The Secret Life of Bees

As you can see, lately I was in a mood for mainstream stories. This is another beautiful story I read right after The Memory Keeper's Daughter. One of the great things I find reading mainstream stories is they are very much like reality and can be thought provoking at times.

The story takes place on a peach farm in South Carolina in 1964. Lily Owens is a fourteen-year-old girl, living with her father and a black housekeeper named Rosaleen. She isn't happy staying with her dad because he is quick tempered and he always find chances at yelling and punishing her. She misses her mom, who died when she was four. Thus, Rosaleen becomes her only confidant. Rosaleen is a woman full of spunk and Lily finds she can be embarrassingly unself-conscious at times.

And that leads to a racial brawl when Rosaleen insults three of the deepest racists in town one day. Rosaleen ends up bruised and beaten in jail. Lily thinks it is up to her to save her, and miraculously, she did. They then head off to a town called Tiburon in S.C., after finding its name on the back of a picture left by her mom.

It is there that they meet the trio of black beekeeping sisters by the names of May, June and August. They take Lily and Rosaleen in, and they work for the sisters in return.

It is during the stay with the trio, Lily begins her journey of finding the missing piece of her life, and daring herself to dream.

Inspiring and heartwarming, this story will captivate readers both mature and the young.