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The Colonel and the Bee: A Globe-Trotting Adventure by [Patrick Canning, Lina Rivera]

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Patrick Canning

The Colonel and the Bee: A Globe-Trotting Adventure Kindle Edition

by Patrick Canning (Author), Lina Rivera (Editor) Format: Kindle Edition

11 ratings

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A peculiar explorer and downtrodden acrobat span the globe on a building-sized hot air balloon, in search of a precious artifact and the murderous treasure hunter who seeks it.

WINNER: Pinnacle Book Achievement Award – Best Adventure (Summer 2018)

The Amazing Beatrix, with no home or family, suffers an abusive ringleader as an acrobat in a 19th-century circus. After a harrowing escape from her tormentor, Beatrix encounters the daring adventurer Colonel James Bacchus, and the unlikely pair team up. Flying to safety aboard the Colonel’s miraculous four-story hot air balloon, they begin a grand quest to find the most precious gem in the world, The Blue Star Sphinx. Perils await them, however, as they must outmaneuver deadly treasure hunters, escaped convicts, and endless double-crosses. If they succeed, they might discover the great treasure, or better yet, a true sense of belonging.

EVOLVED PUBLISHING PRESENTS a fantastical globetrotting adventure, packed with witty banter, colorful characters, and exotic locations, which reads like Sherlock Holmes meets Around the World in 80 Days meets The Wizard of Oz. [DRM-Free]

Roll Out Reviews says, “There is one word that best describes Canning’s latest work: fun. The Colonel and the Bee is that fictional gem readers have been waiting to find for a while to lose themselves in.”

Gordon A. Long says, “This is the sort of book that demands creativity, and Canning delivers. Every character is a Character, stretched past stereotype into archetype. Every setting is new and different and unreal to the finest detail.”

Literature Approved review site says, “The Colonel and the Bee is a story, I would deem, worth being remembered as a classic. ... Their adventures are filled with mystery, riddles, humor, surprising twists, and a stupendous amount of quotes that put my Kindle highlighter to use!”

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Print length

307 pages
Language

English
Publication date

1 June 2018
File size

2846 KB
Page Flip

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Word Wise

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Product description

About the Author

AUTHOR: Patrick spends as much time as possible turning coffee into collections of words that look like books, shorts, and screenplays. Most of his stories attempt to look for the meaning of life in an adventurous way, and often employ humor, important since the search usually doesn't turn up much. He is scared to use semi colons and rarely puts his seat back on airplanes.

EDITOR: I caught the writing bug early on in elementary school after my teacher showed me how to make my own book. Excited by this idea, I ran home and made my first picture book on notebook paper and bound with yarn. I majored in creative writing at the University of Southern California, and entered the world of editing through educational publishing while working at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. I love getting lost in a great story, whether it be literary, science fiction, or coming-of-age. In critique groups and workshops, I've had the privilege of reading works-in-progress and being a part of a great story from its inception through revisions and beyond. If I can ever help an author along in their process, then I consider that a success for both of us. --This text refers to the paperback edition.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07D9QT4FM
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Evolved Publishing LLC; 1st edition (1 June 2018)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 2846 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 307 pages

Customer Reviews:
11 ratings

About the author

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Patrick Canning

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Patrick Canning grew up in Illinois, and now lives in California with his dog, Hank.

He is primarily focused on turning coffee into words, words into money, money back into coffee.

patrickcanningbooks.com

Customer reviews

5 star		58%
4 star		30%
3 star		12%
2 star 0% (0%)		0%
1 star 0% (0%)		0%

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Top review from India

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Ooha Biddala

Indeed a globe-trotting steampunk adventure

Reviewed in India on 26 September 2018

Beatrix was a circus girl, flying from trapeze to trapeze, in between whippings from her cruel ringleader and escaping from the memories of her past. Into this bleak outlook, walks a man with flowers in his hat and charm on his lips, promising adventure, excitement and most of all, tickling her curiosity in a way it had never been tickled before. Maybe he wasn’t as ready to indulge this curiosity of hers as she was to be indulged, but, as a circus acrobat who had already revealed her scars to the world, she was more than ready to take on the challenge.

Ok, I know the blurb I gave makes it sound like a romantic heist on the way; but, no! Listen to me and trust me when I say, it’s anything but.

