Here is the Beehive by Sarah Crossan

Blurb

"It happened,
             again and again
             and
again and again and again.

Together
             apart.
In love
             in aching.

Tangled
unravelling.

Ana and Connor have been having an affair for three years. In hotel rooms and coffee shops, swiftly deleted texts and briefly snatched weekends, they have built a world with none but the two of them in it.

But then the unimaginable happens, and Ana finds herself alone, trapped inside her secret.

How can we lose someone the world never knew was ours? How do we grieve for something no one else can ever find out? In her desperate bid for answers, Ana seeks out the shadowy figure who has always stood just beyond her reach – Connor's wife Rebecca.

Peeling away the layers of two overlapping marriages, Here is the Beehive is a devastating excavation of risk, obsession and loss."

Published 20th August 2020
With thanks to the author, publisher and NetGalley for sending me a copy in exchange for an honest review.

My Review

Sarah Crossan's freeverse writing style is very engrossing, it's so clever how she can tell a story so succinctly and still create a world of emotions. I've read a few of her children's and young adult books and loved them. This is her first adult novel and the tale of adultery and loss was certainly different to her other books.

Ana has been having an affair with Connor for three years when he dies unexpectedly and she is left grieving but can't let explain to anyone why she is behaving so erratically. I felt sorry for Ana that she has lost someone she loves and also that she had found love in a complex situation that she couldn't find a way to resolve. It gradually emerges that not only she is she sleeping with someone else's husband, she has a husband and children herself. Life and love are complex but I struggled with this storyline at times.

This is beautifully written and emotional at times but Ana and Connor's selfishness frustrated me. I gave this 3 out of 5.

The Author

Sarah Crossan is Irish. She graduated with a degree in Philosophy and Literature before training as an English and Drama teacher at Cambridge University and worked to promote creative writing in schools before leaving teaching to write full time.

She completed her Masters in Creative Writing at the University of Warwick in 2003 and in 2010 received an Edward Albee Fellowship for writing.

She currently lives in NYC.