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The Honey Bus: A Memoir of Loss, Courage and a Girl Saved by Bees

Meredith May (Goodreads Author)

4.31 · Rating details · 3,205 ratings · 595 reviews

An extraordinary story of a girl, her grandfather and one of nature's most mysterious and beguiling creatures: the honeybee.

Meredith May recalls the first time a honeybee crawled on her arm. She was five years old, her parents had recently split and suddenly she found herself in the care of her grandfather, an eccentric beekeeper who made honey in a rusty old military bus ...more

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Hardcover, 336 pages

Published April 2nd 2019 by Park Row

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Mar 15, 2019 *TUDOR^QUEEN* rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Thank you to HARLEQUIN-Trade Publishing-Park Row for providing an advance reader copy via NetGalley.

This is a wonderful book about a girl growing up in the seventies amidst family upheaval and discord. As the book begins, Meredith and her little brother Matt are living in Rhode Island with their parents. The tension between the parents is so thick you can cut it with a knife. However, it is the simmering violent anger from the mother that is particularly unsettling. Following a final explosive Thank you to HARLEQUIN-Trade Publishing-Park Row for providing an advance reader copy via NetGalley.

This is a wonderful book about a girl growing up in the seventies amidst family upheaval and discord. As the book begins, Meredith and her little brother Matt are living in Rhode Island with their parents. The tension between the parents is so thick you can cut it with a knife. However, it is the simmering violent anger from the mother that is particularly unsettling. Following a final explosive argument, the Mom packs up the kids and they board an airplane to California where their grandparents live in Big Sur. Mom Sally arrives at her parents' house, once again taking over her childhood bedroom. As the weeks, months and years go by, Sally retreats into her bedroom where she sleeps, smokes and lets her mom (Granny) and stepdad (Grandpa) tend to her kids- shirking all responsibility.

Granny is a schoolteacher and a little more stiff and formal when rearing her grandkids. However, Grandpa is another story. When Meredith is faced with the unhealthy and odd behavior of her unfit mother, she is literally saved by the loving, wise and gentle nature of her Grandpa. While Meredith is mentally (and occasionally physically) abused by her mother Sally, she finds comfort and ease in the presence of Grandpa. Everything makes sense around Grandpa, and Meredith can just...be.

Meredith's grandparents live in a little red house, but nearby on the property there is an old military bus. Inside, Grandpa has painstakingly rigged it as a honey bottling operation. Little by little, Grandpa tells Meredith all about the working of the bee hives he maintains here on the property and others miles away in Garrapata Canyon. The very sensible and cooperative work environment of the bees are a marvel to observe, and Meredith is totally enchanted by them. Where Meredith finds chaos with her mother, she finds peace and a system of perfect sense in the life cycle of the bees.

Over time Meredith (and later, her little brother Matt) became adept helpers to Grandpa with his beehives, as he manned a lucrative business providing honey to regular customers. There were a few truly horrific passages of abusive behavior on the rare occasions mom Sally attempted to take the kids on outings, and they were only for selfish motives. There were also frustrating reactions from Sally's mother who seemed to only placate her daughter in an attempt to make her calm. In the end, it was the grounded and quiet wisdom of Meredith's Grandpa who counseled her just to appease her mother until she was old enough to make her own life.

I learned so much about bees reading this book, and I am truly amazed at their clever and logical working environment. I was so intrigued by what I'd learned that it inspired me to watch YouTube videos about bees! Yes, in the end Meredith was truly saved by her Grandpa, the honey bus and bees. This is a true story, a heartfelt memoir which made it ever more special to read. ...more

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Nov 12, 2019 Diane S ☔ rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 5000-2019, lor-2019

There is no doubt that a book one identifies with has more meaning, but I had no clue how close this book would come to mine. Like Meredith, I was five, and though I did not have a you get brother, I did have a you get sister, when my parents divorced. Like Meredith's mother, mine too took us to live with my grandparents, but luckily my mother was nothing like Meredith's. She did leave us during the week, taking a train into the city to work, returning only on weekends, but she was a loving ...more

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Aug 15, 2019 Elyse Walters rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Library - overdrive ebook!
Many thanks for the 3-day warning that the book was due!!!!

