The Secret Life Of Bees Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1 -
The story takes place in Sylvan, South Carolina in 1964, with a almost fourteen year old girl named Lily. T. Ray is Lily's father who works at a peach farm, she doesn't call him daddy because doesn't fit who he is. Lily's mom died when she was four. So T. Ray hired an African American women named Rosaleen to be a nanny and housekeeper.
One night while laying on her bed, Lily waits for the bees who have been living in her walls to return. Rosaleen always warned Lily that the bees come before death. But even so she decides to wake up T. Ray to see the bees that are now swarming in her bedroom. Already knowing how he is going to get angry at something small and unmeaning full to him, Lily wakes him up anyway and he gets upset.
Lily often thinks about herself to have accidentally something to do with her mothers death. In this moment she has a flashback

and goes back to December 3,1954 the day her mom died. She remembers her mom packing a suitcase. Then T. Ray comes in the room and starts arguing with her mom. Her mom pulls out a gun at T. Ray, but with all the moving and fighting between the two she drops in on the floor. Lily then recalls picking up the gun off the floor and hearing a loud bang.
Her flashback is over and Lily then starts to explain that without a mother she has a hard time trying it make friends. T. Ray doesn't let Lily participate in school or social activities.
One morning Lily catches some bees in a jar but Rosaleen doesn't approve. Rosaleen loves Lily like she was her own child, and Lily can see it. Lily the remembers the first time she really did notice that she loved her. One Easter, Rosaleen brought Lily a baby chick and she loved it, but T. Ray didn't. Rosaleen stood up to T. Ray when he demanded that Lily needed to get rid of it. Lily wishes that Rosaleen would be he mom and they would run away together. Ever since Deborah (Lily's mom) died the family never talked about her. All Lily has left of her mom is a box off things that she hides in the peach farm. In the box is a picture of her mom by an old car, white satin gloves, and a wooden picture of a black mary with "Tiburon, S. C.". Lily opens the box when she is feeling upset or isolated. It is very important that she keeps the box a secret from T. Ray because he would take all those things awash from Lily in a heartbeat.
Lily works at a peach stand selling in the side of the highway. It's always really boring out there with not a lot of business. Out in the stand Lily would rather be reading but T. Ray doesn't let her. She often dreams of going to college and maybe even getting a scholarship one day. A few years ago T. Ray told Lily about her mother's death in the peach stand. T. Ray only does this so Lily doesn't have any questions. He then tells her that Lily had unintentionally killed her mother with a gun that was on the floor.
Lily keeps some of her mothers stuff in a box in the ground at the peach farm. She hides this stuff from T. Ray because if he saw it he would take it from her. On night before her birthday Lily went out in the middle of the night and dug up the box. Inside where some white satin gloves, and Lily then unbuttoned her shirt and she set the gloves on her stomach. T. Ray then comes out side looking for Lily, she quickly puts her mothers belonging in the band of her pants and she try's to quickly button her shirt. He finds her in the middle of buttoning her shirt and he automatically thinks that she was out there with at boy. The then takes Lily back to the house to kneel on some grits as a punishment. Rosaleen then comes and clean up Lily's cuts on her knees.
The next day Lily goes with Rosaleen to register to vote. They stop at a church on the way and take some fans. While on the way some white man yelled at Rosaleen for singing a song about Jesus. Rosaleen ends up spitting her tobacco that's in her spit bottle on the white mans shoes and he then calls the police and beats on Rosaleen. The police come and take both Lily and Rosaleen.
Chapter 2 -
The policeman, Mr. Avery Gatson, drives Lily and Rosaleen to jail, but behind them three white men are following the car. Lily sees how strong Rosaleen seems in this situation. They arrive at the jail, the men that we're following them are waiting at the entrance of the jail. They want Rosaleen apologize for what she did. Rosaleen doesn't say a word to the men, and one of them hits her on the with a flashlight on the head. Mr. Gatson then takes Lily and Rosaleen into jail. T. Ray comes and takes Lily out, but T. Ray leaves Rosaleen behind. They drive home and T. Ray tells Lily the one man Franklin Posey—is the town’s most racist. He would kill Rosaleen even if she had apologize. At home, T. Ray yells at Lily, but she finally stands up to him. Lily tells T. Ray that her mother will not let him harm her, but he laughs at Lily. He tells Lily that Deborah had left Lily when she came home and was died. This comment hurts Lily, but she doesn't believe T. Ray. She see that the bees left the jar next to her bed, and she knows that she too needs to escape. She decides to run away.