The Colonel and Bee are two characters who’re not very new to our literary world- a charming gentlemen whose shades of suspicious grey cover a golden heart and a plucky heroine with a sassy tongue and enough street smarts to flee an armoured city. What makes them special though are their interactions. Neither is trying to best or woo or pull a fast one over the other. It’s a relationship of mutual respect and necessity. And well, a little bit of human kindness. The author built them not just as characters, but made them people and gave them consistency of character. That helps us identify their voices as individuals and really makes you invest in the book.

Apart from the characters, the other thing I want to sing praises about is the language. Now, this book is set in the steampunk genre and the amount of antique vocabulary just freely tossed about in here made me go all dance-y in my head. I’ll be adding an appendix of all the new words I came across at the end on my blog Overrated Sensibilities.

And not just the vocabulary, but the prose, the use of language too- Let me give you an example here:

<i>“You take no milk?” I asked, half in jest.
The Colonel huffed.
“Imbibe the mammary ghost slime of thoughtless gluttons bested by a pasture fence? I’ve far better things to do with my time-”</i>

How eloquent is that!

There were so many times where the dopamine in my brain went all giggly because a particular line had tickled me so much. Of course, the downside of such a roundabout use of language is that sometimes, the descriptions just go over your head; particularly in places where you’re so into the story that you’re not really interested in going back to untangle the mass of grammatical hanky-panky of the background.

The take away, of course, from the above mentioned downside is that the story does engross you that much. It’s divided into various parts of the journey and each part is enhanced with satisfying characters and any amount of skulduggery that’ll keep you fully occupied. The story has meat and a purpose. While the endgame is only teased to the reader until the final 100 pages, it isn’t annoying because there’s a lot going on- fast-paced and non-filler until then.

<b>BOTTOMLINE:</b> It’s a book worth reading, with characters worth remembering and a story that’s enchanting. Furthermore, if you’re a person who enjoys creative use of language, twisting and turning it to make sense, looping and hooping it to make even more sense, then you must read this book because it’ll definitely titillate you till the end.

Happy reading!

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Squeaky Joe

A steampunk classic adventure

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 October 2018

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When a young circus performer escapes her abusive ring-master boss and teams up with a ballooning adventurer, she isn’t at all certain she’s made the right decision. However, the pair set off on the trail of a criminal and the mysteriously named Blue Star Sphinx in a four-storey hot air balloon named the Ox. But Beatrix soon finds they are not just dealing with a thief, but with a killer.

Featuring a fascinating and oddly-matched pair of central characters (The Amazing Beatrix and an The Colonel – an Englishman who wears dandelions in his hat), this is a witty and clever book written in a style reminiscent of those classic adventures of the late nineteenth century. As well as the aforementioned individuals, it also boasts a host of strange and unusual characters who add a touch of the surreal to the story. At times I did find the text a little ‘heavy’ (which also made me wonder what age range the book is aimed at), but otherwise it’s a thoroughly enjoyable read that’ll delight fans of steampunk, classic adventure and Dickensian descriptions.

Mr. Richard Lw Bunning

Acrobatic Entertainment in a Multistory Steampunk Balloon

Reviewed in the United States on 1 August 2018

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This is classic Steampunk genre with a morality tale or two, writ large. The young teenaged, Beatrix, escapes a suitably Dickensian circus to travel the world on a multi-story dirigible, a craft common to so much of the genre.
The adventure, the search for the long-hidden artefact, is entertaining, even though the elements that build the story are somewhat contrived and sometimes less than well knitted together. However, the words themselves are nicely knotted and well cast-off. A ‘Victorian’ tone is achieved and displayed well enough, onto which is painted vivid pictures of both the cast of characters and the world in which they are played. Comedy is a consisted chord, tongue-in-cheek rather than riotously funny. The Colonel is all comic foil, a wild mix of Phileas Fogg, MacDonald Frazer’s Flashman, and Captain Pugwash. It is his eccentricity rather than any string of logic that binds the book.
I am mystified as to what age group the author was aiming at, if any, but certainly its general tone leans most heavily towards the age of its heroine, the young teenager, Beatrix. However, I must point out that even in my seventh decade, I was well entertained. Adventure books, especially ones like this, of a Disneyesk nature, tend to be of liked or loathed flavours throughout a life rather than attractive in a certain decade.
Death is treated with a certain flippancy, being generally confined to the less nice people. A great deal is sexually implied, though the subject detail is suitably distant. That the Colonel is of a particularly libertine, rakish, nature is obvious from early in the book. We must worry at first about the abused young lady coming into the Colonel’s household, and later about the character of one of the darker characters. We are though, kept aloft in lighter airs, in the comical balloon.
My overall feeling was one more of reading the detailed story behind a cartoon strip than a book with any profound depth. I found myself to be seized in a picture world that blended Herge’s Tin Tin and Moore’s Extraordinary Gentlemen. Certainly, the vivid scenes that the prose brings to my mind is the real strength of the book, a world of solid characters that somehow never quite distil from their comic cartoon into the world we live in.

