The History of Bees

The History of Bees (Bienes historie), the first book in Maja Lunde's Climate Quartet, follows three beekeepers across three time periods. In 1852 England, William Savage, a biologist and failed seed merchant, designs a revolutionary new beehive in hopes of restoring his reputation and connecting with his estranged son. In 2007 Ohio, George Boone, a struggling beekeeper, pins his hopes on his son taking over the family's failing apiary business, even as colony collapse disorder threatens everything he's built. In 2098 China, Tao spends her days hand-pollinating fruit trees, one of the only jobs left after bees have gone extinct, until a devastating accident with her son forces her to confront the world her generation has inherited.

Moving between the three narratives, the novel builds a portrait of a slow-building ecological catastrophe and the intimate, often strained relationships between parents and children that echo across all three eras. It is a quiet, melancholic novel about work, inheritance, and what people owe the future.