Grey Bees background, links and discussion questions

Grey Bees

Andrey Vuryevich Kurkov (born 23 April 1961 in Leningrad, USSR) is a Ukrainian author and public intellectual who writes in Russian. He is the author of 19 novels, including the bestselling Death and the Penguin, nine books for children, and about 20 documentary, fiction and TV movie scripts. His work is currently translated into 37 languages. Kurkov's most recently translated novel, Grey Bees, which has "elements of both the fable and the epic", dramatizes the conflict in his country through the adventures of a beekeeper. The novel was translated into French by Paul Lequesne as Les abeilles grises, which won the 2022 Prix Medicis etranger.

Kurkov lives in Kyiv with his English wife, Elizabeth, and their three children. After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, he became an internally displaced person and continued to write and broadcast about the war. A bilingual, native Russian speaker, in a 2022 interview Kurkov speculated that Russia's war on Ukraine, rather than suppress Ukrainian culture and identity, would potentially have the opposite effect, encouraging Ukrainian writers, especially those whose native language is Russian, to publish increasingly, or even exclusively, in Ukrainian. (Wikipedia)

Useful reviews and interviews

Frenemies in a War Zone: On Andrey Kurkov's "Grey Bees - LA Times –

https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/frenemies-in-a-war-zone-on-andrey-kurkovs-grey-bees/

A Humorous Ukrainian Writer, With Nothing to Laugh About- NYT -

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/25/books/andrey-kurkov-ukraine-war.html

A Ukrainian Novel Looks Between the Lines of War - New Yorker -

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/04/25/a-ukrainian-novel-looks-between-the-lines-of-war

A Beekeeper and his bees go on a road-trip across war-torn Eastern Ukraine -

https://electricliterature.com/grey-bees-by-andrey-kurkov-novel-ukraine/

Some major themes of Russian Literature:

1. Westernizers vs. Slavophiles - constant awareness of Russia's relation to the cultures of the West

2. The superfluous man - men whose ambition is made irrelevant by the great power of the state

3. The "enchanted wanderer"

4. Hagiography - Saints' lives

5. Skaz - telling tales in an almost folkloric voice

Discussion Questions for Grey Bees by Andrei Kurkov

1. What is Sergeich's relationship to the color grey? How does it change throughout the novel?

2. Why was the name of Sergeich and Vitalina's daughter such a breaking point for their relationship?

3. What is the significance or the vodka/lard (pig fat, not usually rendered)/onion ceremony in the book?

4. Why does Sergeich feel so empowered by changing the street signs around?

5. Who is the "great man" who comes to sleep on the bee bed, and why is Sergeich so moved by his coming?

6. Why do Pahka and Sergeich remain "friends/frenemies" despite their enormous differences?

7. Why are bees, in particular, at the center of the story? Are they inside culture or outside of it?

8. From the point of view of art, why does Sergeich go to Crimea instead of further west in Ukraine? What does Kurka need him to find there?

9. What is the role of the comic scenes at the border?

10. Are you surprised by Sergeich's ignorance of Tatar culture?

11. How does Sergeich's time in Crimea affect him?

12. Do you really have to know the history of this region to understand this book?

13. What is the relationship between the three regions where Sergeich spends time in this book - the grey zone, "free Ukraine" and Crimea?

14. Towards the end of the novel, Sergeich could have chosen any one of three ultimate destinations: back to his wife, back to Galya, or back to Starohorodivka. Why does he make the choice he does?

15. How has Sergeich changed by the end of the novel?

Map of grey zone in 2015

May book

Grey Bees

by Andrey Kurkov

Wednesday

May 24th at 1pm

At the library or on zoom.

Print copies are available.
Also available:

Hoopla audiobook

Hoopla ebook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

Overdrive/Libby ebook

With a warm yet political humor, Ukraine's most famous novelist presents a balanced and illuminating portrait of modern conflict. Little Starhorodivka, a village of three streets, lies in Ukraine's Grey Zone, the no-man's-land between loyalist and separatist forces. Thanks to the lukewarm war of sporadic violence and constant propaganda that has been dragging on for years, only two residents remain: retired safety inspector turned beekeeper Sergey Sergeyich, and Pashka, a rival from his schooldays. With little food and no electricity, under constant threat of bombardment, Sergeyich's one remaining pleasure is his bees. As spring approaches, he knows he must take them far from the Grey Zone so they can collect their pollen in peace. This simple mission on their behalf introduces him to combatants and civilians on both sides of the battle lines: loyalists, separatists, Russian occupiers, and Crimean Tatars. Wherever he goes, Sergeyich's childlike simplicity and strong moral compass disarm everyone he meets. But could these qualities be manipulated to serve an unworthy cause, spelling disaster for him, his bees and his country?

