- Hardcover: 320 pages
- Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf (May 2000)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0375401628
- ISBN-13: 978-0375401626
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 16 x 3.6 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 4,269,189 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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More About the Author
Product Description
Review
Praise for the author’s previous novels:
Rabbit Boss:
‘Beautiful, poetic, powerful’
Times
‘Rare and wonderful’
Washington Post
Zoot-Suit Murders:
‘May be the best of the home-front novels of World War II’
Los Angeles Times
‘A great novel of love, war and politics. Like A Farewell to Arms…’
Le Monde, Paris
Mile Zero:
‘Dazzling… a masterpiece’
New York Times
‘Mythmaking and magisterial’
Vanity Fair
Product Description
In this story of an astonishing love, Thomas Sanchez portrays the violence, hope, and grandeur of lives transformed by war and exile. At the heart of the novel are Zermano, a world-famous Spanish painter, and his beautiful French muse, Louise Collard -- whose lives are torn apart by the German invasion of France in World War II. Leaving Louise in Vichy-controlled Provence, Zermano returns to occupied Paris. But while he eventually goes on to celebrity and fortune, Louise disappears into obscurity.
Fifty years later, after Louise's death, an American scholar arrives in the south of France seeking the truth about the lovers' tempestuous romance and sudden separation. Why did the painter abandon the young beauty? What was the cause of her lifelong reclusiveness? What dark mysteries were being concealed by the ill-fated couple? By chance, the professor finds a cache of correspondence -- Zermano's letters to Louise in her remote mountain village, and her intentionally unmailed letters to him in Paris. In their vivid, wrenching contents he uncovers secrets that Louise kept even from Zermano about her wartime experience: the dangers of her participation in the Resistance, and her complicity with one of its leaders, the Fly; her struggles to elude a sadistic officer who hunts her for political and personal reasons; her lyrical intimacy with a mystical beekeeper. Louise is forced to make a fateful decision between the love for her man, and the ultimate sacrifice for her country.
In a powerful climax, the scholar is compelled to journey to Mallorca, where Zermano is rumored to be living in self-imposed exile. Determined to reveal Louise's fate to the painter, our narrator does not suspect that he, too, will be forced to confront the enigma of his own desire.
Fifty years later, after Louise's death, an American scholar arrives in the south of France seeking the truth about the lovers' tempestuous romance and sudden separation. Why did the painter abandon the young beauty? What was the cause of her lifelong reclusiveness? What dark mysteries were being concealed by the ill-fated couple? By chance, the professor finds a cache of correspondence -- Zermano's letters to Louise in her remote mountain village, and her intentionally unmailed letters to him in Paris. In their vivid, wrenching contents he uncovers secrets that Louise kept even from Zermano about her wartime experience: the dangers of her participation in the Resistance, and her complicity with one of its leaders, the Fly; her struggles to elude a sadistic officer who hunts her for political and personal reasons; her lyrical intimacy with a mystical beekeeper. Louise is forced to make a fateful decision between the love for her man, and the ultimate sacrifice for her country.
In a powerful climax, the scholar is compelled to journey to Mallorca, where Zermano is rumored to be living in self-imposed exile. Determined to reveal Louise's fate to the painter, our narrator does not suspect that he, too, will be forced to confront the enigma of his own desire.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I bought this book because the title intrigued me and it was reduced. I took it home and couldn't put it down.
A love story set against the backdrop of World War II, not normally my cup of tea. However Sanchez's writing is so vivid you can clearly visualise the characters and what you don't realise is the subconcious impregnation of the horror of war. It sits with you long after the book is finished.
I think a lot of people could have decided on the structure and the theme, as the main part of the book is written as a series of letters. However, few people could have written this so beautifully. Sanchez has a gift for bringing a point home so eloquently that you don't even realise the impact until later.
I'm now ordering two more of his books, I hope they are half as enjoyable.
A love story set against the backdrop of World War II, not normally my cup of tea. However Sanchez's writing is so vivid you can clearly visualise the characters and what you don't realise is the subconcious impregnation of the horror of war. It sits with you long after the book is finished.
I think a lot of people could have decided on the structure and the theme, as the main part of the book is written as a series of letters. However, few people could have written this so beautifully. Sanchez has a gift for bringing a point home so eloquently that you don't even realise the impact until later.
I'm now ordering two more of his books, I hope they are half as enjoyable.
Format:Hardcover
As a tremendous fan of Sanchez's previous books ("Mile Zero" is one of the best novels I've ever read), I was stunned by how bad this book is. This novel is incredibly overwrought and overwritten; at some points you feel like the author may be trying to parody the historical romance genre. While the plot is a strong one (there are some similarities to "Captain Corelli's Mandolin") and the idea of a Picasso-like painter and his mistress seems as if it would work well, Sanchez can't pull it off (despite trying hard... painfully so). Perhaps this was his attempt to write something that might become an "English Patient" type film... as someone who really admires the author's previous work, I can only hope that "Day of the Bees" is an aberration.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
16 reviews
21 of 24 people found the following review helpful
In Praise of Passion
26 May 2000
Format:Hardcover
I am a university English professor so I have spent a great part of my life reading works of literature. Day of the Bees is one of the most astonishingly complex and beautiful works I've read. The declaration of this book is: all praise to sovereign passion--no novel since Wuthering Heights has done it better. Thomas Sanchez has dared to change his style and cross literary genres. He creates a mythic tale of an artist and his muse, involved in a devouring eroticism. This book transcends all expectations and demolishes the notion that romance can't thrive in the modern literary novel. I read that it took the author ten years to write this book and I give him all of my praise for a difficult job well done. This book is both literary and entertaining and I recommend it highly.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
Glorious tale of passionate love
25 Feb 2002
Format:Hardcover
A sweeping tale of passionate love set during the turbulent events of WW2 and spanning 50 years.
Zermano world renowned Spanish painter and his beautiful French lover Louise Collard were separated during the Nazi occupation of France. The world thought Zermano had tired of Louise, she who had once fired his inspiration for his paintings and his lust. In the end it was Louise who left the legacy and Louise who led the way. After her death intimate letters written by her to Zermano, but never posted were accidentally found. They recount the period during the war when she and Zermano were separated, when unspeakable horrors and cruelties abounded in war torn Europe.
Passionate, beautifully written letters describe the love between Zermano and Louise and recount Louise's life during their enforced separation.
This is not a soppy love story, but a powerfully, deeply moving and well written historical tale of two tragic lovers, touched with passion, politics and art. A wonderful book I didn't want it to end and which I highly recommend.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
slow, erotic, dramatic
20 Sep 2001
Format:Paperback
If you are not a 100% true romantic in heart, skip this book. If you have longed for someone, for something that is greater than yourself once in your life, you will probably enjoy this highly dramatic and erotic book. I am a big fan about letters and romance, and I think the writing is exquisitely beautiful. Though, at times I find this book too slow and too outrageous for readers like me to accept. However, I greatly appreciate the writer's effort of offering a magical, somewhat out-of-ordinary love story to our almost too ordinary lives.
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