Meredith May was a journalist at the San Francisco Chronicle! I wish I can say I remember reading her articles. Im sorry, I dont.
This is Meredith Mays memoir.
Its ABSOLUTELY TRUE what other readers have said. THIS IS A VERY MOVING STORY!!!
I dont think its easy to finish reading it and not shed a few tears.
What couldve been a very tragic story for a couple of children...was completely altered by loving ...more

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Jan 20, 2019 Kendall rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I usually never gravitate towards reading memoirs but something hit home when I saw this cover and was intrigued.

I can tell you... I felt so at home in my heart and soul through this book!

I'm so glad that I took a chance on this book because it truly was a beautifully written story about pain, grief, and the power of love despite coming from a dysfunctional family.

Meredith and her brother Matthew grew up in a very dysfunctional family net. Both of Meredith's parents broke up in the beginning ...more

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Nov 10, 2019 Libby rated it it was amazing

Shelves: memoir, coming-of-age, family-relationships, abuse, domestic-drama, published-in-2019, listened-in-2019, audiobook, mental-illness

Sometimes a book just hits you hard; this book was like that for me. My childhood was nothing like Mays whose mother had major depression for years and neglected her children, serving up dishes of emotional abuse instead of the nutritive care that children deserve. I have children very close to me, however, whose parents were often negligent. I took one of them to therapy for years and the therapist told us that neglect is perhaps the most potent form of abuse.

Mays mother never seemed to Sometimes a book just hits you hard; this book was like that for me. My childhood was nothing like May’s whose mother had major depression for years and neglected her children, serving up dishes of emotional abuse instead of the nutritive care that children deserve. I have children very close to me, however, whose parents were often negligent. I took one of them to therapy for years and the therapist told us that neglect is perhaps the most potent form of abuse.

May’s mother never seemed to recover from a break-up with their father. As she relocates with her children to her mother and stepfather’s home in California, May writes of her mother, “somewhere thirty thousand feet up over Middle America, she (her mother) had relinquished parenthood.” When they move in with Granny and Grandpa, May and her brother Matthew are taken care of by their grandparents, for their mother stays secluded in the bedroom. Granny, whose personal history is finely dovetailed into her emotionally immature daughter’s, supports this behavior, and it is Granny who rules the roost. As I read the book, I lament, if they had only gotten her the help she needed, but they do not, and the emotional and life dysfunction of May’s mother becomes a way of life for all of them.

It is the beekeeper Grandfather, Franklin Pierce, who really steals my heart. Whereas their mother is inaccessible, and Granny has the attitude that these children (Meredith and her younger brother, Matthew) have disrupted her peace, have come to steal her valuable time, Grandfather is not only accessible, he welcomes the children into his life and beekeeping world. He teaches the children about the ways of the hive, how the bees support one another, and the lessons prove invaluable to them. He shows up for Meredith at school on a father-daughter night and entrances her friends and their fathers with beekeeping tales. It’s not an easy life for May, especially when she sees how her friend’s mother, a single mother also, lavishes her family with love. This book shows in great detail the toxic effects of Granny’s enabling. Grandfather, however, is magical and his impact on the children’s lives is positive and empowers them with familial love and nurturing support. Their father sees them one week out of the year and is too far away to know what their lives are really like, and they do not tell him.

The narrator for the audiobook that I listened to is Candace Thaxton. She has a very interesting voice that I find hard to describe, with an intonation that goes higher at the end of some words. At first, I wasn’t crazy about her, but as my interest in the story grew, and I was quickly engaged, her narrative style grew on me and became inseparable from the author’s voice. It was Meredith May telling me this story and I cared and wanted the best for her. In an interview with May, she discloses that this memoir took her seven years to write and that she wrote it first as a “monster-mom memoir.”(1) Her agent wanted her to rewrite it and she did, making it into the heartfelt remembrance it is. May is now a fifth-generation beekeeper who worked writing other people’s stories for many years as a journalist. This book is sorrowful, but May’s genuine affection and gratitude for her Grandfather shine through like a beacon for other grandparents and surrogate parents. Like the bees, what they do is for the greater good and there’s no way to estimate the powerful impact of such love on the life of a child.

