Section 1 page 1-75

I have just completed the first 75 pages of The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. From what I have read, this is definitely not what I was expecting. Reading about the horrible relationship between Lily and her father, T. Ray, is heart wrenching. Through the book you can tell he truly does not care for her, and just treats her as a nuisance. She is unable to do anything and if she makes a simple mistake, she is physically punished. When she had slept outside one night and her father found her without her shirt undone, he immediately assumed she was with a boy and refused to hear her side of the story. She was then forced to kneel on grits for about an hour. I find it truly disgusting that her father treats her with so little respect. The names he calls her are horrible and how he emotionally punishes her too is unbelievable.

We also learnt about Lily possibly killing her mother. When I first read it, I assumed I had read it incorrectly and immediately reread the passage to find out she truly believes she accidentally killed her mother. During the story we can tell that her mother is packing up to leave when her father finds her. Her father claims it is to leave both he and Lily, but I believe that her mother just wants to escape the emotional and physically abusive father. The fact that she had a gun shows that she felt very unsafe in the house and by turning it on him, it shows how scared she was of him that she would resort to killing him to protect herself.

Another confusing thing we learn about is the Black Mary picture that once belonged to Lily's mother. This picture is obviously a big symbol throughout this book, as it leads Lily out of T. Ray's house and off to Tiburon, South Carolina. There is obviously lots of mystery with this picture and I'm not sure what I think it means. As she finds August, I assume that her mother was friends with her, which may give Lily some hope that at least one of her parents wasn't prejudiced and was friends with a black women.

Finally, I want to write about Rosaleen. She is about the only role model for Lily, besides her teacher. Rosaleen shows how to truly care for someone, as she sometimes shows her compassion for Lily. Rosaleen still has some flaws though as she refuses to back down to racial behaviour. Although it is good that she stood up to the men who were insulting her, she should have thought thoroughly about the consequences. If she could have just ignored the men, then she wouldn't have ended up in jail and with a man ready to kill her. Rosaleen still is the best role model for Lily and truly helps her out with her hard life, and now on her adventure in Tiburon.

This book is very adventurous, yet heart-breaking as Lily goes through so much. Now with August, she is in for an exciting time, where I am sure her lies will all fall apart soon.

Sarah S.
May 10th, 2014