The Death of Bees
  • Published: 15 March 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099558422
  • Imprint: Windmill Books
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $39.99

The Death of Bees

Formats & editions
EBook
1 Mar 2012
Paperback
15 Mar 2013
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WINNER OF THE COMMONWEALTH BOOK PRIZE 2013

An enchanting and grimly comic tale about love, loss, family and unlikely friendships

WINNER OF THE COMMONWEALTH BOOK PRIZE 2013

Today is Christmas Eve. Today is my birthday. Today I am fifteen. Today I buried my parents in the backyard. Neither of them were beloved.

Marnie and her little sister Nelly have always been different. Marnie leads a life of smoking, drinking and drugs; Nelly enjoys playing the violin, eating cornflakes with Coke and reading Harry Potter. But on Christmas Eve, the sisters have to join forces and put their differences aside. And when Lennie, the old guy next door, starts to get suspicious, it’s only a matter of time before their terrible secret is discovered.
  • Published: 15 March 2013
  • ISBN: 9780099558422
  • Imprint: Windmill Books
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 304
  • RRP: $39.99
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About the author

Lisa O'Donnell

Lisa O'Donnell won the Orange Screenwriting Prize in 2000 for her screenplay The Wedding Gift. She is the author of The Death of Bees, her debut novel, which won the 2013 Commonwealth Book Prize and most recently, Closed Doors. She lives on the Isle of Bute.

Also by Lisa O'Donnell

Closed Doors
See all

Praise for The Death of Bees

This vibrantly imagined novel, by turns hilarious and appalling, is hard to resist.

Daily Mail

A black comedy, mixing The Ladykillers with Irvine Welsh’s The Acid House...O’Donnell adeptly balances caustic humour and compassion.

Guardian

Compelling piece of work... O’Donnell brings a freshness to her narrative, thanks to the brilliantly evoked voices of her two young female protagonists.... Warm without being cosy, explicit without being shocking, and emotive without being schmaltzy, this is a powerful coming-of-age tale with a clear eye for the travails of 21st-century deprived living.

The Scotsman

The Death Of Bees is compelling stuff, engaging the emotions from the first page and quickly becoming almost impossible to put down.

Herald

Channelling the spirit of Joe Orton…O’Donnell cuts black comedy with a big dollop of sentiment…The Death of Bees steadily draws you into its characters’ lives.

Adrian Turpin, Financial Times

A wonderful dark comic first novel

Alice Hoffman

A dark, fierce first novel that is a page-turner and a fairy tale turned inside out. I can’t wait to read what she writes next.

Alice Hoffman, New York Times
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