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Meredith May  is an award-winning journalist and author of the international bestselling memoir, THE HONEY BUS. She is also a fifth-generation beekeeper.

THE HONEY BUS (HarperCollins/Park Row Books) reveals the life lessons she learned in her grandfather’s Big Sur bee yard that rescued her from a difficult childhood. The book has been published in eighteen countries and translated into eleven languages. She wrote a children’s picture book version of her life story titled MY HIVE, which will be published by Cameron Kids/Abrams Books in 2024.

Her 2020 memoir, LOVING EDIE: How a Dog Afraid of Everything Taught Me To Be Brave, chronicles how her life was upended and ultimately enriched by her clinically anxious golden retriever puppy, Edith.

In 2017 she wrote I, WHO DID NOT DIE, documenting the true story of an Iranian child soldier who chose mercy over murder and risked his life to save an enemy fighter during the Iran-Iraq War.

During her sixteen-year career at the San Francisco Chronicle, her reporting won the PEN USA Literary Award for Journalism, the Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism, and first place feature writing awards from the Society of Professional Journalists and the Associated Press. Her series about an Iraqi boy wounded during the second Gulf War was shortlisted for the Pulitzer Prize.

Meredith is a former professor of  journalism and podcasting at Mills College in Oakland, CA. She lives in Carmel Valley where she spends her time writing, beekeeping, and volunteering for the Monterey Bay Aquarium as a scuba diver.

Photo by Jenn Jackson