the secret life of bees- by sue monk kidd

the secret life of bees is about a girl named lily owens. it centers in south carolina. when lily was three, her mother died. her memories of that day haunt her, her parents screaming, her mother packing the suitcase, the gun on the floor, then in her hand, then a loud bang.
since that day lily has grown up with her father and theyre house keeper, a black woman named rosaleen.
her bad tempered father owns and runs a peach farm, and lily has to sell peaches on the side of the road.
lily has a special place in the peach orchard that nobody knows about that she goes to to get away and to think. one night her father finds her there and gets angry because he thinks she was with a boy. he punishes her harshly and she starts thinking about running away.
she goes into town with rosalee one day and they stop to rest in the church for white people on the way. the preacher comes in and tells them to get out because only white people are alowed. on the way out, rosalee steals two fans from the church to keep them cool on the rest of the way into town.
in town, some white men start yelling mean things at rosalee and she starts doing things back to them. they get very angry and start hitting her. a policeman comes and takes rosalee to jail under charges for assault and stealing. she is hurt pretty badly so the police send her to the hospital under guard.
lily is driven home, and when she gets home, she packs her bags and runs away, planning to rescue rosalee and run to tiburon, south carolina because she believes that her mother might have been there once.
she rescues rosalee, and they go to tiburon. in tiburon, they go to the town store to get some food. in the store, lily sees the picture of the black madonna on a jar of honey, the very same picture which had led her to believe that her mother had been in tiburon. she askes the owner of the store where that honey came from, and he gives her directions to the makers house.
it turns out that the makers of the honey are three black sisters, each named after months in the summer.
lily lies to them about the reason she is there and they let her and rosalee stay in the garage if they help them make honey.