About the Book
Post-husband, pre-rest-of-life, Rosanne Daryl Thomas and her seven-year-old daughter move to a small New England town. When, on a whim, she decides to take up beekeeping, her daughter is so proud of her that she can't back out -- no matter how bumbling and unprepared she is. Thomas learns much from the Bee Master and other locals intrigued by a novice woman beekeeper who needs their help -- at first.As she finds her courage, Thomas also finds herself embracing a life she never dreamed of. Entering the mysterious world of bees, she begins a relationship with nature that mingles science with mythology, wonder with humility, and motherly devotion with a search for new ways of seeing and untried possibilities. She learns that beekeeping, like life, can never be mastered. There is always room to make another mistake, and with each mistake comes an opportunity. But she finally gets honey, and gets a little bit wiser in the process.
With a novelist's eye for detail, and prose that intimately engages the reader, Rosanne Daryl Thomas opens the mysterious and seductive world of beekeeping to a whole new audience.
Review :
"Thomas writes with the gentle precision of a master."
--"Newsweek"
"Through Rosanne Daryl Thomas's witty prose the reader is catapulted into a land where bee colonies, with the ever-swarmed queen, prove to be remarkably similar to human society...In between her Ball jars of sugar honey and countless trips to True Value hardware, we also come to know August, and amazing little girl who is able to encourage her mother's spiritual growth while acting like a regular kid."" -- St. Petersburg Times Review"
"Wonder, anticipation, devotion--all are implicit in this scrupulous writing."
--"The New York Times Book Review"
"From its punning title to its final lines, Rosanne Daryl Thomas's tale of her enchantment by bees is a delight to read. It also contains close observations of the natural world, tales of failure and triumph with the hives, and a stellar cast of characters that includes her daughter, their cats, the hapless Farmer Tom, Pete the crossing guard, and, most important, the Bee Master. Every word tastes sweet as honey."--Janet Lembke
"Rosanne Daryl Thomas guides the reader through a chapter of her life when she turned to bees to sustain her through a difficult transition. The combination of pathos and hilarity leave us rooting for her and 'her girls' (the bees) as they tackle the hard and fascinating work of turning life into honey." --Mary-Ann Tirone Smith, author of An American Killing
""Beeing is poetic, literary, factual (an annotated bibliography is included) and chronological by seasons. There is a nice balance between the poetry and the hive maintenance, the literary references and the remedies for stings. But perhaps the following quote from the 'Berlin Magical Papyrus' that opens Thomas' tenth chapter, best sums up her drive to succeed in this humming, foreign world: "'Take the honey with milk, drink of it before the rising of the sun, and there shall be something in thy heart that is divine.'" --Melanie Lauwers, "Cape Cod Times Books editor
"Warm and funny, Beeing is a charming memoir of a year of discovery...Thomas' enchantment with her bees is infectious and stirs in the reader that childish sense of wonder that too often lies dormant in adult hearts."--"Intermezzo
"I give (the author) high points for her courage and stick-to-it-iveness. Good reading and not justfor apiarists.""--The Buffalo News
"Written in a conversational tone, Beeing is a fun jaunt from one comedic episode to the next."--"Orion magazine
"Shes written a story that will appeal to readers who have a dream they love to mentally indulge but cant imagine fulfilling. Beeing is poetic, literary, (and) factual. There is a nice balance between the poetry and the hive maintenance, the literary references and the remedies for stings."--"The Cape Cod Times
." . . the book is an exciting look at the life of an amateur beekeeper/single mom. . . . Written in a conversational tone, Beeing is a fun jaunt from one comedic episode to the next. And when the author starts gearing up for her second season beekeeping, you know she's found her niche." --Jennifer Sahn, "Orion magazine
"The world of bees she enters offers her an intimate look at nature's workaday world apart from her own everyday life. Her sharp prose brings readers into that space comfortably. Thomas tells her tale with skills of observation worthy of a sleuth; what's more, she relates sentiment without sentimentality. Those abilities enable her to take on a genre which easily strays toward wheel-spinning and navel-gazing and make it captivating and suspenseful." - James Heflin, "The Valley Advocate, Northampton, Massachusetts.
"Beeing is the story of a young mother who, with no prior preparation whatsoever, takes up beekeeping. I give her high points for courage and stick-to-it-iveness. Good reading and not just for apiarists." --"Buffalo News
""Beeing is a must-read for those recovering from painful experiences. Thomas' narrow and focused approach in documenting just one year, and centering thatdocumentation on one main activity, is refreshing. Thomas' writing about bees is accessible and her story of learning how to tend them is in no way pedantic. The book's ultimate strength is its author's ability to see, as Emerson once put it, the miraculous in the ordinary. Reading it awakens us to marvelous minutiae of a world we can take for granted." --"Hampshire Gazette
"This memoirist's foray into beekeeping makes a honey of a book. Beeing is fluidly penned, at times lyric in descriptions of the changing seasons. And, there are lessons to be learned here, not the least of which is, 'If you want to get honey, you have to be prepared to get stung.'"--"The (Dallas) Morning News
"Beeing is a must-read for those recovering from painful experiences. Thomas' narrow and focused approach in documenting just one year, and centering that documentation on one main activity, is refreshing. Thomas' writing about bees is accessible and her story of learning how to tend them is in no way pedantic. The book's ultimate strength is its author's ability to see, as Emerson once put it, the miraculous in the ordinary. Reading it awakens us to marvelous minutiae of a world we can take for granted." --"Hampshire Gazette
"A delightful new book."" -- Victoria magazine
