The Indie Bookstore where I work, Content Bookstore in Northfield, Minnesota, has started a Staff Picks Saturday feature on our social media sites. I’ve had four of my favorite books featured thus far and am going to share many of my staff picks here on my blog. First to feature? Well it’s Miss Benson’s Beetle, a novel by Rachel Joyce.

I adore Rachel Joyce’s writing

and two of her books are my absolute favorites – The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry and The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy. I have read The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry three or four times and The Love Song of Miss Queenie Hennessy twice. I wrote about Queenie Hennessy in not just one but two blog posts from 2015, Favorite Reads of 2015 – all set in England and My New Favorite Book!

Even though I’m a fan of Rachel Joyce, I didn’t discover Miss Benson’s Beetle until my friend, Tania, told me she read the book and loved it. So I decided I had to pick up a copy. Fortunately, Content had one on the shelves so I picked it up and started reading it that same evening. I had a hard time putting it down!

Miss Benson’s Beetle is a grand adventure

It’s the 1950s and Miss Margery Benson, a schoolteacher who is quite unhappy with her job, decides to set off from England to an island across the world to search for a golden beetle that may or may not exist. Practically dressed and ready to go with her bug collecting gear, Margery needs a travel companion to help with her expedition. At the last moment, she finds the most unlikely companion in Enid Pretty, a woman clad in a pink suit and sandals who has not one bit of experience that appears will be useful for the journey. Enter a mysterious man who follows them across the ocean, news of a murder back home, and unpredictable weather, and you have a grand adventure like no other!

I could say so much more but will leave you here with my mini-review and let you check out Miss Benson’s Beetle for yourself.

“I stayed up until 2 a.m. (on a work night, even) to finish this book. I just HAD to find out how Miss Benson’s Beetle was going to end. With an unlikely friendship and the search for a golden beetle at its core, Miss Benson’s Beetle is about dealing with the past but not letting it get in the way of a fabulous future. Another hit by Rachel Joyce!”

My Staff Pick Saturday review on Content Bookstore’s Instagram and Facebook sites

I do hope you read Miss Benson’s Beetle and Rachel Joyce’s other fabulous novels. Please let me know if you do!