Bee Season

Title : Bee Season
Author : Myla Goldberg
Publisher : Harper Perennial

This is a piognant book. Told mostly through the eyes of a child, Elisa, it evoked innocent yet bittersweet sentiments. In some ways, it brought to my mind “To kill A Mockingbird”.

It began gently with Elisa’s surprising qualification in her school’s Spelling Bee competition and her sense of achievement at finally being embraced by her family of gifted individuals. Then it escalated as the family span out of control with its members caught within each own whirlwind. There was an aching sense of despair as various notions of love and personal faith started to be called into question. As each person's own crisis overflowed and became the source of sadness for the family.

Myla Goldberg’s debut work has also been made into a movie starring Richard Gere and Juliette Binoche, the latter translating the role of Miriam into a fragile porcelain on the threshold of heartbreak. This is one of the few instances when I find that words translated into motion picture can still retain magic.

Bee Season is a very special book to me - it somehow reminded me of myself as a child and my position within the family. Elisa’s dad Saul brought to mind, my grandfather. Like Elisa, words have mystical powers to me and as certain as I am as Aaron, I have always felt God’s presence in many places and spaces.