Rating: 
Summary: Honey for the soul
Review: If you liked Kaye Gibbon's "Ellen Foster" then Lily Owens will capture your heart. When her father, T. Ray, punished her by making her kneel on grits, I immediately knew that she was a survivor and he was a coward. May, June, and August Boatwright, the beekeeping sisters, and their Black Madonna honey were exquisite. May's tortured soul taught me about empathy gone awry. Sue Monk Kidd's strong southern storytelling skills are reminiscent of Reynolds Price and Harper Lee. In this her first novel, the writing isn't perfect but it tugged at my heart the way Barbara Kingsolver's "Pigs in Heaven" did. The characters, the time period and the small town setting made it similar to "To Kill a Mockingbird." This novel should be read by parents and teens together. I hope Kidd plans a sequel. I care so much about the characters that I yearn to know about their future lives.
Rating:
Summary: Filled with Emotional Breath
Review: Touching? Elegant? Inspirational? Enlightening? Any one of these words could be used to describe "Secret Life of Bees" and yet none of them alone would do it justice. It is a uniquely touching story that takes you on a journey. Like "My Fractured Life" and "Time Traveler's Wife" there is a perfectly executed emotional journey in the words of the story. The author allows us to feel for and with the characters. She breaths an emotional life into the story. The result is stunning.
Rating:
Summary: The Secret Life of Bees
Review: My book club, The Jane Does of Raleigh, NC, recommended "The Secret Life of Bees" for the GMA Read This Book club. The story is a hopeful one of family and sanctuary being defined by love, trust, bonding, and protection rather than by birth, race, or socioeconomics. I was particularly struck by the author's ability to people her novel with an array of black characters who were each shown to be individuals. From the regal August, to the sweet and simple May, to the bitter and distant June, Sue Monk Kidd showed with her first novel what most writers miss--- all black people are not alike, and do not think, act, look or live exactly the same lives. How refreshing and how hopeful it makes me that this author realizes and clearly demonstrates that people are just people who want all the same basic things, after all. This is a wonderful story and a journey that will spark meaningful and productive conversations in churches, book clubs, and families across America about race and family. I love southern authors because they are inclusive, because like the newspaper they are "black and white and read all over". I can't wait to see what Sue Monk Kidd has in store for readers in the future. She cetainly has a fan in me.
Rating:
Summary: Flu inspired reading ¿ but pretty cool!
Review: My sister and I have very different tastes in books. While I was visiting her for vacation, I got home bound with the flu for a few days and was going crazy trying to find something I liked in her collection of books. The two books that I found that I actually enjoyed were "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd and "My Fractured Life" by Rikki Lee Travolta. You don't have to be a girl to like these books. They're pretty cool.
Rating: 
Summary: as slow as a wet week
Review: Sadly, I wasted my time reading this novel through to the bitter-sweet end. Why the author wasted 3/4 of the book letting us know absolutely nothing and drawing the thin storyline out as far as she did is anyone's guess. Aimed at the teenage market perhaps, but most young readers of today would expect more value for their time than is delivered by this book. I can enjoy a slow book if the telling of the story is poetic, so it shouldn't even get a star for that. The best character in the book is Rosaleen, who surprised me by not picking up our little protagonist and throwing her in the nearest river. To the author I yelled "Get on with it!", to Lily "Get over it!".
And by the way, the name Deborah means bee.
Rating: 
Summary: Over-rated. Don't bother
Review: I had heard of Sue Monk Kidd from articles in Guidposts magazine, and I must say I was surprised with all the goddess-
worship in The Secret Life of Bees.The plot was too derivative, for the same type of setting I suggest the much stronger Nora, Nora by Anne Rivers Siddons. The novel was too long, the black/white confrontations were
naive and unbelievable, as were the great female characters. Also I found Lily's young age to be in doubt, she was too smart
precocious and intuative for her age. Fantasy, not fiction.
Rating:
Summary: The Sweetest Book
Review: It is the 1960a when racism was at its peak. Lily Owens is a 14 year old girl who must come to terms with her mother's death. She blames herself because her father "T-Ray" told her that she shot the gun that killed her mother. He made the accident Lily's fault. Lily is unhappy living with him and with Rosaleen, her black stand-in mother. One day Rosaleen is on her way to register to vote, she comes across and offends one of the town's most racist white man. Lily and Rosaleen together flee to Tiburon, South Carolina - because it is the name on the back of the only remnant Lily has from her mother: A picture of the black madonna. In Tiburon they live with the "calendar sisters" - May, June and August - who resembles the woman in the picture. The three sisters - especially August - show Lily that she can find strength within herself and that even though she doesn't have a biological mother, there are many other forms of mothering. They do this through deliciously described passages in the novel. Lily learns about her mothers life, and the lessons she is taught allow her to accept her mother's death, and to move on with her own life.
Rating:
Summary: i should have known better after seeing the book description
Review: sue monk kidd is a very good writer, but i found the story to be unrealistic. are we really expected to believe that these black women would be allowed to raise a young white girl without facing any kind of repercussion? i also found the whole "black mammy" thing tiresome. like we have nothing better to do than spend our whole lives taking care of the rejects of white folks. contrary to popular opinion and despite what the movies tell you, the overwhelming majority of black women would have been much happier raising and taking care of their OWN families. the description of rosaleen was especially offensive to me. rosaleen displayed a particular strength and personality that i admired. yet lily says she is embarrassed by rosaleen's mannerisms and speech. who is she to be ashamed? rosaleen raised and loved her and stood up for her when no one else would, but lily didn't truly appreciate her. certainly the characters in the novel are on common ground in that they all live on the fringes of society; however, it is once again made clear that black people are unacceptable to white folks, including lily, in any fashion unless we are smilin', singin' and dancin'. anything else, like the anger and disillusionment zach experienced after his release from jail or june's initial mistrust of lily, is incomprehensible. (could it be possible that a white person could inspire anything other than bliss in a black person?) i could go on. but what for?
Rating: 
Summary: A Taste of Honey For The Eyes That Touches The Heart
Review: Actually 3.5 stars Author Sue Monk Kidd delivers a slower pace but enjoyable novel about a young girl Lily Owns who is driven to reconcile the past with a mother she never knew who died under very mysterious circumstances. Escaping a horrific life from her father, T. Ray and with her maid and only mother figure, Rosaleen. Lily and Rosaleen arrive at the Boatwright Sisters (Africian-American sisters who are named by the months of the calendar) May, June, and August. Lily and Rosaleen settle in and set up a home at the Boatwright's Pink House, they learn about the nurturing power of women through the spiritual moving lessons regarding the Black Madonna (also a symbol on the Boatwright Sister's honey jars) and a obviously a little bee keeping in the process as Lilly slowly reconciles her mother's past and sudden mysterious death as ( which the Boatwright sisters hold a key to her past) and welcomes a friendship with a young African-American man, Zach.
Set against a racial tense backdrop of the south (Tiburon, SC?), after the runaway success of "The Da Vinci Code" is it really any surprise that finally readers are acknowledging and celebrating the Divine Feminine ideals? "The Secret Life of Bees" may slowly plod along in spots but the sweetness of it lingers on the tongue long after the last page is turned.
Rating:
Summary: Expected More
Review: This book was okay, but it's NOT great writing as the reviews on the first few pages suggest -- it is, very simply, brain candy. Take it to the beach. If you want a Southern, teenage voice in a work that is truly LITERATURE, read Sheri Joseph's "Bear Me Safely Over" or Heather Sellers' "Georgia Under Water." It's a shame this book has gotten the readership it has, really, when there are so many better, more complex books out there on the same subject.
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