Original Ukrainian cover
By https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/43597829, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=71636017

April title

Afterlife
by Julia Alvarez

Wednesday April 26th at 1pm
at the library and on zoom

Copies of the book are available now!
Large print and audio CD available too.

Digital copies:

Overdrive/Libby ebook
Overdrive/Libby audiobook

hoopla ebook
hoopla audiobook

The first adult novel in almost fifteen years by the internationally bestselling author of In the Time of the Butterflies and How the García Girls Lost Their Accents

“A stunning work of art that reminds readers Alvarez is, and always has been, in a class of her own.” —Elizabeth Acevedo, National Book Award-winning author of the New York Times bestseller The Poet X

Antonia Vega, the immigrant writer at the center of Afterlife, has had the rug pulled out from under her. She has just retired from the college where she taught English when her beloved husband, Sam, suddenly dies. And then more jolts: her bighearted but unstable sister disappears, and Antonia returns home one evening to find a pregnant, undocumented teenager on her doorstep. Antonia has always sought direction in the literature she loves—lines from her favorite authors play in her head like a soundtrack—but now she finds that the world demands more of her than words.

Afterlife is a compact, nimble, and sharply droll novel. Set in this political moment of tribalism and distrust, it asks: What do we owe those in crisis in our families, including—maybe especially—members of our human family? How do we live in a broken world without losing faith in one another or ourselves? And how do we stay true to those glorious souls we have lost?

March title

The Next Ship Home : a novel of Ellis Island

by Heather Webb

Wednesday

March 29th at 1pm

Copies of the book will be available at the library starting on March 1st. Also available as a hoopla audiobook, hoopla ebook, and as an Overdrive/Libby ebook.

The book group will meet in the Local History Room as well as on Zoom.

An unflinching look at the immigrant experience, an unlikely and unique friendship, and a resonant story of female empowerment."—Pam Jenoff, New York Times bestselling author of The Woman with the Blue Star
Ellis Island, 1902: Two women band together to hold America to its promise: "Give me your tired, your poor ... your huddled masses yearning to breathe free..."
A young Italian woman arrives on the shores of America, her sights set on a better life. That same day, a young American woman reports to her first day of work at the immigration center. But Ellis Island isn't a refuge for Francesca or Alma, not when ships depart every day with those who are refused entry to the country and when corruption ripples through every corridor. While Francesca resorts to desperate measures to ensure she will make it off the island, Alma fights for her dreams of becoming a translator, even as women are denied the chance.
As the two women face the misdeeds of a system known to manipulate and abuse immigrants searching for new hope in America, they form an unlikely friendship—and share a terrible secret—altering their fates and the lives of the immigrants who come after them.
This is a novel of the dark secrets of Ellis Island, when entry to "the land of the free" promised a better life but often delivered something drastically different, and when immigrant strength and female friendship found ways to triumph even on the darkest days.

February title

These Precious Days

by Ann Patchett

Wednesday February 22nd

at 1pm

At the library and on zoom

Copies are available at the library including large print and audio cd editions. Also available as a Hoopla ebook and Hoopla audiobook, as well as a Libby ebook.

The beloved New York Times bestselling author reflects on home, family, friendships and writing in this deeply personal collection of essays.

"The elegance of Patchett's prose is seductive and inviting: with Patchett as a guide, readers will really get to grips with the power of struggles, failures, and triumphs alike." --Publisher's Weekly

"Any story that starts will also end." As a writer, Ann Patchett knows what the outcome of her fiction will be. Life, however, often takes turns we do not see coming. Patchett ponders this truth in these wise essays that afford a fresh and intimate look into her mind and heart.

At the center of These Precious Days is the title essay, a surprising and moving meditation on an unexpected friendship that explores "what it means to be seen, to find someone with whom you can be your best and most complete self." When Patchett chose an early galley of actor and producer Tom Hanks' short story collection to read one night before bed, she had no idea that this single choice would be life changing. It would introduce her to a remarkable woman--Tom's brilliant assistant Sooki--with whom she would form a profound bond that held monumental consequences for them both.