On the road, Lily made a decision to head toward Tiburon, the town written on the back of the black Mary picture. Lily goes to go to the jail to free Rosaleen. But then she finds that Rosaleen is in the hospital because the three attackers were allowed in her ceil and they beat her up. She then goes to the hospital and sneaks Rosaleen out and they both start to make their way to Tiburon. The two girls they head to highway 40 and hitchhike with a black man who has a truck full of cantaloupe. He drops them off three miles away from Tiburon and he gives then two cantaloupes. Rosaleen and Lily then find a nice pond and eat the canlopes. Later Lily finds Rosaleen naked in the pond so Lily joins her and the bath in the pond.
Chapter 3 -
The next morning Lily wakes up next to the pond and she feels brand new and ready for a fresh start. Not wanting to wake up Rosaleen she takes out the black Mary picture and looks at it for a while. When Rosaleen wakes up she tells Lily about a drem she had about painting her toes with Martin Luther King's spit. They both get their stuff and then start to head towards town. The girls then come across the Frogmore General Store where they get some food, the newspaper, and Lily steals some snuff tobacco for Rosaleen. While in there Lily see a label on a honey jar that is the same as black Mary on it as the picture Lily has in her bag. Lily then asked the clerk about it and he tells her that the honey is made by Miss. August Boatwright and he tells her where she lives. She returns to Rosaleen she tells her what she saw and they head to the pink house.
Chapter 4 -
Lily and Rosaleen finally are at the Boatwright house, the house painted a bright pink color. August Boatwright is standing out front, she is wearing a beekeeper’s helmet and she is with the bees. June Boatwright opens the door, with May Boatwright by her. Lily see that May is not "normal” and finds June is a little mean, but August comes in, is welcoming. Lily finds a three-foot-tall wooden black Mary known as “Our Lady of Chains” in the parlor. She senses its spiritual power. Lily tells August that she and Rosaleen are on there way to virginia to live with her aunt. She goes on and says that her mother died when she was little and her dad died in a tractor accident. Lily thinks that August knows that she is lying but she continues and feels a little guilty. Rosaleen get annoyed that Lily is making up all of these lies and how she contunies to speak for Rosaleen like she wasn't even present. August is kind and allows the two To stay in the honey house until they were ready to go. When they are taken to the honey house it is pouring rain so August gives both girls pie pans to put over there heads so they keep dry. Later at diner, August tells the story of how she inherited the house and the land from her grandfather. After Lily finds Mays weeping wall and paper notes that she had stuck in between the stones. The wall then lead Lily down to a stream where she wet her feet.
Chapter 5 -
Already, Lily and Rosaleen have stayed a whole week the Boatwright house. Lily finally feels comfortable and calm. August had taken Rosaleen to get some clothes at the store. Being around all the colored women Lily starts to feel a little conscious about being white. This is because Lily also hear June taking to August about her and how she shouldn't be there because she's white. While living in the house Lily finds that in her spare time June plays the cello for dying people, and August owns a bee farm and she gets help from someone named Zach. Rosaleen spends a lot of time with May and she learns that when May is upset she starts humming "Oh! Susanna" , then she walks to the weeping wall. Lily helps August and Zach with the bees, and Rosaleen will help May with the house chores. At night, they pray to the black Mary statue in the parlor. August tells Lily about their religion and how it is partly Catholic, and self-invented. Then August tells Lily a story about a nun who runs away but is replaced by a stand-in Mary for years when she is gone. Lily wonders if Mary is taking her place for her back in Sylvan with T. Ray but she doesn't that something like that could happen.
On that first Friday, August shows Lily what she needed to know about the bees and farming the honey. She then begins to tell Lily that all the bees need to feel love so they are not do angry because everyone just wants to feel loved. While she continues to talk about the bees Lily thinks about Rosaleen and wonders if she really loves her. That night Lily and August are sitting outside on the grass. August then starts to talk about May and why she is the way she is. When May was fifteen her twin sister killed herself because she was very sad and depressed. Since then May changed, she gets upset really easliy and it's like she feels the pain in the world. August pints out the weeping wall that May had made herself, so whenever she feels sad she goes out there a puts a piece of paper in the wall. After their talk Lily heads back to the obey house and finds that Roseleen is jealous of the time Lily she spending with August. In the middle of the night Lily starts to cry about her mother and she goes out to the weeping wall. She then falls asleep knowing that she is going to have to tell August the whole truth.
Chapter 6 -
The next morning, Lily meets Neil. Neil is in love with June and asked her to marry him several times, bit she said no. Later on, The Daughters of Mary apsatrt arriving for service. The Daughters are a spiritual group who believe in the same things are the Boatwright sister. The group is made up of six women and one man, and the women wear very fancy hats. The service is about the Black Mary statue and during the service there is a lot of singing, dancing, and praying out loud. August then gets up and tells the story about the statue and she refers to it as "Our Lady of Chains". At the end of the story tha lady's go up and touch the red heart painted on the statue. When it's Lily's turn she gets so overwhelmed that she faints. When she wakes up she is laying in Augusts bed with Rosaleen and August by her side asking her if she was ok. After that they all watch the news about people going to the moon.
