. And for a while it seemed like June was going to end up strangling Lily!
The ending was predictable and anti-climactic in the extreme.
To me it is amazing the incredible success that this book had. A novel with these many holes in it would have gotten a C+ in any self-respecting English Composition class of my day.

On its way to LiteraryLover as a RABCK. I was a teenager on a budget a while (long while) ago, so i know what that's like...
Hope you like it!
Hope you like it!

Thank you so much for sending :) I can't wait to read it ~

I read about half of this book, but couldnt seem to finish it :/
Don't get me wrong, the book was well written, and its a very colorful story- but I just couldnt get into it right now. (Plus I have a lot of summer reading for school that needs to be completed.) I'm sure many others will love this book though.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it for now... Possibly give to a friend... or maybe a release? This books destiny is unknown...
Don't get me wrong, the book was well written, and its a very colorful story- but I just couldnt get into it right now. (Plus I have a lot of summer reading for school that needs to be completed.) I'm sure many others will love this book though.
I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it for now... Possibly give to a friend... or maybe a release? This books destiny is unknown...

Trading with a reader in South Dakota via www.paperbackswap.com
I hope you enjoy the book!
I hope you enjoy the book!

A wonderful book!
CAUGHT IN SIOUX FALLS SD USA
CAUGHT IN SIOUX FALLS SD USA