A literary alchemist, Patchett plumbs the depths of her experiences to create gold: engaging and moving pieces that are both self-portrait and landscape, each vibrant with emotion and rich in insight. Turning her writer's eye on her own experiences, she transforms the private into the universal, providing us all a way to look at our own worlds anew, and reminds how fleeting and enigmatic life can be.
From the enchantments of Kate DiCamillo's children's books (author of The Beatryce Prophecy) to youthful memories of Paris; the cherished life gifts given by her three fathers to the unexpected influence of Charles Schultz's Snoopy; the expansive vision of Eudora Welty to the importance of knitting, Patchett connects life and art as she illuminates what matters most. Infused with the author's grace, wit, and warmth, the pieces in These Precious Days resonate deep in the soul, leaving an indelible mark--and demonstrate why Ann Patchett is one of the most celebrated writers of our time.

January meeting

Due to a winter storm warning, we will be meeting on Wednesday January 25th at 1pm via ZOOM. Please contact the library at info@hopkintontownlibrary.org to obtain the zoom link.

The program is made possible by New Hampshire Humanities and our program host is Carrie Brown.

January title - Perspectives Book Group from NH Humanities

Perspectives Book Group

Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague

Wednesday January 25th at 1pm

Hopkinton Town Library

Presenter: Carrie Brown

As part of New Hampshire Humanities' Perspectives Book Groups, we're reading "Hamnet," by Maggie O'Farrell. In this imagined re-creation of the early life of Shakespeare, his wife Agnes is an extraordinary woman, a gifted healer, and a central force in her husband's life. Tragedy occurs in the family just as the young husband's career in the London theatre is taking off.

Drawing on Maggie O'Farrell's long-term fascination with the little-known story behind Shakespeare's most enigmatic play, Hamnet is a luminous portrait of a marriage, at its heart the loss of a beloved child.

Warwickshire in the 1580s. Agnes is a woman as feared as she is sought after for her unusual gifts. She settles with her husband in Henley street, Stratford, and has three children: a daughter, Susanna, and then twins, Hamnet and Judith. The boy, Hamnet, dies in 1596, aged eleven. Four years or so later, the husband writes a play called Hamlet.

Award-winning author Maggie O'Farrell's new novel breathes full-blooded life into the story of a loss usually consigned to literary footnotes, and provides an unforgettable vindication of Agnes, a woman intriguingly absent from history.

Please contact the library at info@hopkintontownlibrary.org or 603-746-3663 to reserve a copy of the book. The meeting will take place at the library. There will be a zoom option; contact the library as above for a zoom invitation.

This book is also available on Overdrive/Libby as an audiobook or ebook. Login to your Overdrive account to make sure you are seeing all copies available.

November/December title

The library's next book discussion will be held on

Wednesday December 14th at 1pm.

The meeting will be held in the Local History Room

and via zoom.

Copies of the book (regular print and large print) and audiobook are available at the desk at the library.

In addition the audiobook is available to download via Overdrive/Libby.

"An extraordinary story set in the first century about a woman who finds her voice and her destiny, from the celebrated number one New York Times bestselling author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Invention of Wings

In her mesmerizing fourth work of fiction, Sue Monk Kidd takes an audacious approach to history and brings her acclaimed narrative gifts to imagine the story of a young woman named Ana. Raised in a wealthy family with ties to the ruler of Galilee, she is rebellious and ambitious, with a brilliant mind and a daring spirit. She engages in furtive scholarly pursuits and writes narratives about neglected and silenced women. Ana is expected to marry an older widower, a prospect that horrifies her. An encounter with eighteen-year-old Jesus changes everything.

Their marriage evolves with love and conflict, humor and pathos in Nazareth, where Ana makes a home with Jesus, his brothers, and their mother, Mary. Ana’s pent-up longings intensify amid the turbulent resistance to Rome’s occupation of Israel, partially led by her brother, Judas. She is sustained by her fearless aunt Yaltha, who harbors a compelling secret. When Ana commits a brazen act that puts her in peril, she flees to Alexandria, where startling revelations and greater dangers unfold, and she finds refuge in unexpected surroundings. Ana determines her fate during a stunning convergence of events considered among the most impactful in human history.

Grounded in meticulous research and written with a reverential approach to Jesus’s life that focuses on his humanity, The Book of Longings is an inspiring, unforgettable account of one woman’s bold struggle to realize the passion and potential inside her, while living in a time, place and culture devised to silence her. It is a triumph of storytelling both timely and timeless, from a masterful writer at the height of her powers". --from the author's website

October title

Book Group Meeting

Wednesday October 26

at 1pm

Print copies will be available at the library starting October 5th.