(1) https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/book... ...more

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Jul 18, 2019 Lori rated it it was amazing

Shelves: own, reviewed, vine

I don't read memoirs about dysfunctional childhoods. They're depressing and there are too many people in my life who've had bad childhoods, as well as sad stories you see on the news. I was attracted to Meredith May's memoir only for the bees and I love it so much I haven't shut up about it. Long after I forget her painful family issues I will remember this book with love. It's all because of Granddad and the bees.

May's memoir covers her life from ages five to fifteen, with an epilogue. When she I don't read memoirs about dysfunctional childhoods. They're depressing and there are too many people in my life who've had bad childhoods, as well as sad stories you see on the news. I was attracted to Meredith May's memoir only for the bees and I love it so much I haven't shut up about it. Long after I forget her painful family issues I will remember this book with love. It's all because of Granddad and the bees.

May's memoir covers her life from ages five to fifteen, with an epilogue. When she was five her parents split up. Her mother moves her and her little brother from Rhode Island to Carmel, California where Meredith's grandmother lives with her husband of nineteen years, E. Franklin Peace, a fourth-generation beekeeper and a remarkably kind and wise man with no children of his own. Both he and her grandmother are descendents of Carmel Valley's original pioneers. The couple doesn't have much money but they live on a good-sized property in Carmel, and Granddad owns land in beautiful Big Sur on which he raises most of his honeybees.

Meredith's mother is depressed and volatile and it seems like her father has abandoned his children. Their grandmother is stern and cold-hearted, which begs the question of why this well-loved man aptly named Peace gave up his happy single life for her. Whatever, he and his honeybees are the heroes of Meredith's life and of the book. It is he who was Meredith's lodestar.

Granddad has many hives in Big Sur and some near the house. He harvests all the honey in a big bus parked at home. Peace loves his bees, raises them naturally, knows everything there is to know about his own and other kinds, cares deeply about their welfare and is endlessly enthusiastic about all bee things great and small.

Meredith has understandable difficulty adjusting to the challenges of her new life. Granddad is the one person who always has her back and he uses the bees as a tool to guide her, imparting life lessons in his gentle, loving way. He also genuinely wants to teach her all the science and art of raising them, and via her memoir the reader learns along with Meredith and shares her growing enthusiasm and fascination.

May writes in an easygoing style and Peace is a patient teacher. I knew less than I thought about bees. All creatures are fascinating but bees are especially, and there is so much to learn. I had no idea how specific each one's job is. About the myriad ways in which they use their wings, bodies and antennae. Or that the tiniest movement has a very specific function. To pass on information they wiggle their butts, move their antennae, position their heads and establish formations in very particular ways. The details are all in the book and there's much more. There's also brief information about threats to their continuing health and survival. I think we all know life as we know it on our planet depends on bees.

There's a part where Granddad teaches Meredith how to look closely to spot and interpret honeybees' distinct dance moves. During that part and after I had a mental picture of Bee Girl from the "No Rain" video. Bee Girl's exuberance matches Meredith's, and mine, at the wonder of it all. It's a special book. I'm smiling as I type this. ...more

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Mar 02, 2020 Cathrine ☯️ rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: group-challenge, audible-or-audiobook, biography-memoir-essays, hoopla

4 ✚ 🐝 🐝 🐝 🐝
I couldn't completely love this one because of the audio narrator Candace Thaxton. The only time I warmed to her was when she changed her voice and inflection doing a different character, but the story was so well done that it overcame that issue for the most part.
I live down the coast from Big Sur so loved the setting and the way bee keeping and appreciation was such a huge part of this memoir. If you aren't wise to their ways this is a superb opportunity to learn about their ...more

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Dec 03, 2019 Chrissie rated it liked it

