Ayxan Solongo reviewed Die Geschichte der Bienen by Maja Lunde
Review of 'Die Geschichte der Bienen' on 'Storygraph'
4 stars
Who would've thought that DreamWorks' Bee Movie would hit that hard. When will they start showing it like a documentary in schools?
On one hand, this book just made me afraid of the future. Afraid of a future like this. If the 3rd world war won't happen, pretty sure this dystopia is inevitable.
People care more about making unethical AIs, which do not help the planet in any way, even if it were ethical. What are you gonna do with a robot, who can draw, in 10 years? Sell generated images, while everyone is desperately looking for food?
And, because of this stupidity humans are currently living in, I say we totally deserve that karma. Bring it on, bees, time for you to disappear completely and for humans to slowly die out.
~
Now, for the actual review of the story.
William:
My least favorite story. Incredibly sexist and just …
Who would've thought that DreamWorks' Bee Movie would hit that hard. When will they start showing it like a documentary in schools?
On one hand, this book just made me afraid of the future. Afraid of a future like this. If the 3rd world war won't happen, pretty sure this dystopia is inevitable.
People care more about making unethical AIs, which do not help the planet in any way, even if it were ethical. What are you gonna do with a robot, who can draw, in 10 years? Sell generated images, while everyone is desperately looking for food?
And, because of this stupidity humans are currently living in, I say we totally deserve that karma. Bring it on, bees, time for you to disappear completely and for humans to slowly die out.
~
Now, for the actual review of the story.
William:
My least favorite story. Incredibly sexist and just very stereotypical characters with little to no personality.
Edmund is one of my most hated characters – not just this book, but generally, from all the books I've read – and all I wanted was to get an eraser and just erase him from existence. It was agony reading his name and whenever he was just slightly mentioned.
Thalia too, actually. I wanted to like her, but she was such a flat character – basically written as the perfect mother, who always sides with her kids, while the father does nothing but punishing them. While, yes, William wasn't much of a father, Thalia was pathetic. She should've kicked Edmund out of the house long ago.
At least Edmund got the ending he deserved, but the people around him, who suffered because of him, deserved way better.
Charlotte, my favorite character, also at least got what she deserved, although not enough. She deserved more.
Apart from that, it was interesting to see William following his passion with the bees and how it served as a base for the storylines in the future. These were only short bits though and the slice of life with his family problems were not in my interest, and just seemed unnecessary. A book about bees, but 70% is about misogyny.
Rating: 2 stars.
George:
Didn't like it much either, but it was better than William's. A little less sexist, but still stereotypical gender roles. Emma (George's wife) pretty much didn't have any other role, except for cooking and crying and wanting to move to Florida and being a good mother, while George was the bad father. Well, he wasn't bad per se, but he never showed emotions, except when he was angry and needed to show that he's the man in the house, and he only knew his son objectively, yet still felt like he knows the best for him, although he doesn't know him at all.
Tom, his son, was a nice character. I liked how he called his father out. He's pretty much the only non-stereotypical character in this book.
Story-wise, it wasn't that engrossing to read. Maybe because it plays in our time, more or less. It only really got interesting when it was revealed how they are connected to William, but even that was short and close to the end.
Rating: 3 stars.
Tao:
The most gripping storyline and what kept me going. Maybe it's because she's from the future, an unknown place, something more exciting to explore and dive into. Maybe it was the way her chapters were written – like a thriller. I love reading stories, where I can make lots of theories and Tao's chapters were exactly that. Although I figured out what happened to her son pretty quickly (well, at least it was one of my theories) and it was pretty obvious anyway, it was still compelling to read, and trying to get answers to her questions, together with her.
It didn't start to be a thriller until the 100th page or so, and was rather boring in the beginning. Unnecessary family life, it felt as if I was reading a hetero rom-com, without the comedy part. And even without the romance part, as there was no romance, really.
Rating: 3.5 stars.
~
As you can see, all stories were more about family problems and sexism, rather than bees, which was very annoying, but I guess I get it. While the title may say "the story of the bees", it's not supposed to be a documentary or a Wikipedia article of bees. It's supposed to show how humans and bees are connected, how much our lives are intertwined, how much of an effect they have on our lifestyles. And every lifestyle includes family problems.
If that's what Maja Lunde wanted to show, good job. If not, well, I don't know then.
