The Bee Sting by Paul Murray

Notes from the Book Club Meeting on 26th September 2024.

As ever, we had a lively discussion about this book, concluding that it was a little bit of a “Marmite” read: some people liked the book, others liked it less…

So what is the storyline of “The Bee Sting”? 

The novel tells the story of the Barnes family, a once powerful and wealthy family in Ireland, now facing financial difficulties after the Great Recession of 2008. The patriarch of the family, Dickie Barnes, operates 2 local car dealerships and workshops that he inherited from his father.

So, what were the main thoughts about the book?

For the people who did not enjoy it so much, the criticism was that they found it boring, too long (650 pages) and the pace fairly slow. The characters were somehow not all that 'likeable' except for the young son PJ who had a very endearing personality. 

With one particular character (Imelda) her chain of thoughts is written in a very similar style to Virginia Woolf’s stream of consciousness, and those entire sections in the book lacked punctuation which was not enjoyable and was found to be very confusing.

Those who enjoyed the book more were particularly engrossed in the story when one of the characters (Frank) dies. At that point, the story tips towards a more engaging style with an in-depth description of their past lives and journeys. This is when we started to sympathise and become more fond of the characters, even though the choices made were often poor. The comic tragedy of some of the scenes makes some really good reading as well as the description of some characters’ anxieties due to money pressures.

And for me, the best section of the book was its ending. Without revealing too much, the ending of this book is one of the best cliffhangers I have ever read and written in its very own unique style!

The style of the book as well as its storyline had many similarities with the books from Jonathan Franzen’s (“The Corrections”).

The “Bee Sting” is a good read.

However, the overall feeling from our reading group’s members was that it was just too long and too dark and that a lighter read was needed for next time!

So, our next read will be: “Really Good, Actually” by Monica Heisey.

The next meeting will be on Thursday 14th November 2024 at 20:00 and we will meet at Vanessa’s.