Hilarious and Endearing
Bee is an overachieving middle-schooler with brilliant parents. Her father, Elgin, is a project manager at Microsoft, overseeing the development of, well, a robotic, mind-reading band-aid. Her mother, Bernadette, the recipient of a MacArthur genius grant, is an elegant, burned-out, Pacific Northwest-hating architect. Dysfunctional yet endearing, Bee, Elgin, and Bernadette set the stage for this enjoyable novel, which follows Bee and her investigation into Bernadette's disappearance, who has vanished from a cruise ship bound for Antarctica. Told through a series of emails, faxes, and letters, sprinkled here and there with Bee's own narrative, the novel is entirely original. The form is unique but not gimmicky, the characters fresh, strange, and believable—expertly balancing the mundane and absurd. Though the text doesn't lend itself to narration, Kathleen Wilhoite effortlessly transcends this challenge, making for a fantastic listen. Highly recommended.