Bees+-+Chapter+5


 * Chapter Summary** - Joe, Jenn, & Sally (US)

In this chapter, Lily stops running from her father, and anyone else who may be looking for her and really starts to look around at where she is. She begins to learn about the women she is living with, who she is sure knew her mother. The Boatwright sisters, named May, June and August have agreed to let Lily and her babysitter, Rosaleen, live with them for a while. But they are not guests. Lily and Rosaleen work in the house and help with the bees. The Boatwright sisters keep bees for a living and sell not only honey but beeswax and candles as well.

Lily overhears the sisters talking and learns that they don’t believe her story. They know she is lying about how she came to be there but will protect her. Lily also feels the first sting of discrimination. As the only white person around, she feels for the first time she might be rejected because of her skin color.

Each night, the women in the house watch the news. The novel is set in the late 1960s and the civil rights movement is often a headline. Lily feels “white, self-conscious, and ashamed” (89). In addition to watching the news, each night the women pray around a statue of a black virgin Mary. Not traditionally Catholic, the women embrace a kind of African, low-country, catholic mix.