Shelves: bio, fauna, philo-psychol, usa, life-stages, audible-uk, 2019-read

In my view, the cover, the title and the book description are misleadingthe tone conveyed is too upbeat, too sunny, too happy. This book is about a dysfunctional family, the authors family. When Meredith May was five and her brother three, her parents divorced. The kids were taken by their mother across the country from Rhode Island to Carmel, California, to live with their maternal grandparents, but their mom is depressive and seriously, mentally ill. She puts herself in her bed, in her room, In my view, the cover, the title and the book description are misleading—the tone conveyed is too upbeat, too sunny, too happy. This book is about a dysfunctional family, the author’s family. When Meredith May was five and her brother three, her parents divorced. The kids were taken by their mother across the country from Rhode Island to Carmel, California, to live with their maternal grandparents, but their mom is depressive and seriously, mentally ill. She puts herself in her bed, in her room, and does not come out. Not for merely a few days, or a few weeks or months but for years. When she eventually does leave the room, what she does and says to others is so cruel, so scathing, it seems a pure miracle that her two kids have survived. She physically and mentally abuses the kids, particularly Meredith. It is not uncommon for such behavior to pass from one generation to the next, and it is this that we observe here when we learn about the other adults in the family.

Meredith speaks of her childhood, from the age of five through her teen years, the details more and more sparse as she grows older. She learns how to get by until the day she can leave home, escape.

Her grandpa is the one beacon of light in her life. Actually, we come to learn that he is her step-grandpa. It is he that is the savior of both her and the book. Without him, the book would simply be just too grim. He is kind. He is down to earth. He takes the time to listen to her when she needs to talk. He is there for her, and no one else is. He is a beekeeper. He loves bees and in them he sees how people should behave, but don’t. He shares what he has learned from bees with her. In doing so he gives of himself. As he shares with her all that he knows about his beloved bees, he teaches her not only about bees but about life itself. As he instructs her about bees and beekeeping, we learn too.

Although I am glad her step-grandfather reached out to her, and he did it in the only way he felt he could, I do wish with my whole heart that he had taken the initiative to bring in outside help. The family sorely needed help, both psychological counseling and financial aid. I believe it was his kindness that got Meredith through. Kindness is a powerful tool.

What the reader learns about bees is fascinating!

In this memoir the author relates how she remembers feeling. Now an adult, she is looking back on her childhood. Some of the thoughts expressed are those of an adult. Other thoughts are those of a child. The mix of the two is at times jarring. Particularly the thoughts attributed to the author’s three-year-old brother seemed too mature to me.

The sole aspect of this book that is heartwarming is the relationship that develops between Meredith and her step-father. I found the book to be primarily a disturbing, depressing, sad read.The information about bees is interesting, but let’s be realistic, they offer no immediate solution to this family’s serious problems.

I didn’t expect this book to be so depressing! I do not like this book, but I have found it to be reasonably well done.

The audiobook is read by Candace Thaxton. She uses different intonations for different speakers. When expressing Meredith’s thoughts and words, each sentence, and often even separate words which she wants emphasized, end on a high note. The result is a singsong cadence that sounds superficial and unnatural. Unfortunately, a large portion is read in this manner. The other intonations are much better and the words are always easy to hear, so I have given the audiobook narration three stars. ...more

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Nov 27, 2019 Christy rated it it was amazing

Shelves: memoirs, favorites, audiobook, read-in-2019, non-fiction

I don't really have a whole lot to say about this one except that I LOVED it!! I love so many memoirs, and this one is no exception. I love being able to read about people's lives that are so different from my own. Plus the honey bee aspects of the story were extremely fascinating. I wished the author would have read the audio book, but the narrator used was very good.

Meredith May grew up in a dysfunctional home with a volatile mother and mostly absent father. When her parents divorced, she ...more

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May 07, 2019 Kimberly Dawn rated it it was amazing

Bees need the warmth of family; alone, a single bee isnt likely to make it through the night.

THE HONEY BUS is a touching memoir of Meredith Mays 1970s childhood in Big Sur, California.

At age five after her parents divorce, Meredith, her mother, and brother left their home in Rhode Island to return to Big Sur to live with her maternal grandparents in their small home.

