Just Jennifer

The Wedding Bees by Sarah-Kate Lynch (William Morrow, February 2014)

Sugar Wallace has been on the lam from the last fifteen years with nothing but her bees and good Southern manners.  She is not on the run from the law, however, but worse, from her proper Southern mother who is mortified that Sugar left her fiancé at the altar just before saying “I do”.  Sugar has spent the past decade and a half going wherever the bees take her, making close friends, but never staying in one place for too long.  Her latest stop is Alphabet City in Manhattan where she turns her penthouse terrace into a rooftop paradise for her bees.  Sugar immediately realizes that her fellow apartment mates are even more standoff-ish than she expected them to be, but also realizes that each one is damaged in their own way and sets out to bring them out of their apartments and help them with her special brand of magic---honey and good manners.  Sugar can’t, however, seem to get past the things that hold her back, even when she is near handsome Scotsman Theo Fitzgerald who produces sparks just by looking at her and who, from the moment he met her, as avowed his love for her and his wish to spend the rest of his life with her.  Little by little, the bees, love and Theo work their magic on Sugar, help her to heal and begin to live her life with the zest and vigor she encourages in other.  Eccentric characters and sentient bees add a touch of magic to this story about being, letting be and letting go.