Overdrive/Libby ebook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

September book

Book group meeting

Wednesday September 28th at 1pm

Finding Chika by Mitch Albom

Print and audio cd copies available at the library

Digital editions:

Hoopla ebook

Hoopla audiobook

Overdrive/Libby audiobook

Check out our latest Gallery exhibit A Celebration of Haitian Art (through the end of October). Also on Thursday September 29th at 7pm Judith Kumin will present
A Panorama of Haitian Art in the Library Community Room. Join us!

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Tuesdays With Morrie comes Mitch Albom’s most personal story to date: an intimate and heartwarming memoir about what it means to be a family and the young Haitian orphan whose short life would forever change his heart.
Chika Jeune was born three days before the devastating earthquake that decimated Haiti in 2010. She spent her infancy in a landscape of extreme poverty, and when her mother died giving birth to a baby brother, Chika was brought to The Have Faith Haiti Orphanage that Albom operates in Port Au Prince.

With no children of their own, the forty-plus children who live, play, and go to school at the orphanage have become family to Mitch and his wife, Janine. Chika’s arrival makes a quick impression. Brave and self-assured, even as a three-year-old, she delights the other kids and teachers. But at age five, Chika is suddenly diagnosed with something a doctor there says, “No one in Haiti can help you with.”

Mitch and Janine bring Chika to Detroit, hopeful that American medical care can soon return her to her homeland. Instead, Chika becomes a permanent part of their household, and their lives, as they embark on a two-year, around-the-world journey to find a cure. As Chika’s boundless optimism and humor teach Mitch the joys of caring for a child, he learns that a relationship built on love, no matter what blows it takes, can never be lost.

Told in hindsight, and through illuminating conversations with Chika herself, this is Albom at his most poignant and vulnerable. Finding Chika is a celebration of a girl, her adoptive guardians, and the incredible bond they formed—a devastatingly beautiful portrait of what it means to be a family, regardless of how it is made.

https://www.mitchalbom.com/books/chika/

August title

August Book Group Meeting

In person and via zoom

August 31st at 1pm

(Please email the library at
info@hopkintontownlibrary.org
if you would like the zoom link)

Still Life

by Sarah Winman

Print books are available for check out
at the library and the book is also available on
Overdrive/Libby (ebook and audiobook).

Tuscany, 1944: As Allied troops advance and bombs fall around deserted villages, a young English soldier, Ulysses Temper, finds himself in the wine cellar of a deserted villa. There, he has a chance encounter with Evelyn Skinner, a middle-aged art historian who has come to Italy to salvage paintings from the ruins and recall long-forgotten memories of her own youth. In each other, Ulysses and Evelyn find a kindred spirit amongst the rubble of war-torn Italy, and set off on a course of events that will shape Ulysses's life for the next four decades.

As Ulysses returns home to London, reimmersing himself in his crew at The Stoat and Parrot -- a motley mix of pub crawlers and eccentrics -- he carries his time in Italy with him. And when an unexpected inheritance brings him back to where it all began, Ulysses knows better than to tempt fate, and returns to the Tuscan hills.

With beautiful prose, extraordinary tenderness, and bursts of humor and light, Still Life is a sweeping portrait of unforgettable individuals who come together to make a family, and a richly drawn celebration of beauty and love in all its forms.

--Goodreads.com

July title

July Book Group Meeting

In person and via zoom

July 27th at 1pm

The Secret Keeper of Jaipur

by Alka Joshi

Books are available for check out
at the library and on hoopla and Overdrive/Libby.

This follow-up to The Henna Artist picks up the story 12 years later, and is told alternatingly in the voices of henna artist Lakshmi; her protégé Malik; and Nimmi, Malik's beloved. It's 1969, and Malik is studying the building trade under the tutelage of the Singh family and apprenticing at the Facilities Office of the Jaipur Royal Palace. When a section of their largest project, the Royal Jewel Cinema, collapses on opening night, blame is quickly assigned. Meanwhile, Lakshmi is running the Lady Reading Healing Garden, while her husband, Dr. Jay Kumar, heads up the Community Clinic. They invite Nimmi to coordinate the healing garden, creating opportunities for the facets of Malik's life—personal/professional and traditional/modern—to intersect. As Malik tries to clear the person blamed for the cinema collapse, he uncovers nefarious connections between his mentors and his life back in Shimla, which may put Nimmi in danger. It's only after Malik employs the help of Lakshmi, and her connections at the Royal Palace, that justice may be served. With lush details, a return to favorite characters, and emotional complexity, this story satisfies on every level. --Library Journal

June title

Our next book is A Thousand Ships: A Novel by Natalie Haynes; the Trojan War from the point of view of the silenced women! Lots of options for accessing this title: we will have print copies (here by Wednesday 6/1), an audio CD edition, hoopla audiobook, Overdrive/Libby audiobook and ebook. We'll meet in person and via zoom on Wednesday June 29th at 1pm.