Meredith was left rudderless, as she had lost her father physically and her mother emotionally, to severe depression and violent ...more

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Apr 09, 2019 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it really liked it

Shelves: ebooks, netgalley, biography-memoir, reviewcopy, read2019

When Meredith was 5, her parents separated and she moved with her mother and brother to her maternal grandparents' home. Her grandfather the beekeeper introduces her to the world of honeybees. It is a comforting, rural memoir and bees have great metaphor potential that the author utilizes through her Grandpa's voice. Research on bees runs throughout with a somewhat sad epilogue combining her grandfather's aging with the bee crisis.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through ...more

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Oct 22, 2019 ☮Karen rated it really liked it

Shelves: audio, nonfiction, hoopla, 5000-2019, read-in-2019, hear-hear-on-bt

3.5 stars.

This is a sad memoir, not just because of the dysfunction in Meredith May's childhood caused by her depressed mother, but because it focuses in on what will happen if we don't pay attention to our waning honeybee populations. Wake up call. This is a crisis we all need to be worried about as it's not going to fix itself.

Meredith's grandpa was a fifth generation beekeeper and taught her how to care for the bees and assist him in every way. He was a fount of knowledge and she learned well ...more

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Sep 08, 2019 Diane Barnes rated it liked it

Shelves: bedtime-books

A memoir of a young girl whose parents divorced and she and her brother were raised by their grandparents in Carmel, CA. Her grandfather was a beekeeper with hundreds of hives, and he and the bees saved her sad childhood with a distant, psychotic mother. I had no idea bees were so smart and have such an advanced society, but as the author points out, we can learn a lot from them. The grandfather was the star of this one though. Such a gentle, kind man.

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Aug 27, 2019 Kathryn in FL rated it liked it

Shelves: memoir, nonfiction, autobiography, overcoming-trauma, coming-of-age, family-relationships, american-dream-unravels, 2019

I read and completed this story with mixed feelings. I'm not particularly comfortable assigning a rating on someone's life experiences, especially when abuse is involved. I tend to overthink and compare my own experiences and those of others that experienced childhood suffering. It colors your perceptions so deeply, that you spend tremendous time in self-examination and observation to reinterpret this world after escaping. I have spent vast amounts of time in conversations with others discussing I read and completed this story with mixed feelings. I'm not particularly comfortable assigning a rating on someone's life experiences, especially when abuse is involved. I tend to overthink and compare my own experiences and those of others that experienced childhood suffering. It colors your perceptions so deeply, that you spend tremendous time in self-examination and observation to reinterpret this world after escaping. I have spent vast amounts of time in conversations with others discussing old coping skills and reactions and focusing on replacing these with healthier perspectives and behaviors, which take so much effort to execute. It took time to realize that comparing pain is best done with great compassion and even larger offerings of encouragement! Everyone's pain is legitimate. Do some experience more pain than others, yes. Does that delegitimize the pain experienced by the one who suffers less? It shouldn't.

The journey this story takes is painful to hear. Ms. May experienced abuse and neglect at the hands of her mother after her parents divorce at 5 years of age. Her mother moved from RI to California, to live with her maternal grandmother and her grandmother's husband. Meredith, her brother and mother shared a small bedroom in a very small, humble home with very few luxuries. Meredith had no toys and little clothing. That which she had was purchased at second hand stores and selected by her cold, no-nonsense grandmother. She escaped to the open spaces of Big Sur with her "adopted grandfather", who listened with compassion to her challenges. His love was a solace in a cold world, where her mother often isolated herself, that she totally ignored Meredith. On fewer occasions, her mother would step out of her "other" world to express a sudden, deep, abiding rage that turned savagely on Meredith and her brother. These incidents though infrequent were terrifying and physical injury occurred. Her grandmother would deepen the children's hopelessness by accusing them of being responsible for these outbursts. Thus creating an enforced silence regarding their experiences.

Throughout this examination of her past, we get an insider's account about how the bee community works, so intricately together to maintain their thriving communities. The division of roles the bees willingly play, so integral to their life and the hive's vitality. We see this juxtaposed with the toxicity of Meredith's life and how her antagonist is protected from consequences. Likewise, she was told many lies about her Father by her maternal grandmother and mother. When she had her first opportunity to visit him a few years after their departure to CA, her mother grilled her on things she needed to return from her father's possession. Meanwhile, her physically distant Father and his loving wife are so kind and focused on her, that she lives temporarily in a fairy tale world. He never pries into her life except to ask if her mother hits her! She lies and says no. He offers her an escape, she is welcome to live with him permanently. But she refuses, deep down it feels like a betrayal to do so (so typical among survivor's is the feeling of unworthiness and the ingrained belief that the abuser should never be "betrayed" by their own needs). What a horrible choice and a wonderful opportunity all rolled into one! How I fantasized that someone would provide an opportunity such as this when I was growing up. Frankly, even what I know about being a survivor, I am a little shocked that she refused. However, I suspect lurking in her mind was the possibility that this was "to good to be true".

