I just happened up on an offer for an advance reading copy of a book that has many levels of being intriguing. The first to hit my eye was the title, Honeybee Rescue: A Backyard Drama, by Loree Griffin Burns with photography by Ellen Harasimowicz. Since I have an overwhelming interest in nature and a grandfather who used to keep bees, I needed to see.
The book is listed as kindergarten to third grade, but I would put absolutely no upper limit on it. The true story and photographs follow Mr. Connerly, a beekeeper who finds a colony in an unsafe rundown garage, and Mr. Neilson, an expert bee rescuer as they move the bees into a better place. It would be hard to choose whether the narrative information or the beautiful photographs are the best parts of the book. They mesh well together and are fascinating even to people like me who have long since put third grade in the rear window.
My special favorites were the diagrams and pictures of the layers of the beehive and the vacuum cleaner that the writer calls a “honeybee sucker-upper” that captures the bees and keeps them safe for the move. The fun is not even over when the story is finished. There is an interesting interview with Jon Nelson, the bee rescuer, revealing his start on this activity when he was a kid. The glossary helps the individual reader and will be good for a science class reading the book together. The author’s note is yet another interesting story of how this book came to be. In her sources, Loree identifies herself as a beekeeper and cites information from other beekeepers and researchers. Good selections for further reading round out the back matter. All the words and photographs beginning with the title and ending with the copyright information at the end were intriguing.