The Bee Sting

ByPaul Murray

Release Date: 2023-08-15
Genre: Literary Fiction

Score: 4

From 595 Ratings

Description

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

One of The New Yorker's Essential Reads
One of The Washington Post's 10 Best Books of the Year
One of TIME's 10 Best Fiction Books of the Year
A Dua Lipa x Service95 Book Club Pick

From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray's The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and thought-provoking tour de force about family, fortune, and the struggle to be a good person when the world is falling apart.

The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under—but Dickie is spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife, Imelda, is selling off her jewelry on eBay and half-heartedly dodging the attention of fast-talking cattle farmer Big Mike, while their teenage daughter, Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge drink her way through her final exams. As for twelve-year-old PJ, he’s on the brink of running away.

If you wanted to change this story, how far back would you have to go? To the infamous bee sting that ruined Imelda’s wedding day? To the car crash one year before Cass was born? All the way back to Dickie at ten years old, standing in the summer garden with his father, learning how to be a real man?

The Bee Sting, Paul Murray’s exuberantly entertaining new novel, is a tour de force: a portrait of postcrash Ireland, a tragicomic family saga, and a dazzling story about the struggle to be good at the end of the world.

Reviews

Pretty good, but irritating
3
By E Carrochio
I enjoyed the writing and most of the story. Several chapters have no punctuation. I thought maybe this was an error in making the e-book. No, it’s a stupid device by the author. The ambiguous ending was irritating also. If I’d been reading a paperback version of this, I would have thrown it across the room.
Depressing
1
By Sdlaurie
The most depressing book I have ever read. Waste of time and money. Left a pit in my stomach.
Don’t waste your time.
1
By amolioli
That’s it. Don’t waste your time. Ending is trash.
Disappointing
2
By jlc123jlc
Horrible ending. Terrible characters that are almost in redeemable. Just when I start to feel some sympathy, the worst happens. I trudged thru the long book hoping for a good resolution. Disappointing.
I loved his prior book, “Skippy Dies” hoping this one would be as good.
Terrible ending
4
By freddy468
This book is way too long to have such a terrible ending. Totally disappointing.
Ugh
1
By Bj3551
Reading this book was agonizing. It boring and incredibly long. The ending was so incredibly stupid. People, save yourself hours of reading-you’ll thank me for it. There are too many good books out there. You can pass on this one.
Jaw dropping
5
By mrprzy
So bloody good
Wow
5
By cl bb
Awesome
Laborious
2
By x'q,zzz
What a slog to get to a nothing ending.
How did this book win any literary awards?
1
By Vail is my home
When I start a book, I finish it. I can only recall about three books that I did not finish because they were so bad. This was the third. The characters are not likable, story goes nowhere, and the writing is marginal at best. In the Imelda section there is no punctuation, in a failed attempt to have the reader see the disfunction in her life. The only thing it invoked in me was frustration. Give this one a pass.