Like other books of this type in the sub-genre, it definitely poked and prodded into the places I prefer to keep shrouded in darkness with the door shut tight and preferably locked. It isn't all that different than "A Boy Called It", which I preferred, perhaps that was a function of timing it appeared in my life, as much as the story itself.

I recommend this to those who want to get an "insider's look" into the indelible marks of abuse AND the JOURNEY TO HEALING. I also recommend this for those who have walked this long and lonely path. Many did and likewise. many did not have a loving "grandfather" figure to give them love and support during these darkest moment of life. This demonstrates that there is life after trauma and forgiveness is so integral to overcoming. It is my observation that I would have connected more if I felt the author was more in touch with her emotions. She is a journalist by trade and this story is based more in a factual chronicle. It would have been more meaningful to me, if she had exposed more emotion. ...more

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Mar 15, 2019 Linden rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: advance-review-copy

Why do I keep gravitating to depressing dysfunctional childhood memoirs? Could someone please remind me to step away? This is the story of Meredith, whose parents divorced when she was a child, and her mother took her and her little brother to live in California with Granny and Grandpa. Mom was useless, Granny was strict, but Grandpa loved the kids and taught them all about his hives, and about the bees who inhabited them.

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Feb 18, 2019 Mike Sumner rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Everyone should read The Honey Bus, a parable for our time, a beautifully composed memoir of, for the most part, a young girl - Meredith May - who, with her younger brother Matthew, experiences the despair of a broken home, separated parents and a dysfunctional mother. Moved away from their father and Rhode Island to live with grandparents in California. Step-grandpa is a beekeeper, has been for many years. A fount of knowledge about honey bees and their invaluable contribution to life. Uses an ...more

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Jul 07, 2019 Ellie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

I will recommend this memoir to every reader I encounter. This is truly one of "those books"-the kind that you will carry with you forever in your heart. You will be moved to tears and laughter and relief. You will learn about the amazing life of bees and come to comprehend the direness of what we all have been hearing for years about the disappearance of the bee and what that means for our future civilization. It is not a textbook-it is not dry or preachy-it is a story of a family that loves ...more

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Apr 20, 2019 Onceinabluemoon rated it it was amazing

Loved this, life stories shared through a grandfather and bees. Beautiful memoir of a dysfunctional family, all shrouded under the love and care of bees. I especially loved this as I was listening while I gardened, across the pasture is a commercial beekeepers hives, bringing bitter facts to the forefront.
I lived in Carmel for many years, the familiarity was embracing. Of course this goes beyond bees, a mentally ill mom wreaked havoc in this family, but the guidance of a caring step grandfather ...more

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Mar 02, 2019 Sally Boocock rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: biography

One of the most touching books I have ever read. It will stay with me for a long long time. As well as being biographical it is so informative about bees and how important they are to our survival. I cannot recommend this book highly enough. Everyone should read it.

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Jan 04, 2020 Ann R rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, favorites, autobio-biography-or-memoir, ag-library, california, 2020-read

Although I rarely read memoirs, I was intrigued by the 1970s California setting and the idea of a honey bus. I don't want to say too much about the story but it is a beautifully written coming of age story about a girl and her brother managing to thrive within a dysfunctional family. May's paternal grandfather becomes her saving grace and she deftly interweaves the ongoing story of the bees and the life lessons she learns from helping to care for her grandfather's hives. Although I have read ...more

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Mar 07, 2019 Michael Cayley rated it it was amazing

This is a cross between a memoir of a difficult childhood and a hymn to the honeybee.

