A Taste for Honey

Gerald Heard

Until the last few years, there had been quite a lot of bee-keeping in the Ashton Clearwater district. But lately nobody, except the sinister and solitary Heregroves, had managed to make their bees thrive.

This was tiresome for Sydney Silchester who had gone to the country to be on his own and undisturbed by friends and garrulous neighbors. It was even more tiresome for him when Mrs. Heregrove was stung to death by her husband's bees. His situation suddenly became fraught with mysterious terror when he met his extraordinary neighbor, Mr. Mycroft, a scientific apiarist who had made discoveries about Heregrove's bees which pointed to murder on wings.

Who is Mr. Mycroft? The true identity of this magnificent, inscrutable old gentleman is a deep secret--but there are echoes of Baker Street in his voice, and a familiar gleam in his eyes that miss no clue. In A Taste for Honey, he meets one of the most sinister murderers of all time, and encounters one of the most fiendishly ingenious murder methods ever devised.

"A Taste for Honey is intriguing and sinister, somewhere between G. K. Chesterton and John Wyndham; Heard has Chesterton's conviction that the most important mysteries are moral questions reaching beyond 'whodunnit,' and he shares Wyndham's fascination with the disquieting, almost alien forces that threaten the quiet of pastoral England. But Heard's style is entirely his own. Few crime novels of the period take quite so much pleasure in language, except maybe for the lyrical evocation of the mean streets of the American private eye, but even then Heard is definitely of the English school; his prose is more rarefied than muscular." Dr. Christopher Pittard, distinguished University of Exeter scholar of British Detective Fiction

"With a seemingly omniscient detective, a reluctant sidekick and a disturbed rural idyll, A Taste for Honey is firmly embedded in the Golden Age detective genre. Yet it also seeks answers for wide-reaching questions about personal responsibility and ethics, questions which anticipate later developments in the genre. While definitely a paean to the Holmesian tradition, A Taste for Honey does not rely on simple answers—we may know whodunnit, but the question of why is altogether more disturbing." Dr. Stacy Gillis, Lecturer in Modern and Contemporary Literature at Newcastle University, UK. www.ncl.ac.uk/elll/staff/profile/stacy.gillis

"More than 30 years before Nicholas Meyer's The Seven Percent Solution opened the floodgates of Sherlockian imitation, H.F. Heard's A Taste for Honey was the first significant book-length Sherlock Holmes pastiche, and it remains one of the very best. This new edition should be welcomed by all lovers of classic detective fiction." Jon L. Breen, noted mystery and crime-detective wiriter, scholar and critic

"The narrator of A Taste for Honey is a prissy dilettante who closely guards his privacy from the hubbub of the tranquil English village he has moved to. Mr. Silchester likes honey, is persnickety about its quality and therefore seeks out the only beekeeper in the neighborhood. But there is something odd about his supplier, who is unfriendlier than Silchester himself. When the beekeeper's wife dies horribly of bee stings, Silchester becomes the next-intended victim of a killer who is experimentally breeding fatal bees." February 9, 1981, Newsweek review

"I thought I knew all the tricks of the horror trade but I never expected to have my hair stand on end when a bee flew in through an open window... A triumph of ingenuity and horrific simplicity." Boris Karloff

"...the most original and enchanting crime story of the year." Christopher Morley

"A veritable triumph of modern mystery...packing plenty of horror." Will Cuppy, The New York Herald Tribune

"Slow-moving, whimsical, somewhat weightily allusive, this tale is definitely caviar to the general; in a sense, it may be called a bookman's book." New York Times Book Review

"Terrifying...perfectly done...The most original contribution in many years." Vincent Starrett

