'The Bee Sting is the finest novel that Murray has yet written and will surely be one of the books of 2023... It bears comparison to the brilliant comic writer Jonathan Coe... But Murray is his own writer, capable of keeping a multi-faceted and compulsive plot moving along with alacrity and confidence, while seamlessly blending drama, comedy and heartbreak... For 13 years, Paul Murray has been best known as the author of Skippy Dies. That, I suspect, is about to change.' - Sunday Independent

'Immersive, brilliantly structured, beautifully written, so dense yet so compelling, [and] as laugh-out-loud funny as it is deeply disturbing... The Bee Sting is as ambitious as anything that has gone before, but with a focus and shape that grants it great depth as well as breadth. Seriously, all you need is this, your suntan lotion and a few days off work and you're good to go... I didn't see the plot twists coming. And they keep on coming, And coming again... I began with an ovation. I'll end abruptly, and in awe... Paul Murray, the undisputed reigning champion of epic Irish tragicomedy, has done it again.' - The Spectator (Ian Samson)

'The most enjoyable new novel I came across this year. A sprawling, Franzen-esque saga about the Barnes family in Ireland recovering from the 2008 financial crisis, it's an amazing piece of realist fiction, full-bodied, multi-narrative; a huge swing by Murray.' - Bret Easton Ellis  Observer

'No one writes tragicomedy as good as this... Both brilliant entertainment and a penetrating look at the human condition, as heavy with pathos as it is rich with humour. And if 650 pages asks a lot of the reader, in this case it more than delivers.' - Nick Duerden  iNews

'Paul Murray is a confident, stylish writer: he convincingly evokes a teenage girl's rage, a boy's fear, a father's secrets and a mother's disappointments and grief.' - The Economist, 'Best Books of 2023'

'Funny and painful with ghosts from the past and spectres from the future.' - Clive Myrie  Observer

Paul Murray was born in Dublin in 1975 and is the author of An Evening of Long Goodbyes, Skippy Dies, The Mark and the Void and The Bee Sting. An Evening of Long Goodbyes was shortlisted for the Whitbread First Novel Award and nominated for the Kerry Group Irish Fiction Award. Skippy Dies was shortlisted for the Costa Novel Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, and longlisted for the Booker Prize. The Mark and the Void won the Everyman Wodehouse Prize. The Bee Sting won the Nero Book of the Year Award and the An Post Irish Book of the Year, and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize, the Writers' Prize for Fiction and the Kirkus Prize for Fiction. Paul Murray lives in Dublin.