Meredith and her brother Matthew come to California with their unstable mother following the breakup of their parents marriage, to stay with grandparents. Grandfather is a passionate beekeeper, and in bees Meredith finds solace without sentimentality, as she discovers the intricate social life of bees, with both its cooperation and its capacity for ruthlessness.

Much of the book is taken up with superb accounts ...more

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Jun 10, 2019 Traci at The Stacks rated it it was ok · review of another edition

This memoir was hit and miss for me. The stuff about the bees was so interesting and I learned so much. The stuff about her mother and granny felt really forced. The writing felt like her childhood self was writing it, but I could tell if that was a choice. It was just ok for me.

UPDATE: turns out this book is YA which makes more sense why i found the authors voice to be juvenile.

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Nov 16, 2018 Missy Block rated it it was amazing

A beautifully written memoir about Meredith, a child that not only learns to survive a dysfunctional mother, but learns thru the eloquent life of bees and the wisdom of her beekeeping grandfather how to navigate beyond the circumstances she was given. I fell into this book on page one and connected so deeply to Meredith and her Grandpa, that I couldnt put the book down until I knew where their journey led them. While their personal story captured my heart, the plight of the honey bees gripped my ...more

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Mar 08, 2020 Martha☀ rated it really liked it

Shelves: biography, audiobook, hoopla, hear-hear

Meredith May tells the story of a few tumultuous years of her childhood and she does so with such drama and feeling that it comes across as a fictional tale. But it isn't.
When Meredith's parents split in 1975, her mom took her and her brother across the country to Big Sur, CA to live with grandparents. Her mother then locked herself away in the bedroom for years, leaving the two children to fend for themselves and have their basic needs met by prickly Granny. If it wasn't for Grandpa and his Meredith May tells the story of a few tumultuous years of her childhood and she does so with such drama and feeling that it comes across as a fictional tale. But it isn't.
When Meredith's parents split in 1975, her mom took her and her brother across the country to Big Sur, CA to live with grandparents. Her mother then locked herself away in the bedroom for years, leaving the two children to fend for themselves and have their basic needs met by prickly Granny. If it wasn't for Grandpa and his gentle loving manner, Meredith would have fallen into a deep depression herself. But Grandpa was there and taught her all the life lessons she needed when she takes on a role as his beekeeping helper. Caring for 100+ hives in the valleys of Big Sur, Grandpa shows how the bees work as a family; caring for the young, building and cleaning the hive, bringing home nectar and pollen for the colony, distancing themselves when they are sick, etc.
But life is rocky for Meredith as she learns some of life's truth - such as when she finds out that her father has sent letters and tried to keep in contact, as she makes friends and witnesses the kinds of loving relationships that other families have, as she withstands neglect, verbal and physical abuse at the hands of her mother, as she switches off her tolerance for her mother and decides that getting away from her is her only hope.
I especially loved the many references to retro-fashion, toys and foods that I enjoyed myself in the 1970s, many of which had fallen out of my memory until this book.
I listened to the audio version of this book and really enjoyed it. The narrator has an unusual voice which works perfectly as the voice of 5, 6, 9, 15 year old Meredith as well as the narration parts. I read somewhere that someone considered this to be a Young Adult story but I disagree. Although there is definitely a 'coming of age' aspect to Meredith's life, the concepts of mental illness, depression, neglect and abuse are all treated in a very adult way. ...more

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May 27, 2019 Barb rated it really liked it

My son is a beekeeper. I was drawn to this book from the cover and the description. Yes, I learned a lot about bees that I didn't know before. But this isn't just a book about bees. The author's reveals her early life when her parents split and she was dragged by her mother across the country to live with her grandparents. The book has been compared to Glass Castles, and yes, I can see the resemblance but I found this book to be more redemptive. The author's relationship with her mother is ...more

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May 16, 2019 Caren rated it really liked it

Shelves: adult-nonfiction

This is a lovely book. It is a dual portrait of the greatest positive influences on one young girl's life: bees and the grandfather who introduced them to her. The author's difficult childhood was turned into a thing of beauty through the connection to nature her grandfather helped forge. After her parents' separation and eventual divorce, the author's mother took the two children (the author and her younger brother) from Rhode Island back to Carmel, California to live with her own mother. The ...more