I'll still rate it 4 stars because it's an important matter, but story-wise and based on my enjoyment it would rather be 3 stars.
I do love, though, how the three protagonists are connected – apart from the bees, of course.
~
Page 456 was a bit difficult to read. As an artist, at least.
<spoiler> I can't even destroy my old drawings, as cringe as some are. Imagine destroying ones that are over a century old and no one else knows about them. A family heirloom, a historical piece. Even if they're technically worthless.
Just as worthless as this paragraph for this review. </spoiler>
On one hand, this book just made me afraid of the future. Afraid of a future like this. If the 3rd world war won't happen, pretty sure this dystopia is inevitable.
People care more about making unethical AIs, which do not help the planet in any way, even if it were ethical. What are you gonna do with a robot, who can draw, in 10 years? Sell generated images, while everyone is desperately looking for food?
And, because of this stupidity humans are currently living in, I say we totally deserve that karma. Bring it on, bees, time for you to disappear completely and for humans to slowly die out.
~
Now, for the actual review of the story.
William:
My least favorite story. Incredibly sexist and just very stereotypical characters with little to no personality.
Edmund is one of my most hated characters – not just this book, but generally, from all the books I've read – and all I wanted was to get an eraser and just erase him from existence. It was agony reading his name and whenever he was just slightly mentioned.
Thalia too, actually. I wanted to like her, but she was such a flat character – basically written as the perfect mother, who always sides with her kids, while the father does nothing but punishing them. While, yes, William wasn't much of a father, Thalia was pathetic. She should've kicked Edmund out of the house long ago.
At least Edmund got the ending he deserved, but the people around him, who suffered because of him, deserved way better.
Charlotte, my favorite character, also at least got what she deserved, although not enough. She deserved more.
Apart from that, it was interesting to see William following his passion with the bees and how it served as a base for the storylines in the future. These were only short bits though and the slice of life with his family problems were not in my interest, and just seemed unnecessary. A book about bees, but 70% is about misogyny.
Rating: 2 stars.
George:
Didn't like it much either, but it was better than William's. A little less sexist, but still stereotypical gender roles. Emma (George's wife) pretty much didn't have any other role, except for cooking and crying and wanting to move to Florida and being a good mother, while George was the bad father. Well, he wasn't bad per se, but he never showed emotions, except when he was angry and needed to show that he's the man in the house, and he only knew his son objectively, yet still felt like he knows the best for him, although he doesn't know him at all.
Tom, his son, was a nice character. I liked how he called his father out. He's pretty much the only non-stereotypical character in this book.
Story-wise, it wasn't that engrossing to read. Maybe because it plays in our time, more or less. It only really got interesting when it was revealed how they are connected to William, but even that was short and close to the end.
Rating: 3 stars.
Tao:
The most gripping storyline and what kept me going. Maybe it's because she's from the future, an unknown place, something more exciting to explore and dive into. Maybe it was the way her chapters were written – like a thriller. I love reading stories, where I can make lots of theories and Tao's chapters were exactly that. Although I figured out what happened to her son pretty quickly (well, at least it was one of my theories) and it was pretty obvious anyway, it was still compelling to read, and trying to get answers to her questions, together with her.
It didn't start to be a thriller until the 100th page or so, and was rather boring in the beginning. Unnecessary family life, it felt as if I was reading a hetero rom-com, without the comedy part. And even without the romance part, as there was no romance, really.
Rating: 3.5 stars.
~
As you can see, all stories were more about family problems and sexism, rather than bees, which was very annoying, but I guess I get it. While the title may say "the story of the bees", it's not supposed to be a documentary or a Wikipedia article of bees. It's supposed to show how humans and bees are connected, how much our lives are intertwined, how much of an effect they have on our lifestyles. And every lifestyle includes family problems.
If that's what Maja Lunde wanted to show, good job. If not, well, I don't know then.
I'll still rate it 4 stars because it's an important matter, but story-wise and based on my enjoyment it would rather be 3 stars.
I do love, though, how the three protagonists are connected – apart from the bees, of course.
~
Page 456 was a bit difficult to read. As an artist, at least.
<spoiler> I can't even destroy my old drawings, as cringe as some are. Imagine destroying ones that are over a century old and no one else knows about them. A family heirloom, a historical piece. Even if they're technically worthless.
Just as worthless as this paragraph for this review. </spoiler>