2 people found this helpful

Joshua Grant

I loved every second of this adventure!

Reviewed in the United States on 30 May 2019

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One of the things I love about Patrick Canning is his focus on odd characters with his world-spanning adventures. In The Colonel and the Bee, we see Beatrix, a down on her luck circus acrobat, team up with explorer James as they travel the world in a hot air balloon racing to get a mysterious treasure Indiana Jones style. It was greatly satisfying to experience this late 1800s adventure, getting to see interesting locales and very memorable characters. It was a little like James and the Giant Peach meets The Mummy, just not as creepy. I really hope to take another adventure with Beatrix and James and would recommend this one to any Indiana Jones fans out there!

S.D.

An exquisitely written and action-packed story!

Reviewed in the United States on 19 November 2018

Verified Purchase

Title: The Colonel and The Bee
Author: Patrick Canning
Genre: Young Adult Action Adventure Fiction
Rating: Five Stars!

Have you ever started a book expecting one thing, but then you get a little ways into it and you suddenly realize that it’s an entirely different thing—but in a completely awesome way? Well that’s exactly what happened to me when I started The Colonel and The Bee. That isn’t to say that the book synopsis isn’t right on point—I mean, it’s a pretty accurate description of the plot, but it somehow didn’t prepare me for all of the fun and adventure that was in store. But, before I dive into how great the book is, here’s the actual book blurb . . .

“The Colonel and the Bee” Book Synopsis

A peculiar explorer and downtrodden acrobat span the globe on a building-sized hot air balloon, in search of a precious artifact and the murderous treasure hunter who seeks it.

Beatrix, a spirited but abused acrobat in a traveling circus, seeks more than her prison-like employment offers. More than anything, she wants to know her place in the world of the halcyon 19th century, a time when the last dark corners of the map were being sketched out and travel still possessed a kind of magic.

One night in Switzerland, the mysterious Colonel James Bacchus attends Beatrix's show. This larger-than-life English gentleman, reputed to have a voracious appetite for female conquests, is most notable for traveling the world in a four-story hot air balloon called The Ox.

Beatrix flees that night to join the Colonel, and the two of them make a narrow escape—Beatrix from her abusive ringleader, the Colonel from a freshly-made cuckold. Beatrix, feeling the Colonel may have the answers to her problems, pledges to help him catch the criminal he seeks in exchange for passage on his magnificent balloon.

The criminal seeks a precious figurine, The Blue Star Sphinx, but he's not alone. The Sphinx's immense value has also drawn the attention of the world's most deadly treasure hunters. A murder in Antwerp begins a path of mystery that leads all the way to the most isolated island on Earth.

What dangers await the Colonel and the acrobat?

Evolved Publishing presents a globe-trotting adventure in the tradition of such greats as “Around the World in 80 Days.”

Summer’s Take On “The Colonel and the Bee.”

As I said earlier, it’s a great book description, but it really doesn’t do justice to the exquisite writing style of the author and the amazing rapport that develops between the Colonel and Bee—think The Doctor, but a charming male version who really fancies the ladies, and his companion, this one like the kick-ass reincarnation of Nancy Drew or the younger version of Carmen Sandiego. The book, at its core, is fun, and while there are some serious underlying issues, like the abuse that Bee suffers at the hands of the ringleader and the horrific living conditions of the carnival employees and animals, the book itself never skips a beat with its humor, charm, wit, and mystery. Hence, I give The Colonel and The Bee a five out of five star rating and I hope that I’ve inspired you to grab a copy soon!

Amy's Bookshelf Reviews

Good read

Reviewed in the United States on 8 October 2018

Verified Purchase

It's an interesting read and the first book I've read by Canning. His story has an interesting premise, and brings the reader on a journey. It revolves around two characters and has an interesting old-movie vibe. I enjoyed reading the story, as it's adventurous and adds a bit of excitement. There is a tone to it that doesn't really heighten or lower the story. The characters are developed but maybe need a bit more depth. I look forward to reading more work by Canning.

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