"Starting in the 1970s there was a proliferation of Sherlock Holmes pastiches that is still going on today. The vast majority of them have been written for the author's self-aggrandizement. They also don't capture the essence of the Victorian era (and some don't even try). Professor Moriarty, Irene Adler, a long chase scene, an international crisis, famous personages - one or all of them are often present. The more absurd ones have Holmes trekking off to the United States to solve a case. Having him get married or piloting an airplane as an octogenarian even occurs in several instances. The best thing about all these imitations is they show how good the original stories were by comparison. Thank goodness H. F. Heard eschewed the above. His Mr. Mycroft tales are not pretentious but instead encompass the style of the 'old-fashioned' mystery. A delightful read!" Paul D. Herbert, founder of the Cincinnati-based Sherlockian society, The Tankerville Club; member of the Baker Street Irregulars; author of The Sincerest Form of Flattery and articles for The Baker Street Journal, the Sherlock Holmes Journal, and Baker Street Miscellanea

It really is amazing the things you learn late in life that you can't believe you never came across at an earlier age. A lot of times it makes me feel rather uneducated in the genre and world that I have prided myself on being involved and knowledgeable in for so many years. That's basically how the book A Taste for Honey hit me as I was reading it. There were so many things I learned from this brilliant piece of murder-mystery fiction. Sherlock Holmes had a brother named Mycroft? As a Holmes fan, I should have known this. How has this eluded me for 36 years? That was the first piece of information I learned that put me in my place. Also, author H.F. Heard worked with an editorial board at Oxford University with H.G. Wells, Aldous Huxley, and Julian Huxley. He worked with H.G. Wells! Now there's a reference for you.

A Taste for Honey is many things. It's a great crime story. A brilliant murder mystery. An education on the wonders of bees. A study of morality. All of these things make up the properties of this little novel. Did the author know what he was accomplishing? It's hard to know.

Without going into too much detail on all the events that take place in the book, here's a quick synopsis. Sydney Silchester is a lover of honey. He gets his honey from a local beekeeper named Heregrove. After Heregrove's wife dies from being attacked by the bees, all of the hives are destroyed. This leaves poor Silchester to find a new honey supplier. He finds one in the form of Mr. Mycroft. An interesting man, who seems to have quite a knowledge of investigation and also is a beekeeper. It is never revealed if this Mycroft is indeed Holmes' brother. From the extremely intelligent deductions and attention Mycroft pays to details, some have actually speculated that it is Holmes himself, using a different name to keep anonymity. Maybe he had moved to the country to escape the ruckus of an evergrowing modernized London. Who's to know, which only adds to the brilliance and mystery of the novel. To keep things simple, after a change of events, Mycroft and Silchester begin an investigation of Heregrove. Did he kill his wife? Is he trying to kill Silchester because he thinks he knows too much and is too suspicious? It's really almost too much to try to describe to you. You need to read it for yourself.

All I can say is, the novel is very intelligently written, as you would expect after reading the small bio on the author. His attention to detail is wonderfully done. It reminds me of Ian Fleming's descriptions of food and clothing in the James Bond novels. Every little detail and thought of the main character (this is written in first person from the point of view of Silchester) is delicately drawn out.

If you love love smart and well-written murder mysteries, my advice is to read this novel immediately. First published in 1941, it can definitely be regarded as a classic that many may have overlooked or never heard of. My advice is don't read the Foreword before you read the actual story. It had what I would call some spoilers that might prove more interesting reading in hindsight. If you have trouble finding it or can only locate it at an astronomical price through Amazon or E-bay, it is actually being re-published by Blue Dolphin Publishing later this year. You can go to www.geraldheard.com for more info on ordering and the author's other works.

We had the great pleasure to do an interview with John Roger Barrie, literary executor of H. F. Heard, whose 1941 novel A Taste for Honey was adapted into The Deadly Bees. Barrie runs the official Heard website at www.geraldheard.com.

AP: Have you seen The Deadly Bees on DVD?

JRB: Yes. Legend Films did a superb restoration job.

AP: The movie is based on the novel A Taste for Honey by H. F. Heard. I’ve read the book, which is a very smart, taut murder mystery.

