A Family Crisis

The influence of Ireland on modern literature cannot be denied. Over the years and over centuries, Ireland has produced a long line of writers who have taken the world by storm. With nearly two millennia of existence under its belt, Irish literature is the third oldest literature in Europe; only Greek and Latin literature existed longer. It has a long and rich literary tradition, with its earliest forms coming in religious texts, poetry, and even mythological tales. Irish mythology has indeed played an important role in shaping early Irish literature; its vestiges are still prevalent in the contemporary. Perhaps one of Irish literature’s greatest achievements is its seminal role in shaping and influencing works written in English.

Irish literature has a long list of top-caliber writers such as James Joyce, Oliver Goldsmith, Edmund Burke, Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, C.S. Lewis, Bram Stoker, and Maria Edgeworth. They have written timely and beloved classics such as Ulysses, The Chronicles of Narnia, Gulliver’s Travels, and The Picture of Dorian Gray. This long tradition continues in the contemporary, with award-winning writers such as Anne Enright, Sally Rooney, John Banville, Anna Burns, and Colm Tóibín carrying on the torch. Their works have been lauded by various literary prize-giving bodies such as the Booker Prize. Enright, Banville, and Burns have won the prestigious award while the works of Rooney and Colm Tóibín made it to the long list.

Another Irish writer making waves globally is Paul Murray. He immediately created waves with his debut novel, An Evening of Long Goodbyes, which was warmly received by literary pundits and readers alike. Published in 2003, it earned a slew of accolades including being shortlisted for the  Whitbread First Novel Prize and nominated for the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Award. His sophomore novel, Skippy Dies (2010), gained him even more recognition, further consolidating his status as a writer to watch out for. Skippy Dies was longlisted for the prestigious Booker Prize and shortlisted for the Costa Prize. His third novel, The Mark and the Void (2015), was listed by Time Magazine as one of the top ten best fiction books for the year.

“And yet we continue not to do anything to stop it, because the things that are causing it, the things we’re doing that are making it worse – building buildings, taking planes, driving cars, eating meat, buying stuff, having children! – these are the very things that make us us. So we seem to be faced with an impossible dilemma: if we don’t want to be killed by climate change, we have to stop being ourselves. You can see why people aren’t exactly rushing to man the barricades. The thought of addressing it actually seems in some ways worse to us than being killed by it. Or put it another way, the thought of no longer being ourselves is harder for us to get our head around than the thought of being dead.”

~ Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

Eight years since his last novel, Murray made his long-awaited literary comeback in 2023 with the publication of The Bee Sting. Murray’s latest novel charted the fortunes of the Barnes family, a well-to-do Irish family living in a small Irish town. The patriarch, Dickie Barnes manages a car dealership and garage franchise that his father founded; his father has since retired and moved to Portugal. Unfortunately, Dickie did not possess his father’s talent for persuading buyers. Ironically, he’d rather opt to dissuade prospective buyers from purchasing a car, as he would later confess to his daughter. However, the showroom was the family’s primary source of income, the primary means by which they maintained their lifestyle.

The crux of the story, however, was when the once-lucrative enterprise hit a sudden slump. The consequences of the 2008 financial crash made their way into their village, adversely impacting the Barneses’ business, much like “half the shops on Main Street”. The other businesses were able to rise above adversity. The Barneses, on the other hand, only sunk further. Their situation was exacerbated by a rogue mechanic who was stealing catalytic converters and deliberately besmirching the Barneses’ reputation. The decline of their business was a catalyst for the ensuing emotional and existential trouble that would expose the chasms that had long existed among the members of the family.

Slowly, the thin threads that bound the family started to unspool. Dickie was forced to close one of his garages after which he retreated into the woods rather than confronting the slowly sinking business. This left the rest of the family to fend for themselves. Seeing her husband’s failure pushed Imelda, “the most beautiful girl in the four provinces,” to the brink of panic. To hold the fort, she started resentfully selling her jewelry and some of the family’s furniture. The couple’s two children, Cassie and PJ, also had their own struggles. As the family was descending into chaos, they had no recourse but to grapple with their concerns on their own.

Polyphonic, the story toggled between the present and the past. It was propelled by the character’s struggles, with the story commencing with Cassie. She was bookish and was in her last year of secondary school, preparing for university. She was the quintessence of a daddy’s girl who looked beyond her father’s flaws; she easily forgave him for his miscues. However, she does not extend the same courtesy to her mother whom she saw as shallow and petty. Cass’ cross to bear was her friendship with Elaine with whom she discovered the pleasures of vices: boys and alcohol. Cass wanted to win over Elaine’s approval. The two young women also shared the dream of escaping their small town.

