Reviews with content warning for Drug use - The Bee Sting

Reviews tagging 'Drug use'

The Bee Sting by Paul Murray

23 reviews

danpeachey's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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amberjelfs's review against another edition

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reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

26 HOURS OF LISTENING FOR THAT ENDING?

This was my first audiobook set in Western Europe - I was happy to hear various narrators with accents that properly represented the characters. Great switch ups between characters to build up the story and develop how they’ve reached where they currently are and the entanglement of all the characters.

However, I found that the ending fell short for such a long read.

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makayla_radford's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

I had a lot more expectations for this book going into it based on many of the reviews. The concept of it sounds great, and really the plot itself was captivating and kept me coming back to the book.

That said there were some things I found very distracting while I was reading. The book is centered around the 2008 financial crisis, but there are constantly references to things that did not exist/were not commonly used at the time such as Twitch or Instagram. Additionally there were subplots that never actually received conclusions which continued to distract me from the main story.

I have to disagree with many other reviews though since I actually liked the ending. I felt it was fitting for the book and boosted it up to ⭐️⭐️⭐️

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adawada's review against another edition

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5.0

I really loved getting to know the main characters during the very long chapters. The second part of the book was quite a surprise when the narrative changes to a second person point of view but nevertheless I thought that it did add something to the story. I also really enjoyed most of the secondary characters and how they were involved in the story. The ending was slightly predictable but I enjoyed it just the same. I don't usually read long books but I'm so glad that I have read this!

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sandysmith's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny mysterious reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I'm really torn on this book, a long one at 600 + pages with relatively small text, parts of which had me hooked and parts disappointing. Concentrating on 4 main family members Dickie, stepping his dead brother Frank's shoes, Imelda engaged to Frank marries Dickie, pregnant with Cass, and lastly the little brother PJ. Parts of the book lack punctuation and were difficult to read. But there was plenty to get your teeth into. Concentrating on these 4 characters points of view. Set in Ireland, a small town and Dublin. The ending was rushed and disappointing without any conclusion. The last chapter was written in a play/Greek tragedy format, but I felt it was not concluded. I'm all for allowing a reader to make their own minds up / a mysterious cliff hanger but this went too⁷⁹ far and it was almost like the author ran out if steam and couldn't make his mind up as to the way it would end. So parts I loved and other parts I disliked. Interesting and difficult to review

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