Here Is the Beehive

by Sarah Crossan

Overview

A "gutsy, modern, deeply entertaining" debut about a love affair cut short, and how lonely it is to live inside a secret (The Observer UK).
 
Ana Kelly can deal with death. As an estate lawyer, an unfortunate part of her day-to-day is phone calls from the next of kin informing her that one of her clients has died. But nothing could have prepared Ana for the call from Rebecca Taylor, explaining in a strangely calm tone that her husband Connor was killed in an accident.
 
Ana had been having an affair with Connor for three years, keeping their love secret in hotel rooms, weekends away, and swiftly deleted text messages. Though consuming, they hide their love well, and nobody knows of their relationship except Mark, Connor's best friend.
 
Alone and undone, Ana seeks friendship with the person who she once thought of as her adversary and opposite, but who is now the only one who shares her pain — Rebecca. As Ana becomes closer to her lover's widow, she is forced to reconcile painful truths about the affair, and the fickleness of love and desire.
 
Funny, frank, and strange, Sarah Crossan's moving novel is wholly original and deeply resonant.

New York Post "Novels Everyone Will be Buzzing About this Fall"
The Millions "Most Anticipated 2020" List

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780316428583
Publisher:	Little, Brown and Company
Publication date:	11/17/2020
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	697,844
Product dimensions:	5.60(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Sarah Crossan has lived in Dublin, London and New York, and now lives in Brighton. She graduated with a degree in philosophy and literature before training as an English and drama teacher at Cambridge University. Sarah has won many international awards for her verse novels, including the CILIP Carnegie Medal, the CBI Book of Year award and the CLiPPA Poetry Award. This is her first novel for adults.

Editorial Reviews

★ 09/14/2020

In Irish writer Crossan’s beautifully written first adult novel (after the YA book Being Toffee), a married London lawyer and mother of two has an affair with her client, Connor Mooney, a married father of three. Ana finds her husband, Paul, to be “homely” and “compassionate,” and feels unsatisfied in their marriage, which mostly consists of communicating by “grunts and nods.” Ana and Connor meet up in hotel rooms when they can, but Ana wants more from the relationship; while she is willing to give up her family for Connor, he’s hesitant to leave his wife. The three-year affair ends with Connor’s death, the cause of which is initially kept from the reader. Ana hears the news from the unsuspecting Rebecca, who calls to inform Ana in her capacity as the lawyer of Connor’s estate. Ana is devastated and unable to mourn her lover openly, and is left with nothing but a password-protected photograph of him on her computer. Then she secretly changes Connor’s will and declares herself the executor, “so I could know your life and befriend your wife and keep you for a while.” The book, structured in five parts, explores Ana’s grief, guilt, and loss in stunning, spare lyrical prose, which appears like verse on the page as dialogue breaks into snippets of Ana’s consciousness. Told from the point of view of a highly flawed Ana, this mesmerizing story will have readers hooked. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

Told in verse, this story of obsession and illicit love reads like a thriller.”—People Magazine

“A gripping exploration of obsession, risk, and loss.”—The Millions

“It flows as easily as honey . . . and it accomplishes a stream-of-consciousness feel that conveys both how quickly grief can shatter a person and how those shattered pieces still connect.”—Washington Post

"Here is the Beehive is a psychologically-complex masterpiece. Twisty, deep, and ultimately devastating, this one is impossible to put down."—Sarah Dunn, author of The Arrangement

"A fresh, affecting take on a tale as old as time."—Kirkus Reviews

“If you love Sally Rooney and Ottessa Moshfegh, you’ll devour this strange story.”—HelloGiggles

"An eviscerating account of modern marriage."—The Independent (UK)

"Beautifully written ... in stunning, spare lyrical prose, which appears like verse on the page. . . . This mesmerizing story will have readers hooked."—Publishers Weekly

"This book is just sublime . . . I loved every page."—Caitriona Balfe, star of Outlander

"This exquisitely well-balanced novel-in-verse is painful to read yet almost impossible to put down. . . . Each character is fully realized, with even walk-on characters brought vividly to life with a few deft words."—School Library Journal

"Gutsy, modern, deeply entertaining . . . unlike anything I’ve read before. . . . The writing is so bright and alive and the novel is a triumph — crackling with psychological and sexual ambiguity."—The Observer (UK)

“Amazing . . . I absolutely love the form, which breathes new life into a familiar story making it both more elegant and more brutal.”—Emma Healey, author of Elizabeth is Missing

“One of our most original writers.”—John Boyne, author of A Ladder to the Sky

"Sarah Crossan is a truly masterful writer. . . . fascinating, gloriously written and completely unique."—PRIMER

From the Publisher

2020-09-02
A married woman mourns the loss of her lover.

Crossan, Ireland’s fifth children's laureate, explores the unexpected end of an extramarital affair in her first adult novel. Estate lawyer Ana deals with death daily but still finds herself wholly unprepared when she learns Connor—her client and lover of three years—has died suddenly: “We plan for death, / make sensible decisions while gorging on life. / But no one intends to die.” Ana learns of Connor’s passing from his widow, Rebecca, who knows nothing about their relationship. Written in verse, the novel weaves past and present together as Ana tries not to succumb to grief while looking back over the good (and bad) of their relationship. Married with two children herself, Ana finds herself ensconced in a unique kind of grief; she must mourn in private because their relationship was a secret and mourning properly could cost her everything. While coping with Connor’s death, Ana becomes increasingly erratic: She ignores her family, falls behind at work, and tries to befriend Rebecca. As the two women become closer, Ana begins to reevaluate what Connor has told her about his wife and his life. It's only after he’s gone that she begins to see him and their relationship for what it truly was. Crossan’s writing helps underscore the novel’s themes of memory, time, and the manifestation of grief. The fragmented style mirrors Ana’s scattered thoughts and memories, and the white space on the page feels like a physical embodiment of their affair—which took place in the found stretches of their lives. At one point, Ana thinks: “We were never forever. / Always in a place of / passing. / Everything that mattered happened in locked rooms. / Nothing came out of them.” As she exits that locked room for good, Ana must step fully into her messy life—whatever the outcome.

A fresh, affecting take on a tale as old as time.

Kirkus Reviews