Broadcaster and classicist Natalie Haynes amplifies the muted voices of women in her all-female retelling of the Trojan War. From slaves to queens to muses to deities, she takes the scraps of women Homer offers us in THE ILIAD and THE ODYSSEY and patches them into full characters with powerful stories.

In A THOUSAND SHIPS, Homer is writing yet another epic. Desperate for inspiration, he beseeches Calliope, the muse of epic poetry and the novel’s sporadic narrator, to lend him her song once more. She obliges, albeit reluctantly, intent on two objectives: teaching Homer the true meaning of war and memorializing the women left unsung.

"[T]he novel draws cohesion from the fragmented voices of women. In presenting her audience with so many voices, Haynes could have written a cacophony. Instead, she has conducted a choir."

What follows is a series of primarily self-contained chapters tackling not only the Trojan War but also its long and drawn-out aftermath. For the most part, each chapter is its own entity and does not follow a linear timeline. Creusa runs through a smoke-choked city in search of her husband. Briseis is enslaved by her family’s murderer. Laodamia laments the death of her king. A rejected Oenone raises her son as a single mother atop Mount Ida.

While these stories give A THOUSAND SHIPS the feel of a series of thematically connected vignettes, the book is lent narrative scaffolding by the Trojan women and Penelope's letters to her husband, Odysseus, transforming it into something between a collection and a novel.

Nestled between stories of goddesses arguing over golden apples and wives offering prophetic warnings to their husbands, the Trojan women are living in the direct aftermath of the war. Their stories converge in these chapters as they huddle together on a beach at the outskirts of the Greek encampment. Their fates hang in a precarious balance. They are held captive by the Greeks and are waiting to be divided as spoils of war among the men who have slaughtered their loved ones and laid waste to their homes. Still, they continue to hope --- for those who made it out of Troy and for one another --- and, in doing so, exhibit bravery even in the depths of loss and despair.

Penelope’s letters, on the other hand, offer a witty respite from the traumatic stories of other women as she awaits her husband’s return in a quiet rage. She listens as the bard sings songs of his exploits across the seas and grows more cross by the year as she imagines Odysseus getting sidetracked from his destination (her) by an endless parade of monsters, cannibals and enchantresses.

Even as the tone of the chapters sways from daunted to desperate to downright ruthless, the novel draws cohesion from the fragmented voices of women. In presenting her audience with so many voices, Haynes could have written a cacophony. Instead, she has conducted a choir.

If THE ILIAD is an ode to the actors, then A THOUSAND SHIPS commemorates those acted upon: “victims of men, slaves of men, survivors of men.” With the wisdom of Athena and a pinch of humor, Haynes considers the many ways in which women exhibit strength, even in situations of relative powerlessness.

Reviewed by Kayla Provencher on January 29, 2021

From BookReporter.com

May title

Our May title is The Seed Keeper by Diane Wilson. The group will meet on Wednesday May 25th at 1pm at the library in the Local History Room and on zoom. There are copies of the book to check out here at the library as well as a hoopla ebook edition and audiobook edition (if you have any questions about using hoopla just let us know!). We'll also have a CD audiobook available if you would like that format.

Rosalie Iron Wing has grown up in the woods with her father, Ray, a former science teacher who tells her stories of plants, of the stars, of the origins of the Dakota people. Until, one morning, Ray doesn’t return from checking his traps. Told she has no family, Rosalie is sent to live with a foster family in nearby Mankato—where the reserved, bookish teenager meets rebellious Gaby Makespeace, in a friendship that transcends the damaged legacies they’ve inherited.

On a winter’s day many years later, Rosalie returns to her childhood home. A widow and mother, she has spent the previous two decades on her white husband’s farm, finding solace in her garden even as the farm is threatened first by drought and then by a predatory chemical company. Now, grieving, Rosalie begins to confront the past, on a search for family, identity, and a community where she can finally belong. In the process, she learns what it means to be descended from women with souls of iron—women who have protected their families, their traditions, and a precious cache of seeds through generations of hardship and loss, through war and the insidious trauma of boarding schools.

Weaving together the voices of four indelible women, The Seed Keeper is a beautifully told story of reawakening, of remembering our original relationship to the seeds and, through them, to our ancestors. ---https://milkweed.org/book/the-seed-keeper

Perspectives Book Group

Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague

Wednesday January 25th at 1pm

Hopkinton Town Library

About The Thursday Murder Club