The Bees (Laline Paull)

I know this story, about a bee who rises above the rigid rules of the hive to reach a potential that challenges the reality the bees have accepted all their lives, has excellent reviews and is listed as one of the top SF/F books of 2014. It just didn't work for me. I went in expecting something more along the lines of Richard Adams's classic Watership Down, in which rabbits have speech and a longer view than rabbits really have, but otherwise were completely true to what rabbits are really like (at least, as far as I know). The Bees, though, stepped much too far outside of what I can imagine life might really be like for those creatures. The bees in this story not only talk, they shake hands and curtsey. Their hive contains large chambers with floors carved in floral patterns, with staircases and doors that swing open. They eat food from platters, and change shifts based on the ringing of bells. What they are is people in bee suits, which kept crashing my disbelief to the floor and I gave up after 50 pages. If you are more tolerant to such things then this story might work well for you, but not for me.