Author Lisa O'Donnell's new novel "The Death of Bees" tells the story of two sisters who find their parents dead, bury them in the backyard, and how they go about living their life in their parent's absence. O'Donnell speaks to Npr.org about writing the book, her inspirations and what the book has a grim and gory first few chapters.

The novel opens with these lines:

"Today is Christmas Eve. Today is my birthday. Today I am fifteen. Today I buried my parents in the backyard.

"Neither of them were beloved."

O'Donnell reveals that she intended for the story to actually be a screenplay but as she penned the first few lines of the story she decided on making it a novel. She revealed that the idea of the story was to have a lonely girl who as neglected and alone but then she came up with the concept of two sisters. Initially O'Donnell thought of sending their parents away on a holiday so as to gave the concept of these two girls growing up without their parents a foundation. However, according to O'Donnell the idea of their parents on a holiday was "sick" enough for her. So she decided on killing them instead.

The early chapters of the book have been said to be extremely "gruesome", what with the two sisters burying their parent's bodies in the backyard after the week from their death because the bodies start to decompose.

"Somebody said ... they found it quite difficult to get through those chapters. But I had been humorous before those chapters, so I knew that people would struggle through them because they knew, they were assured of some laughs beyond it," says O'Donnell in an interview with Npr.org

Though the content of the book is filled with drugs, abuses and gore, O'Donnell still thinks the novel is a young adult book. ""I think there's a narrow margin. I mean, I hate saying this, but there are 15-year-olds and there are 15-year-olds. Young girls do fantasize about the absence of their own parents, wishing they weren't around. It's not a nice thing to say but, you know, frustrated teenagers. I don't think that there's anything in there that would surprise your average parent. I think that they're aware of the dangers their children face. And if they're not, they should be," says the author.

The book is priced at $25.99.