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Feb 28, 2019 KC rated it really liked it

Shelves: memoir, non-fiction, nature, science, family-drama, girl-power, arc, coming-of-age, generational, environment

This captivating memoir is part coming-of-age family drama and part intro to bees 101. After her parents divorce, five year-old Meredith, her mom and younger brother relocate from Rhode Island to California to live with her grandparents. While tiptoeing around her despondent yet volatile mother, Meredith becomes fascinated with her Grandfathers bees, their hives and their behavior paralleling between human life and bee life. What you take away from The Honey Bus is that family can be ...more

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Apr 08, 2019 Glen rated it liked it

Shelves: firstreads, biography

I won this book in a goodreads drawing.

The memoir of a woman who, as a girl went to live with her grandparents when her parents split up. Her grandfather was a bee keeper, and kept hives in an old abandoned bus. Keeping bees teach her life lessons.

A look at a life that could be sad, but is instead hopeful.

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May 04, 2019 Kim rated it liked it

Bees never cease to amaze me. This book weaves a very personal story of a young girl's struggles and perseverance based, in part, on the journey she takes as she learns about these miraculous insects by her grandfather's side. I enjoyed it, despite the sometimes disturbing journey her family life took. Now if I can only figure out how to become a hobby beekeeper....

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Jan 20, 2020 Jeanette (Again) rated it really liked it

Shelves: nonfiction, biography-memoir, four-star-nonfiction, america

The unconditional love between grandparent and grandchild is a sacrament. For those of us who don't have normal parents, that love is essential to our development. My special grandpa died when I was fourteen years old. Without even closing my eyes I can still see that gleam in his eyes that meant pure love to me. At family gatherings he would sit there in his old man onesie, watching us run and play, with a look on his face like he couldn't believe how lucky he was to have granddaughters like The unconditional love between grandparent and grandchild is a sacrament. For those of us who don't have normal parents, that love is essential to our development. My special grandpa died when I was fourteen years old. Without even closing my eyes I can still see that gleam in his eyes that meant pure love to me. At family gatherings he would sit there in his old man onesie, watching us run and play, with a look on his face like he couldn't believe how lucky he was to have granddaughters like us. At picnics in the park I used to stop what I was doing once in awhile and look over at him just to see that look on his face and soak up some of those love beams.

Reading this book was an emotional experience I wasn't expecting. It stirred up a lot of things 'n stuff I had buried, as we do when we become adults. When I finished reading about Meredith's grandpa going to school with her, I found myself weeping in a way I never did at the time my grandpa died. Back then I was too young to recognize the rarity of what I had lost. I couldn't have known that it would be another twenty years before I would meet another old man who would look at me with that same unfiltered adoration and anticipate my every visit as if it were Christmas Eve and I was Santa Claus. By then I knew treasure when I found it, and I adopted that man as a surrogate dad.

Meredith was blessed to have her grandpa in her life until she was forty-five years old. She has carried on his legacy of beekeeping and educating people about the important role bees play in pollinating our food crops.

I've always been fascinated on a superficial level by the social behavior of bees. Now I want to study it in more detail. The way they keep things humming along smoothly is complex and magical. Every bee has a specific job, and everything they do is in the best interest of the colony as a whole. With that knowledge, I will never again use the expression "hive mind" to refer to human groupthink that leads to senseless and often violent behavior. The true hive mentality always serves the collective good. Bees are like the Three Musketeers of the insect world: All for One and One for All. ...more

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About Meredith May

Meredith May

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Meredith May is the author of THE HONEY BUS (HarperCollins/Park Row April 2019), and I, WHO DID NOT DIE (Regan Arts 2017). She is a fifth-generation beekeeper with several hives in San Francisco. During her 16-year career at the San Francisco Chronicle, her writing won the PEN USA Literary Award for Journalism and was shortlisted for the Pulitzer Prize. She is a former professor of podcasting at ...more

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“Mother Nature knit a careful plan in place, and if you pulled one thread of it loose, the whole thing could unravel. These insects that made most people run in fear were the invisible glue of the earth that held us all together.” — 2 likes

“What was the statute of limitations on sadness?” — 1 likes

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