Signing “Bee Time” at Munro’s Bookstore, Victoria BC
Most Recent Book
Winston, M.L. and R.J. Saklikar 2018. Listening to the Bees. Nightwood Editions, Gibson’s B.C.
I’m available for:
Talks
Bee Time: Lessons From the Hive. (Governor Generals Literary Award for Nonfiction, 2015)There are powerful lessons to be learned from bees about how we humans can better understand our place in nature, engage the people and events surrounding us with greater focus and clarity, interact more effectively in our relationships and communities, and open ourselves to a deeper understanding of who we are as individuals, communities and a species. I’ll talk about my experiences over 30 years of walking into apiaries, and the lessons learned from a life spent among the bees.
Listening to the Bees: Mark Winston, a naturalist and author of the Governor General’s Literary Nonfiction Award-winning book, Bee Time: Lessons from the Hive, has joined forces with celebrated poet Renée Sarojini Saklikar. The result is a unique blend of science and poetry. This talk, and the book, grew from a common passion for bees, an exploration of the intricate ways we come to understand our world through language and through science. Listening to the Bees combines Winston’s personal essays based on forty years as a scientist in the field studying bees, and Saklikar’s poems created in response to a rich scientific archive.
“Listening to the bees connects us to the ineffable mysteries we will never resolve or fully understand. As a scientist, I find it oddly satisfying that data and studies can only take us so far, that there is a realm where there are no answers, only wonder at how little we can know.”
–Mark Winston
The Artistry of Bees: There is much to learn about honeybees, and ourselves, through art that takes bees as subject and topic. Best described as inspiration, it’s expressed in the way that the magical, mystical essence of the hive inspires our creativity and wonder. The most powerful translators of the marvels presented by bees may be artists, who provide distinctive insights through various media. Because we routinely conduct business with bees, we often overlook the profound lessons they provide in spheres beyond data and commerce. Bees yield insights into the spiritual, religious, and philosophical realms for those who pause to view their message through art.
Current Book
Previous Books
My seven books have had strong reviews in the popular press, been translated into a number of languages, sold well in North America and internationally and have had considerable impact on issues including pesticide use, genetically modified crops and development of sustainable beekeeping and agriculture. Titles include:
The Biology of the Honey Bee
Killer Bees: The Africanized Honey Bee in the Americas
From Where I Sit
Nature Wars: People vs. Pests
Nora and Ted Sterling Prize in Controversy, SFU 1998
Short listed, BP Natural World Book Prize
Travels in the Genetically Modified Zone
Bee Time: Lessons From the Hive
2017 Audiobook: from Audible
2016 Korean edition, Hongik Publishing
2017 Italian edition, il Saggiatore s.r.l.
2014 Science in Society General Book Award, Canadian Science Writers Association
2015 Governor-General’s Literary Award for Nonfiction
2015. CBC Best Books of 2015
2016. Seven months on national bestseller lists, including four weeks as the number one bestselling non-fiction book in Canada
Selected Reviews
The Biology of the Honey Bee: Winston’s writing is brisk and enthusiastic and the book’s illustrations clear and informative. This is a delightful study of an odd, yet oddly familiar, creature.—John R. Alden, Wall Street Journal
Nature Wars: [An] erudite and fascinating book . . . The lesson here reads like a Greek tragedy: The more modern agriculture removes biodiversity from the land, the more susceptible it becomes to pests, which ultimately means more pesticides. This deadly cycle explains why the promise of biological controls of the use of natural predators has remained just that, a promise. Andrew Nikiforuk, Globe and Mail [Toronto]
Nature Wars: Winston is probing and thoughtful, whether he is exploring what he contends was an unwarranted public outcry over a 1992 spraying in Vancouver of the biological control Bacillus thuringiensis to thwart a gypsy-moth invasion, or the likelihood that the public will view as a failure the ongoing effort in the Okanagan Valley of British Columbia to stop the spread of codling moths (an apple pest) by releasing sterile male moths. Robert Braile, Boston Globe
Nature Wars: In an articulate and accessible writing style, Winston explains the pesticide dilemma, the threat that our reliance on synthetic pesticides poses both to human health and safety and to the preservation of what is left of the natural environment. Lawrence M. Hanks, Nature
Travels in the Genetically Modified Zone: Winston’s lucid new book…[is] both timely and valuable, not least because it is easy to read and understand, even for the non-scientist. As the issue confronts the whole of the planet, this book deserves to be as big a seller as any Harry Potter adventure. Nicholas Lander, Financial Times
Travels in the Genetically Modified Zone: Winston writes fluidly, in a style accessible to the general reader. He opts for simplicity rather than…obfuscation…His description of how genetic engineering works–like the cut-and-paste functions of a computer program–is both basic and elegant. Ingeborg Boyens, Globe and Mail
Bee Time: Lessons From the Hive: “A charming and poetic account, Winston writes lovingly of the rhythms and quiddities of the apiary, stepping between reportage, scientific exactitude and a deep, poetically expressed love of bees, beekeeping and the cultural forms that bees inspire . . . An insightful delight.” New Scientist 21 October 2014