Strange Horizons, December 21, 2015

“Telling the Bees” by T. Kingfisher

Reviewed by Christos Antonaros

There is a girl who dies every morning and wakes up after a couple of hours. Every time she returns to life, she must announce to the beehives she keeps in a cottage that she is their new master.

Finishing “Telling the Bees” by T. Kingfisher, I was left with a bag full of unexplained questions. Even though the protagonist is attention-grabbing, I could not comprehend the motives behind her actions, but only her goal. In my opinion, the story’s effect would have had greater impact with more depth and would have benefited with a few more words to that end, for it begins with the promise of a fascinating plot, but this promise remains unfulfilled.

Christos Antonaros is a dark fiction author with a love for European mythology.