“People imagined poems were wispy things, she said, frilly things, like lace doilies. But in fact they were like claws, like the metal spikes mountaineers use to find purchase on the sheer face of a glacier. By writing a poem, the lady poets could break through the slippery, nothingy surface of the life they were enclosed in, to the passionate reality that beat beneath it. Instead of falling down the sheer face, they could haul themselves up, line by line, until at last they stood on top of the mountain. And then maybe, just maybe, they might for an instant see the world as it really is.”

~ Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

As everyone deals with their own demons, no one is looking after twelve-year-old PJ. He fears for his parent’s divorce and being sent to boarding school. He had a keen understanding of what was happening around him. However, none of these reach his parents’ ears. PJ spent his days communicating with a stranger, talking about video games. He also dreams of running away and it was the online world that allowed him that space. As the story shifts to Imelda’s perspective, the story also transitions to stream-of-consciousness, a deliberate choice as it underscores her lack of formal education. She grew up in abject squalor and was raised by a father with violent tendencies. It was a past that she would rather forget. The realistic fear of hurtling down to poverty prompted her to take action lest she find herself in the same quagmire she badly ran away from.

The dive into the past takes the readers into the early days of the relationship of Dickie and Imelda. Imelda was besotted not with Dickie but with Dickie’s younger brother, Frank. Frank was the antithesis of his older brother. He was the star of his school’s football team and was the golden child. Frank was easily the favored son of the wealthiest man in town. Frank and Imelda were engaged but a tragic accident prematurely ended their budding romance. Imelda ended up marrying Dickie hoping that Frank’s ghost would appear during their wedding day. There was also a palpable lack of affection between the two of them. During their wedding ceremony, Imelda refused to have her veil lifted as a bee got stuck under her veil and stung her face; Cass viewed this as another manifestation of her mother’s vanity. The titular bee sting then turns into an allegory, signifying a critical juncture in the events that succeeded their union.

Meanwhile, Dickie’s story takes the readers to his days as a student at Trinity College. His years at Trinity College, which Cass would be attending decades later, were brimming with secrets that he obscured from his family and the rest of the world. A pivotal moment in his young life was his encounter with Willie who he met during a club debate. He was enamored by Willie who was openly gay. It was at the intersection of their paths that Dickie was seized by a sexual awakening. Before meeting Willie, Dickie was unsure of his own sexuality. Just as things were about to reach a head, Dickie was forced to return to this hometown following his brother’s death. However, he kept his sexuality a secret. It was this secret that dictated how he responded to the personal crises he encountered as an adult.

Secrets have indeed proliferated the lives of the Barneses. To the outside world, they were the portrait of perfection. Their projection of perfection, the source of envy by the community, belies the tensions that brew underneath the surface. It was both ironic and tragic how the members of the family barely knew each other. Take the case of Cass and her mother. Cass viewed her mother’s refusal to remove her veil during her wedding day as a sign of her vanity. Imelda’s perspective, however, disproves Cass’ perception of inanity. It was one of many misgivings and secrets they kept from each other. They were unsure of how to convey the emotions that they harbored against each other. Their unhappiness contributed to their slow descent into chaos. Meanwhile, those around them are waiting to capitalize on their discord.

“This must be what it feels like to be dying, he thinks; the world remains around you, like a lover who does not want to hurt you by leaving, but in spirit it’s already gone, taking with it the meaning of everything you shared. In truth it is already transforming into a future you will never be part of; and you realize only then that it has been transforming all of this time, throughout your whole life, and you with it; and that, in fact, is life, though you never knew, and now it is over.”

~ Paul Murray, The Bee Sting

As the story moved forward, it became increasingly palpable that the family’s troubles went beyond the finances. Their financial trouble was coupled with emotional and existential upheavals, further threatening the thin threads that bound the family together. As Murray vividly captures the intricacies and complexities of dysfunctional families, the readers meet characters in dire need of acceptance and affection. However, the secrets that they kept disconnected them. They were adamant and refused to confront their personal issues head-on. Murray does a compelling job of taking the readers into the interiors of his characters. We get to know their quirks and what made them tick. He was also resplendent in capturing the complications of father and son relationships and sibling rivalry.

