The Bee Sting

<p><b>WINNER OF THE NERO BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION 2023<br>WINNER OF AN POST IRISH BOOK OF THE YEAR 2023<br>SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2023<br>SHORTLISTED FOR THE WRITERS' PRIZE FOR FICTION 2024<br>SHORTLISTED FOR THE KERRY GROUP NOVEL OF THE YEAR 2024<br>ONE OF SARAH JESSICA PARKER'S BEST BOOKS OF 2023<br><br>Book of the Year 2023</b> according to <i>New York Times</i>, <i>New Yorker, The Sunday Times, The Economist, Observer, Guardian, Washington Post, Lit Hub, TIME magazine, Irish Times, The Oldie, Daily Mail, i Paper, Independent, The Standard, The Times, Kirkus, Daily Express, City A.M. </i><br><br><b>From one of our greatest comic novelists and the author of Skippy Dies comes a funny, thought-provoking story of one family desperately clinging on as their world falls apart . . .</b><br><br><b>'A tragicomic triumph. You won't read a sadder, truer, funnier novel this year' </b><i>Guardian</i><br><br>The Barnes family is in trouble. Dickie's once-lucrative car business is going under - but rather than face the music, he's spending his days in the woods, building an apocalypse-proof bunker with a renegade handyman.<br><br>His wife Imelda is selling off her jewellery on eBay while their teenage daughter Cass, formerly top of her class, seems determined to binge-drink her way to her final exams. And twelve-year-old PJ is putting the final touches to his grand plan to run away from home.<br><br>Where did it all go wrong? A patch of ice on the tarmac, a casual favour to a charming stranger, a bee caught beneath a bridal veil?<br><br>Can a single moment of bad luck change the direction of a life? And if the story has already been written - is there still time to find a happy ending?<br><br><b>'The finest novel that Murray has yet written . . . will surely be one of the books of 2023' </b><i>Sunday Independent</i><br><br><b>'Murray is a natural storyteller . . . Ambitious, expansive, hugely entertaining tragicomic fiction'</b> <i>Irish Times</i><br><br><b>'It's a thing of beauty, a novel that will fill your heart' </b><i>Observer</i><br><br><b>'Generous, immersive, sharp-witted and devastating . . . a triumph' </b><i>Financial Times</i><br><br><b>'It's been compared to Jonathan Franzen's <i>The Corrections</i>; I'd argue it's better' </b><i>Daily Mail</i></p>