The Honey Bus

Content Warning: This section of the guide discusses abuse and depression.

Meredith May is the author of The Honey Bus (2019) and a fifth-generation beekeeper. As the memoir relates, she was born in Rhode Island and raised in Big Sur, California. May is an award-winning journalist whose 2004 series about an Iraqi boy wounded during the Gulf War was shortlisted for the Pulitzer Prize. Her first book, I, Who Did Not Die (2017), tells the story of an Iraqi boy conscripted into military service who was saved by an Iranian soldier sent to kill him. Like The Honey Bus, it features themes of resilience and friendship. May’s third book, Loving Edie: How a Dog Afraid of Everything Taught Me to Be Brave (2020), describes her journey raising a clinically anxious dog while managing her own emotions. In 2024, she will release a children’s book, My Hive, based on The Honey Bus.

Meredith is the narrator and protagonist of The Honey Bus. Her parents’ divorce and the sudden move to California with her mother and brother had a profound impact on Meredith, who bears The Lasting Effects of Trauma. For example, Meredith’s uncontrollable, physical reaction to a Beatles song at school that reminds her of her father suggests that she is traumatized by her family’s split.