This vibrantly imagined novel, by turns hilarious and appalling, is hard to resist.

A black comedy, mixing The Ladykillers with Irvine Welsh’s The Acid House...O’Donnell adeptly balances caustic humour and compassion.

Compelling piece of work... O’Donnell brings a freshness to her narrative, thanks to the brilliantly evoked voices of her two young female protagonists.... Warm without being cosy, explicit without being shocking, and emotive without being schmaltzy, this is a powerful coming-of-age tale with a clear eye for the travails of 21st-century deprived living.

The Death Of Bees is compelling stuff, engaging the emotions from the first page and quickly becoming almost impossible to put down.

A dark, fierce first novel that is a page-turner and a fairy tale turned inside out. I can’t wait to read what she writes next.

Channelling the spirit of Joe Orton…O’Donnell cuts black comedy with a big dollop of sentiment…The Death of Bees steadily draws you into its characters’ lives.

A wonderful dark comic first novel

There is no one to match [Forster] for the way her assured,subtle and careful prose can detail the insecurities, torments and problems of what are, to all surface appearances, just nondescript, unremarkable and often half-lived lives

Margaret Forster has a deft and idiosyncratic touch

A story which becomes steadily more gripping

A brilliantly uncomfortable read about the art of forgetfulness

Brilliant... You won't put this book down until its emotional end