The Bee Sting

　　2023布克獎決選，通篇諷刺而幽默
　　告訴你如何在分崩離析的世界裡，努力扮演一個好人
 
　　在崩盤的愛爾蘭中，一個多災多難的大家族－Barnes。丈夫Dickie曾經是都柏林郊外一位成功的汽車推銷員，如今生意已經盪至谷底。一直以來活在已亡故，卻深具魅力的弟弟－Frank陰影之下的他，現在每天都將時間花在森林裡，打造所謂的『末日壁壘』。他的妻子Imelda，同樣無法擺脫自己應該要嫁給弟弟Frank的想法，一邊對隔壁鄰居Mike的示愛總是半推半就。而他們的大女兒Cass，原本是個不需要人擔心的資優生，已經準備上大學的她，竟然染上酗酒惡習，光明前途及將毀於一旦。小兒子PJ則在偷偷擬定逃家計畫，準備跑去見他在網路上認識的神秘網友－Ethan。
 
　　所有事情走向似乎越走越歪，到底應該回到哪一個點重新來過？那隻跑來Imelda婚禮上搗亂的致命蜜蜂？Cass出生前那年的車禍？還是一路回到Dickie十歲時和父親站在花園裡，體會什麼是當個男子漢的那年夏天？ (文／博客來外文館)

One of The New York Times Top 10 Books of the Year
Winner of the An Post Irish Book of the Year, the Nero Gold Prize, and the Nero Book Award for Fiction
Shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the Writers’ Prize for Fiction
Finalist for the Kirkus Prize for Fiction

One of The New Yorker’s Essential Reads of 2023. One of The Washington Post’s 10 Best Books of 2023. One of TIME’s 10 Best Fiction Books of the Year. Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, The Guardian, The Economist, New York Public Library, BBC, and more.

From the author of Skippy Dies comes Paul Murray’s The Bee Sting, an irresistibly funny, wise, and thought-provoking tour de force about family, fortune, and the struggle to be a good person when the world is falling apart.

The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under--but Dickie is spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife, Imelda, is selling off her jewelry on eBay and half-heartedly dodging the attention of fast-talking cattle farmer Big Mike, while their teenage daughter, Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge drink her way through her final exams. As for twelve-year-old PJ, he’s on the brink of running away.

If you wanted to change this story, how far back would you have to go? To the infamous bee sting that ruined Imelda’s wedding day? To the car crash one year before Cass was born? All the way back to Dickie at ten years old, standing in the summer garden with his father, learning how to be a real man?

The Bee Sting, Paul Murray’s exuberantly entertaining new novel, is a tour de force: a portrait of postcrash Ireland, a tragicomic family saga, and a dazzling story about the struggle to be good at the end of the world.

Paul Murray was born in Dublin in 1975 and has an MA in creative writing from the University of East Anglia. He is the author of An Evening of Long Gooodbyes, which was short-listed for the Whitbread First Novel Award; The Mark and the Void;and the bestselling Skippy Dies, which was long-listed for the Booker Prize.