JRB: A Taste for Honey sold more copies than any of Heard’s 38 major books, about half a million, which was a huge amount for its day. Christopher Morley and Boris Karloff praised it, among others.

AP: I understand the book will soon be reissued.

JRB: We’re aiming for this fall.

AP: The book’s main character is Mr. Mycroft. Is he intended to be Mycroft Holmes, Sherlock’s brother?

JRB: That remains a mystery. Heard never said. By the same token, he never refuted those who claimed it was Sherlock.

AP: Didn’t Heard write some other Mr. Mycroft novels?

JRB: There were two more, which we’ll eventually be reissuing. Heard wrote other fiction as well. His collection of eight short stories The Great Fog was just reissued last June.

AP: The Mr. Mycroft character does not appear in The Deadly Bees.

JRB: We’re careful to state that The Deadly Bees in very loosely adapted from A Taste for Honey. In many instances the setting, plot, and characters have been changed, so that the movie often bears little or no semblance to the book. Mycroft the investigator becomes Manfred the villain. The narrator Sydney Silchester morphs into Vicki Robbins. The rural countryside of Ashton Clearwater turns into Seagull Island. The wife and dog are stung to death onscreen, whereas in the book the wife’s death is related after the fact, while the dog—a mastiff, not cuddly little Tess—succumbed to only one bee. And so forth.

AP: Do you think Amicus Productions massacred the novel?

JRB: I would say the novel inspired the movie. But the movie they made is a decidedly different from the book. Those who purchase the book should not expect to read about pop singer Vicki Robbins or Ralph Harvrove’s favorite pub.

AP: In the June 2008 issue of Little Shoppe of Horrors, Philip Nutman’s "The Uncensored History of Amicus Productions" reveals that the novel had been changed by Milton Subotsky of Amicus, then by Paramount, and then scripted by Robert Bloch. Then director Freddie Francis had a comedy writer rewrite Bloch’s script.

JRB: Well, that pretty much explains why the movie is not a strict adaptation of the book.

AP: How did the production come about?

JRB: Amicus’ Max Rosenberg first contacted the publisher of A Taste for Honey in May 1963 about obtaining motion-picture rights to the novel. Max stated that in about 1948 his partner Milton Subotsky had discussed with Heard the possibility of making a play from his novel. After all, Christopher Morley glowingly wrote in 1946, “A Taste for Honey is one of the greatest undramatized plays that has ever been written.”

AP: And so negotiations proceeded smoothly?

JRB: The extensive correspondence over negotiations indicates a fairly smooth ride, punctuated with a few bumps in the road. In October 1965, Heard and Amicus reached an agreement. By February 7, 1966 the principal photography had been completed. By then it was titled The Deadly Bees. It’s further documented that the picture went over budget due primarily to its being shot in Techniscope.

AP: What did Heard think of the movie?

JRB: Unfortunately Heard suffered a major, incapacitating stroke in October 1966 so, for better or for worse, he never saw the movie. For that matter, he never saw the February 22, 1955 ABC-TV adaptation of A Taste for Honey that was titled The Sting of Death, and which starred Boris Karloff.

AP: Many reviewers have trounced the film.

JRB: Not you. Not George Reis of DVD Drive-In. Sure, it has some hokey moments, and it’s a bit slow at times. But for what it is—the first-ever killer bees flick—it’s really not that bad. It’s grossed $3M since its release in April 1967. It served as a platform for Ron Wood’s first rock group.

I think that it was miscast in its genre. It’s billed as a horror film, but it’s not. If one views it as a mystery-suspense story set in a claustrophobic English hamlet, populated with characters who range from semi-neurotic to sociopathic, and featuring a few crazed bees, I think it holds its own.

AP: Anything you would like to say in closing?

JRB: When I spoke with Max in 2002, he referred to the book as “a splendid novel.” He’s right. I believe it’s time to rethink the movie. As you write in your review, “I think that the film deserves another look.”

ISBN: 978-1-57733-215-2

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