Out of all the books I have read this is the best! I could not put it down "hold on let me finish this chapter then I'll eat". I had to chose a book to do a school report on and i picked this book hands down. I would reccomend this book to anyone. I am so happy that my English teacher reccomended The Secret Life of Bees to me. Lily is just sick and tired of eing piushed around by T. Ray her abusive father. Lily wants get away and find everything she can about her mother Deborah that was killed when Lily was four. Lily needs to find out whether or not she was the one who killed her mother. Rosaleen her "second-mother" gets arrested for "insulting" racists in Sylvan, South Carolina. Lily breaks her free and they run off. Lily and Rosaleen end up stay with the calander sisters, May, June, and August. They help Lily come to understand her mother and herself.