Review: Bumblebee Season by Eileen Garvin

Bumblebee Season by Eileen Garvin

Blurb from Goodreads:

Beekeeper Jake Stevenson should be celebrating. His fledgling honey farm has been inundated with orders. Instead, Jake is worried. He can’t seem to hire anyone—with local teens more interested in jobs at Hood River’s hip waterfront—and there’s no way he can handle the approaching harvest all by himself, no matter how adept he’s become at maneuvering among the beehives in his wheelchair.

Meanwhile Flaco López, a young migrant from Mexico, is lost on Mount Hood when he stumbles upon Jake’s beehives in a high alpine meadow. As Flaco takes refuge on Jake’s farm, they begin to form a tentative friendship. And the two soon cross paths with Abigail Plue, a scientist more interested in insects than people, who’s on Mount Hood studying a threatened native bumblebee.

Then a local rabble rouser begins to rally support to build a commercial hunting camp that would destroy Mount Hood’s pristine wilderness—the home of Jake’s honeybees and Abigail’s beloved bumblebees. And Jake, Abigail, and Flaco must come together to protect everything they hold dear. Full of warmth, big-hearted characters, and a celebration of nature in all its complexity, Bumblebee Season reminds us that human connection might just be the most powerful force there is.

My Review:

This follows some of the characters from The Music of Bees (which I loved!).  I often think of those characters so this was a fun sort of spin-off/continuation.  This book also touches on several issues facing the west and was very thoughtfully done.  I really enjoyed it.  If you haven't read anything by this author, give her a try!!

Bumblebee Season comes out next week on April 21, 2026, and you can purchase HERE!  

ABIGAIL PLUE SURPRISED people, though she didn't understand exactly why. It seemed as if, upon meeting her, they'd been expecting someone else. At least after Abigail had spoken. That was the only way she could explain it. People seemed to harbor some expectation of what she'd say or how she might say it, and when her words came out they were never quite right. No one ever said that exactly, but she could tell it's what they thought.