The Bee Sting: A Novel
One of The New York Times Top 10 Books of the Year
Winner of the An Post Irish Book of the Year, the Nero Gold Prize, and the Nero Book Award for Fiction
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Writers' Prize for Fiction
Finalist for the Kirkus Prize for Fiction
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Community Reviews
This contemporary Irish family drama is the bomb!!! The characters are well written and you connect with every one. The novel is long 600 pages but doesn’t drag. It builds and fires up beautifully at the end. Our bookclub of 8 gave it five stars. We were all animated and talked endlessly about all the different characters and themes that came together to create a very interesting story.
The characters were really enjoyable and despite me worrying I wasn't going to relate to at least one of the four family members I was surprised that all of them were relatable.
this book was LENGTHY. do I regret reading it - no. do I recommend - maybe. honestly reading theories about the ending and symbolism of the book made me appreciate it a lot more. I struggled in the middle of the book with Imelda’s POV (although I understood the choice to forgo punctuation). After I pushed through that section, I couldn’t put the book down (especially any Cass POV). Overall, stunning prose but such a depressing book/characters.
Rollicking? Exuberantly comic? What did I miss?
Sad, unhappy people lack of communication in families
Bullying men, self-centred individuals.
Overall though, it was thought-provoking, debating at the Hist was interesting, the first law of debating, which side are you on?
Riches to rags and vice versa, small-mindedness.
Sad, unhappy people lack of communication in families
Bullying men, self-centred individuals.
Overall though, it was thought-provoking, debating at the Hist was interesting, the first law of debating, which side are you on?
Riches to rags and vice versa, small-mindedness.
There was a lot if hype about this book and I was very intrigued to read it. In all honesty, I was disappointed. It took me such a long time to actually get into this book (a very long book!), it felt a task to read it initially. But just over about half way through I started to enjoy it and thought I was starting to understand the authors style and book’s purpose a little clearer, and started to feel more invested in the characters, there was some really excellent writing (I really liked how he wrote as Imelda would due to her upbringing), and there was some really good content around Dickie that I wasn’t expecting at all, which again was brilliantly written and heart hitting. I liked that we got to know each of the characters well but often felt the detail was way too much. And I get that some may find the ending clever, but I felt deflated, I didn’t enjoy this ending at all, very disappointing and not at all clever (in fact a little arrogant) . This book was simply just not for me I’m afraid, I felt the return on my investment of time was rather cheated. Such a shame as I really had become invested.
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