About The Book and Author

The Secret Life of Bees is a genuine literary phenomenon. A powerful story of coming-of- age, race-relations, the ability of love to transform our lives and the often unacknowledged longing for the universal feminine divine, the novel tells the story of a fourteen year old Lily, who runs away with her black housekeeper in 1964 in South Carolina and the sanctuary they both find in the home of three eccentric beekeeping sisters.

The Secret Life of Bees has sold more than 5 million copies worldwide, spent over two years on The New York Times bestseller list and been published in 34 countries. It was chosen as the BookSense Paperback Book of the Year in 2004, and was nominated for the prestigious Orange Prize in the U.K. among others. Taught widely now in college and high school classrooms, The Secret Life of Bees is fast becoming a modern classic. In addition to being adapted into a movie, it has been produced on stage in New York by The American Place Theater. Ms. Kidd also wrote the best-selling novel The Mermaid Chair, lives in Mt. Pleasant, SC with her husband Sandy Kidd. Her new memoir, Traveling with Pomegranates, co-authored with her daughter, Ann Kidd Taylor, will be published in 2009.