Product Description

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #604600 in Books
• Published on: 2007-08-21
• Released on: 2007-08-21
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 128 pages

Review
“Captures first love’s exquisite, earth-shattering joy and the struggle and thrill that come with claiming one’s own life.”—Starred, Booklist “Her understated, tightly focused language evokes vivid scenes and heady emotions...each line of dialogue, each interaction illuminating struggles that readers face as well.” — Starred, Publisher's Weekly “Teens who have suffered their own stings will appreciate Koja's honest and hopeful rendering.” —Bulletin for the Center for Children's Books  “...a short but rich psychological exploration of the intense complexities of frienship and love in a teen world.” —School Library Journal
“This is a beautiful novel about relationships.” —Publishers Weekly, ShelfTalker
“Readers will find it hard to pry themselves away from this brilliantly written story...A must read for young romantics.” —IRA

About the Author
KATHE KOJA is the author of several notable books for young adults, including The Blue Mirror and Buddha Boy, both ALA Best Books for Young Adults, and, most recently, Going Under. She lives near Detroit, Michigan.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
From Kissing the Bee
 
    I wanted Emil. I wanted him from the very beginning, before Avra even saw him. No one knew this, even though Avra would occasionally make these odd little jokes, when we were all together: driving somewhere, the radio on and the windows down; or sitting on the patio, under the acacias; or drinking gunpowder tea in our favorite booth at the Green Bowl: If anything ever happens to me, she’s say, piling my hand and Emil’s together on the lacquered green table, his long fingers, the scarred silver-spoon ring she gave him, you two have to carry on in my name.
    Carry what on? I would say, sliding my hand back, my skin electric where it had touched his, a living tingle.
    It’s the lest we could do, Emil would say. And roll his gray eyes, and smile.
 
    His smile is so sweet. Always with his lips closed—there’s this little gap between his front teeth, extremely cute but he is very self-conscious about it—long narrow lips the exact shade of Dark Peach lip balm; his hair is the color of champagne. He is just as tall as Avra but only just. My head barely comes up to his chin. . . . Once he slept with his head on my shoulder, in the backseat of Avra’s car. We had gotten bored at this stupid keg party—neither one of us is much of a drinker—so we went out to the car to wait for Avra, waiting and yawning and talking and then not-talking, until Emil finally just gave up and fell asleep. His hair—it was longer then—mashed up tickling against my skin, his arm was warm and still and heavy on mine. I took little breaths, tiny little breaths, to breathe in his smell, to not break the spell and wake him up. The street-light shone sideways through the back window, that faint underwater green, and I pretended we were on the ocean somewhere, on a sea journey, a nonstop honeymoon cruise. I leaned my head sideways, craned it sideways, so my hair would brush his. Finally I fell asleep, too.

Customer Reviews

Koja's best in years.
Kathe Koja, Kissing the Bee (FSG, 2007)

While Kathe Koja is one of those authors who can do no wrong, that is not to say that Koja's work has not had varying degrees of rightness over the years. Kissing the Bee is the rightest, in its earnest and seductive way, since Straydog five years ago.

Dana is a high school senior working on a project about bees. Her best friend is Avra, high school culture's version of a queen bee, with all the qualities that entails. Avra's boyfriend is Emil, the somewhat disaffected hipster who never quite fits in, but is all the more popular for it. The three of them are a unit unto themselves within the boundaries of that high school culture, but their unit is straining; Avra is champing at the bit to run away from home, and is planning on leaving straight from the prom. She expects Emil to go with her, though has never actually asked whether he will. Dana and Emil, both of whom are friendlier with Avra's parents than she is, are the only people who know. And Dana is in love with Emil. How can things not fracture?

Among the many strengths that have marked Kathe Koja's writing for the past decade and a half, the greatest has always been her ability to create simple, understated, completely real characters. She usually sticks them in more fantastic situations, as seen recently in The Blue Mirror; in fact, she's trod this very road before, in the fantastic adult novel Kink ten years ago, though with a much more dark-fantastic spin on things than can be found in this almost grittily realistic novel. Dana is my favorite Koja lead since Grant Cotto (Strange Angels); she rarely comes right out and says what she's thinking (and when she does, it's usually to throw us a curveball), but Koja lets us know through her actions. And (for the most part, though the whole toasting-of-the-bees scene does get a little heavy-handed) we're not talking about the whole Hollywood heavy-lidded stare thing here, either. Small jumps of muscle or cocks of eyebrow, to continue that parallel-- to put forth an example, when Dana wants to express her frustration with the events around her, she picks up the wings from Avra and Emil's prom costumes, puts them in her car, and drives around all night. I mean, come on. Even Dana doesn't know what she means to do by this-- but by this point in the book, you will. And that's what makes Kathe Koja such a powerful writer.

I was sad when I found out that Kathe Koja would no longer be writing adult novels, but she has certainly translated her talent wholesale into the young adult arena. And it has rarely shone the way it does here. **** ½

Courtesy of Teens Read Too
Dana and Avra are best friends. As good of friends as can be when one person is the queen bee and the other is charged with doing what it takes to keep the queen happy.

Avra is the undisputed queen -- she decides what they do and when they do it. She also has lofty plans for the future. Avra is counting the days until the end of high school. At that time, she plans to escape from her family and town in an attempt to conquer the world. In true, royal fashion she has even determined that one member of her "royal court," her boyfriend, Emil, will accompany her on her journey.

Dana has her own plans. She is heading to college and, in addition to her duties of helping Avra prepare for prom, she is working on her final project for school. Dana has been preparing a project on the lives and habits of bees, which closely mirror the social interactions she and her friends are experiencing. Dana also has a problem that she has managed to keep secret from Avra and Emil. She is in love with her best friend's boyfriend. But does Emil have feelings for Dana, as well?

KISSING THE BEE is an amazingly straight-forward novel that will draw you in and keep you reading from the first page to the last. The main character is as true as she is flawed; a character that anybody who's ever loved can identify with. Kathe Koja has written a story that flows smoothly from beginning to end. There are no distractions within the story; the focus remains on the relationship between three young people, teetering on the edge of change.

Reviewed by: JodiG.