Chapter 7 -
Lily still gets a little nervous and jumpy when she hears the police sirens outside the house. Then later on Lily finally meets Zach Taylor who is a junior who plays football. He tell her that he wants to become a lawyer. Lily starts to have a crush on Zach but she knows what people would think of her if she dated a black boy. She feels able to tell hi that she wants to become a teach or a writer. The two begin to work on the bee farm and helping August with the honey. Rosaleen later talks to Lily and tells her that she is living in a fairy tail land and soon it is going to end. This makes Lily think how much longer can they stay at the Boatwright house. One day, Zach and Lily to check on some other hives on another property. In the truck Lily starts to laugh uncontrollably and the she starts to cry. She opens up to Zach and she thinks that he might to like her back.
When the two come back. Lily sees Rosaleen moving out of the only house. Rosaleen tells Lily that she is moving into the main house into Mays room to help confort May. Lily begins to feel jealous but she realizes that it would be better if May had someone there with her. While helping Rosaleen move her stuff Lily sees August reading a book by Jane Eyre. August start to tell her what the boo is about a girl who's mother dies and the girl feels alone and abandoned. Lily start to panic because she thinks that August knows the truth about Lily and wants her to tell the her the truth. Lily then later overhears June and Neil fighting, Neil then leaves angry at June. The next day, Zach brings Lily a book so she can write her stories and poems in. He then tells her that people wouldn't except that they are together so they can't be. Lily starts writing at every moment she gets her book.
Chapter 8 -
August and Lily start to paste labels to honey jars in the honey house.

The two start to have some small talk. They both talk about thing they love, and the two find that they are very alike. Lily then starts to ask August questions like how the Lady of Chains got into her family, about the lanes on the jar, and was August ever married. August says that she did want to get martyred because she didn't want to give up her freedom. Afterward the two head to the hives, and Lily notices that there are no bees outside of the hive. August tells her to put her ear to the hive, and the Lily hears the bees moving their wings to keep the hive cool. August tells Lily that the queen is a mother to all the bees and all the other bees all have certain jobs in the hive. She then opens the hive and the bees begin to swarm around Lily and cover her. Lily remembers that she must stay very calm during this. August thinks There is something up with Lily and she tells her that they need to talk. At lunch May doesn't make her usual because she has stay away from the weeping wall for five day

straight.
Later on Zach has to make a run to the law offic to drop off some hinder. Lily begs August to let her go and she lets her. When they get there Lily meets Mr. Forest and his Ms. Lacy. After telling her where Lily is staying Ms. Lacy is startled to know that Lily is staying with a black woman. Zach and Mr. Forest then go into his offic to lok at some cases. When Lily is alone she calls T. Ray, and when she hears he on the other line she gets sad. He yells at her over the phone and he wants her to say where she was but she doesn't. Lily then asked Lily a simple question to T. Ray about her favorite color, and he didn't even know. After that she hangs up.
When Zach comes back he has his first law book for his library. Lily then gets asked all these different questions about where she is from. She then pretends that she doesn't feel good so Zach takes her back to the Boatwright house. When she is home Lily writes her after and letter about how she doesn't live him because how he treats her. She then tears up the letter because she never going to send it. That night, Lily went into the parlor, and to the black Mary statue. She finally kneels to the statue and asks for guidance and help.
Chapter 9 -
The one day it was extremely hot and August needed Lily's help to cool the bees with water. While doing this Lily gets stung and August says she is now a beekeeper because she had gotten stung. Lily thinks now she is a beekeeper, a write, and a future English teacher. When they are finished they find May and Rosaleen playing with the sprinkler, and August and Lily go play along with them. Then June comes to stop the girls and ends up getting wet and laughing with them. Later, while watch May try to get rid of bugs in the house, Lily realizes her mother had done the same thing. She then asked May if she knew a Deborah Owens, and she does. May tells like that she stayed in the honey house, but then may starts to hum "Oh! Susanna!". After awhile of waiting Lily decided to tell August the truth. But instead of doing that Lily rides with Zach to get a new radiator for the truck.
When they are in town Zach sees his friends at the movies. One of Zach's friends threw a bottle at a police man standing by the movies, but none of the boy say who did it and the cop blames Zach. Then Zach is taken to jail, and Lily has to walk home. After the walk lil arrives at the house and sees Mr. Forrest at house with August. They are discussing Zach case because Mr. Forrest is inch age of it. June thinks it's better that May doesn't know about Zach because this could make her very upset. August then takes Lily to go see Zach, but she doesn't know what to say. All Lily said to him is that she is going to write about him and his story. May eventually finds out what happened to Zach from his mother. But she this time when she went to the wailing wall she was not upset. Her sisters offer to take her there bug she insisted on going alone.