Grief and trauma further added burden to Dickie and Imelda who were weighed down by the past and by the decisions they took. Dickie, who had to live under the shadows of his brother, now had to fill the gap left by his brother. He transforms into a proverbial ghost, resigned to his fate. Murray’s writing was at its most affectionate in its portrayal of grief. An interesting dimension of the story was the parallels between the collapse of the foundations of the Barnes family and the environment. The climate change crisis was repeatedly referenced in the story; at one point, father and daughter had a discourse on nature. Floods and heat waves were also mentioned. As all of these converge, Dickie sensed an impending doom, hence, his resolve to build a shelter in the woods.

Shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize and the winner of the Irish Book Award Novel of the Year, The Bee Sting is another feather in Murray’s cap. It is a vivid portrait of a family on the cusp of collapse. The story of the Barnes family is the convergence of financial, emotional, and even existential troubles. Their plight tackled the complexities of parenthood and filial relationships. Murray has a knack for capturing family dynamics, including toxic father-son relationships and sibling rivalries. Beyond families, The Bee Sting probed into teenage angst, sexuality, grief, and trauma. It segues into the discovery of one’s identity and even climate change. It probes into the past while anchored in the present.

Parts-coming-of-age and parts family saga, Murray’s fourth novel is a compelling examination of dysfunctional families, the consequences of our decisions, and how the secrets we keep from each other can threaten harmony. The story of the Barnes family was tragic but it was also comic, riddled with wit and complimented by riveting prose that reels the readers in. Slivers of hope riddled the story of the Barnes family. However, the novel was bereft of a definite conclusion, with Murray refusing to give the readers full satisfaction. The conclusion was left to the readers’ imagination. Nevertheless, The Bee Sting is a lush tapestry that consolidates Murray’s mettle as a top-caliber storyteller.

“Today, in the developed world, the great threat to political order is that people will pay attention to their surroundings. Thus, even slaves have access to entertainment. You could even say we are paid in entertainment. The novel was the first instance of what in the twenty-first century has become a vast and proliferating entertainment industry, an almost infinite machine designed to distract us and disempower us. We are presented with a virtual world powered, literally, by the incineration of the real.”

~ Paul Murray, The Bee Sting
Book Specs

Author: Paul Murray
Publisher: Hamish Hamilton
Publishing Date: 2023
Number of Pages: 643
Genre: Literary, Family

Synopsis

The Barnes family is in trouble.

Dickie’s once-lucrative car business is going under – but rather than face the music, he’s spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman. His wife, Imelda, is selling off her jewellery on eBay and half-heartedly dodging the attentions of fast-talking cattle farmer Big Mike, while their teenage daughter Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge-drink her way to her final exams. And twelve-year-old PJ, in debt to local sociopath ‘Ears’ Moran, is putting the final touches to his grand plan to run away from home.

The present is in meltdown, but the causes lie deep in the past. If you wanted to change this story, how far back would you have to go? To the car crash twelve months before Cass was born? To the infamous bee sting which ruined Imelda’s wedding day? All the way back to Dickie at ten years old, trembling before his father in the garden, learning how to be a real man?

Is it possible that a single moment of bad luck set in motion everything that came after? And does that mean the fate of the Barnes family is already sealed? They are facing a reckoning. If they can’t change the past, or rewrite the story they have already lived, is it too late for a happy ending?

About the Author

Paul Murray war born in 1975 in Dublin, Ireland to a professor of Anglo-Irish Drama at University College Dublin and a teacher. Murray attended Blackrock College in south Dublin before studying English literature at Trinity College, Dublin. He completed his master’s in creative writing at the University of Est Anglia.

Murray’s literary career commenced in 2003 with the publication of An Evening of Long Goodbyes. It was an immediate critical success. It was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Prize in 2003 and was also nominated for the  Kerry Group Irish Fiction Award. His sophomore novel, Skippy Dies (2010) was also warmly received by critics and readers alike, receiving various accolades such as being longlisted for the 2010 Booker Prize and shortlisted for the 2010 Costa Prize, the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction, and the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction. His third novel, The Mark and the Void, was released in 2016 and also received similar praises as its predecessors.

Murray’s latest novel, The Bee Sting, was released in 2023. it was shortlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize and won an Irish Book Award as the 2023 Novel of the Year. Murray also wrote the screenplay for the 2018 Irish film Metal Heart, which was directed by Hugh O’Conor. Apart from writing, Murray spent time in Barcelona as an English teacher. He also has listed Thomas Pynchon’s Gravity’s Rainbow as a book that has influenced him. He was recently named as the Trinity Long Room Hub 2024 Rooney Writer Fellow