Chris Cleave's Little Bee

 

                                Ski Path in Stowe                                Mount Mansfield view from a farm

                            

Review of Chris Cleave’s Little Bee (2008)

 

 

Knowing my love for books, my son and my husband always try to delight me by buying books whenever they get the chance. One such memorable occasion was during our trip to Thiruvananthapuram, where we stayed at a downtown hotel. Right across from the hotel stood a bookshop—if I remember correctly, it was DC Books. That evening, we leisurely wandered into the store, and, as if on cue, my two enthusiastic supporters quickly spotted Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things. It had just won the Booker Prize, making it an especially cherished gift for me.

Years later, while visiting my son in Stowe, Vermont, we went window shopping in the quaint little town. Stowe, with its picturesque charm, has a population of about 6,000 and lies near the towering Mount Mansfield (see the images above). Vermont, the 14th state of the U.S., joined the Union in 1791. Initially known for its lumber industry, Stowe later transitioned to agriculture and farming. It is home to the Vermont Ski Museum, which was founded in 1988 and later relocated to Stowe in 2000. Interestingly, the town has a connection to The Sound of Music, as the original von Trapp family settled there after their tours as the Von Trapp Singers.

Beyond skiing, Stowe is also a destination for trekking and climbing. The Mount Mansfield Trail is a favourite among climbers, while the Long Trail—a challenging 272-mile hike along the Green Mountains’ main ridge—is considered the oldest continuous footpath in the U.S. Completing this trek is regarded as a remarkable achievement, and yes, Nikhil did it! The trail was envisioned by James P. Taylor and constructed between 1910 and 1930.

But I digress—Stowe just has a way of lingering in my thoughts. Returning to books, while strolling through the town, my son Nikhil discovered Little Bee in a charming, tucked-away bookstore. As with many of the books I collect, I started reading it but soon set it aside as academic obligations pulled me back into my busy world. It rested on my bookshelf for quite some time, until a year or so ago, when I finally finished it. Once again, as always, I found myself struck by the powerful relationship between two women from different worlds.

For those unfamiliar with Little Bee, it was written by Chris Cleave, a columnist for The Guardian in London. His first novel, Incendiary, won the Somerset Maugham Award and was later adapted into a film.

The narrative revolves around two women—Little Bee from Nigeria and Sarah O’Rourke from England. After being released from an immigration detention centre, Little Bee traces Sarah’s home and arrives there on the day of her husband Andrew’s funeral. Their connection had begun two years earlier in Nigeria, where Sarah and Andrew had vacationed near a resort. There, they faced a harrowing decision when Little Bee and her sister, fleeing a group of oil company men responsible for a village massacre, begged them for help. In a horrifying exchange, one of the men severed Sarah’s finger as payment for Little Bee’s life.

As the story unfolds, the tragedies Little Bee endured come to light—suicide, rape, and the brutal realities of migration. Sarah, too, navigates personal conflicts, while her young son Charlie refuses to leave his Batman costume. Toward the novel’s end, a police investigation into Charlie’s disappearance triggers an emotional collision of Little Bee’s memories—both in Nigeria and in England.

The novel opens with the epigraph: “Britain is proud of its tradition of providing a safe haven for people fleeing persecution and conflict.” It closes with a Nigerian proverb: “If your face is swollen from the severe beatings of life, smile and pretend to be a fat man.”

While the book offers intriguing insights into women, relationships, and immigration, I couldn’t shake the feeling that Cleave was deliberately painting asylum seekers in an overly positive light. At times, it seemed as if the novel carried an underlying agenda—one that left me somewhat unsettled. I appreciate a compelling story, but I prefer narratives that unfold organically rather than within a predetermined framework.

Another moment that lingered in my mind was the reflection on globalization near the novel’s end:

I smiled down at Charlie, and I understood that he would be free now even if I would not. In this way the life that was in me would find its home in him now. It was not a sad feeling. I felt my heart take off lightly like a butterfly and I thought, yes, this is it, something has survived in me, something that does not need to run anymore, because it is worth more than all the money in the world and its currency, its true home; is the living. And not just the living in this particular country or in that country, but the secret, irresistible heart of the living. I smiled back at Charlie and I knew that the hopes of this whole human world could fit inside one soul. This is a good trick. This is called globalization. (p. 264)

Reading Little Bee inevitably stirred memories of my son’s own immigrant journey and the endless search for a true sense of home and belonging—one that so many of us continue to navigate.