Chapter 10 -
The girls sit and wait for May to come back to the house. Finally August gets up and goes looking for May, the others follow her. When they find she is not by the wall they call the police. They keep walking until they reach the river, there they find that May had drowned herself in the river and killed herself. Lily is then questioned by the police, and they say that she should be ashamed to live with black women. The Daughters of Mary come with a lot of food to comfort the lady's in the Boatwright house.The next day, Zach gets out of jail and goes to see Mays body. Lily begins to see that there is not a real difference between her people and the community that she is surrounded with now. August feels that the bees are morning too so her and Lily cover the hives with black cloth. A couple days from May's suicide, August finds her note that she left them, tune and August read it. Basically what they got out of the letter was that the two should live there lives to the fullest. So June thinks for her this means that she should marry Neil. The Boatwright household then has a four day vigil, this is where they only are awake at night and they sleep during the day. They use this time to pray a lot.
Chapter 11 -
Lily sees that a lot of things start to change after May' death. Zach has also changed after coming from jail, but Lily talks to him and asked him not to be angry as the white men and he says he won't. After awhile things go back to normal, so normal that August made Lily her favorite dessert. The next morning Lily wakes up to see the other Boatwright lady's filled with joy because for the next two days they celebrate the Assumption Of Mary. The women bake and prepare for the feast. Then Neil comes over and proposes to June and she finally says yes. After that the rest of the day they continue prepare. Then the Daughters of Mary come over and they wrape the Mary sculpture in real chains to symbolize her breaking the chains. Lily finds that there is a lot of love in the room. During the long service Lily steps out of the honey house, and Zach follows her. The two head down to the river the two talk about how they will be together when the time is right. Then Zach kisses Lily.

Chapter 12 -
When Lily and Zach finish, Lily feels that she is ready to tell August the truth so she waits in August's room. They both talk about her mother and August explains that she knew who Lily was the while time and she was. She goes on to explain that Lily's mother After her talk with Zach, Lily goes directly to August’s room and waits for her. She decides it's time to talk about how she looked after her mother when she was growing up. She talks about Deborah being a kid and she tells Lily stories about her mother. Lily starts to cry when she talks about her dad because of what she said about her mother not loving her. August then talks about how her mother meet T. Ray and how a few years ago she had called to ask if she could stay at the Boatwright house. Lily then tells August how her mother died and how she shot her. The two move down to the kitchen. In the kitchen, August gives Lily ice water, and they continue to talk. Lily takes out the wooden picture of Mary to August and she tells her how she found the house. August tells Lily when her mother called she had thought that she was going to bring baby Lily with her but she didn't. Lily start to feel angry toward her mother because she left her. Those two words later kept repeating inter mind.
Chapter 13 -
In the middle of the night Lily goes to the Mary statue while thinking about how her mother was not what she thought she was. Lily wants to start to pray but she just grabs some honey jars and tosses them on the wall and they smash. Rosaleen is there with her in the morning and they clean up the honey and glass, then she fixed Lily up like old times. Lily tells Rosaleen why she did what she did. Then in the afternoon the Daughters of Mary come for the second day of the Mary feast. August is asked by Lily to tell her story to Zach. When the feast is over August gives lil a box of her mothers things she left, like a hairbrush, a mirror, and a picture of her and her mother when Lily was little. While Lily was looming at the picture mad Lily think that her mother really did love her.
Chapter 14 -
After the talk with August all the other women in the house see that Lily needs her space to grieve about her mother. She is finding it hard to forgive her mother. When Lily is in her own world, June is planing her wedding that's on October 10th. After her time to herself Lily sees that Rosaleen is going to regester to bore with August in a new dress and Lily is proud. Zach later that day tells Lily that her is hoping o a white high school next year but Lily doesn't even know if she is going to stay or go.
Lily start to forgive her mother, but when her and August are working with the bees the next day August tells Lily that she should let Mary be her mother. Also that Lily mush find a mother from inside herself. Later that day Lily gets the door and sees that T. Ray is outside. He found her from the number she had called from the lawyers office. He starts to calmly yell at Lily for running away. Then August and Rosaleen come to the door and the nicely tell he that Lily would be better if she were to stay with them. He agrees witness the lady's and then he leaves. Before he drives away Lily stops him and asks him who really killed her mother and her said that she did. In the end, Lily lives with August and Rosaleen and she goes to school with Zach. She even forgives her mother and she realizes that she has many mothers in the Boatwright sisters and the Daughters of Mary.