Product Description
As a young man, Jacob Jankowski was tossed by fate onto a rickety train that was home to the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. It was the early part of the great Depression, and for Jacob, now ninety, the circus world he remembers was both his salvation and a living hell. A veterinary student just shy of a degree, he was put in charge of caring for the circus menagerie. It was there that he met Marlena, the beautiful equestrian star married to August, the charismatic but twisted animal trainer. And he met Rosie, an untrainable elephant who was the great gray hope for this third-rate traveling show. The bond that grew among this unlikely trio was one of love and trust, and, ultimately, it was their only hope for survival.

Amazon.com Review
Jacob Jankowski says: "I am ninety. Or ninety-three. One or the other." At the beginning of Water for Elephants, he is living out his days in a nursing home, hating every second of it. His life wasn't always like this, however, because Jacob ran away and joined the circus when he was twenty-one. It wasn't a romantic, carefree decision, to be sure. His parents were killed in an auto accident one week before he was to sit for his veterinary medicine exams at Cornell. He buried his parents, learned that they left him nothing because they had mortgaged everything to pay his tuition, returned to school, went to the exams, and didn't write a single word. He walked out without completing the test and wound up on a circus train. The circus he joins, in Depression-era America, is second-rate at best. With Ringling Brothers as the standard, Benzini Brothers is far down the scale and pale by comparison. Water for Elephants is the story of Jacob's life with this circus. Sara Gruen spares no detail in chronicling the squalid, filthy, brutish circumstances in which he finds himself. The animals are mangy, underfed or fed rotten food, and abused. Jacob, once it becomes known that he has veterinary skills, is put in charge of the "menagerie" and all its ills. Uncle Al, the circus impresario, is a self-serving, venal creep who slaps people around because he can. August, the animal trainer, is a certified paranoid schizophrenic whose occasional flights into madness and brutality often have Jacob as their object. Jacob is the only person in the book who has a handle on a moral compass and as his reward he spends most of the novel beaten, broken, concussed, bleeding, swollen and hungover. He is the self-appointed Protector of the Downtrodden, and... he falls in love with Marlena, crazy August's wife. Not his best idea. The most interesting aspect of the book is all the circus lore that Gruen has so carefully researched. She has all the right vocabulary: grifters, roustabouts, workers, cooch tent, rubes, First of May, what the band plays when there's trouble, Jamaican ginger paralysis, life on a circus train, set-up and take-down, being run out of town by the "revenooers" or the cops, and losing all your hooch. There is one glorious passage about Marlena and Rosie, the bull elephant, that truly evokes the magic a circus can create. It is easy to see Marlena's and Rosie's pink sequins under the Big Top and to imagine their perfect choreography as they perform unbelievable stunts. The crowd loves it--and so will the reader. The ending is absolutely ludicrous and really quite lovely. --Valerie Ryan

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 4.5 based on 1783 reviews)

Colourful and atmospheric by Helen Simpson (Leeds, England)

4 Stars
November 08, 2009
Circus life, during the American Depression. Told in the first person by Jacob Jankowski a young college boy who is suddenly orphaned and penniless and finds himself literally on board the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth! There's a prologue where we discover a secret which Jacob has kept for seventy years then we begin the story, alternating between 1931 and the modern day with an elderly Jacob. Very easy to read...I found myself flicking pages quickly. Gruen seems to capture the circus's attraction and glitz as well as it's often uncomfortable reality. The hierarchy from the roustabouts to the performers and bosses is fascinating and Gruen's descriptions bring to life the days when circuses had trains (conjuring up images from Dumbo!) The novel pulls you in, starting off slowly and ends up unputdownable as you have to find out what eventually happened/happens. I found the contrast between the way the Jacob of 'then' and 'now' is treated, both startling and thought provoking and ultimately I just really enjoyed reading about something I had little knowledge of, with a good twist in the tale.

action adventure romance historical novel circus lore by Dr. June M. Reinisch (New York USA)

5 Stars
November 06, 2009
great. everything you want in a great novel from characters you really care about to surpriises to viilains you hate to real adventure to circus history and personal romance. hard to put down.

If I Ran The Circus by Bitsy Bling (Seattle, WA)

4 Stars
November 04, 2009
I had a hard time putting this book down, not because it was action packed or particularly fast paced, but because the development, sincerity and engaging voice of the main character at both stages of his life was refreshingly flawless. The voice remains true and believable throughout the entire narrative and is well developed giving me a clear picture of who Jacob Jankowski is and why I should care. Because this is achieved, I am fully invested in his world and experiences. Like wise, the supporting characters are dynamic and interesting, but even given their deformities, whether physical or psychologically, they never over shadow the main character. The book provokes thoughts on treatment and intelligence of animals, economy, marriage, class, race, healthcare, friendship and family. As well as, it forces us to take a hard look at how our culture deals with the elderly. "Sometimes the monotony of bingo and sing-alongs and ancient dusty people parked in the hallway in wheelchairs makes me long for death. Particularly when I remember that I'm one of the ancient dusty people, filed away like some worthless tchotchke." If I had to give a 'con' to the book, it would be toward the ending when the author simplifies Jacob's journey with a 'run away with the circus' solution. However, this does not disappoint and in a way is the logical path and most appropriate ending given the character's circumstances and alternative. It is the happiest it can get.

I'm not easily grabbed by books by jane (Mid-Atlantic)

5 Stars
November 03, 2009
I'm not easily grabbed by books, but this one did it fine fashion. I usually read maybe 20 minutes before I go to bed, but I finished this book in four nights including two nights where I stayed up two hours reading. It was absolutely wonderful from start to finish.

Need Tea Reviews by Krystle Yanagihara (Honolulu, HI)

4 Stars
November 01, 2009
I've heard so many good things about this book, not to mention I've read the author's previous book, Riding Lessons, so I was curious about this one. Her writing was fantastic in this book, a great improvement over her previous ones, though there was the odd word choice here and there that I raised my eyebrow to. I loved how we got to see the daily life of Jacob as a 90-year-old man, who looks back on his days of his youth, and then we see the true story evolve from his younger version's eyes. I loved and felt quite a bit of sympathy for the main character when he was older, everything was done realistically; from the passage of time that wore down his body, his inability to do things that he once did, the loss of his ability to remember and keep track of things he should know, and the heartbreak he feels at being left behind by those he loved. Pictures head the start of each chapter from the pov of the younger Jacob, with amazing insight to the circuses of old. I loved the amount of research she incorporated into the story and it brought a great sense of realism to the already fluid prose. Each of her characters had their flaws, quirks, and even the animals were fresh and had their own voice. Rosie especially was a neat one. I felt sorry for her a lot of times because I'm quite sure the way she was treated probably occurs with great frequency at a lot of circuses or performing acts. I'm not sure about the ending though, it seemed too neatly wrapped up, and the rising tension to the climax of the book wasn't as striking as I thought it could be. The prologue, in my opinion, could have been cut out because it sort of took the fun out of the ending. But anywho, great book. I wasn't disappointed.

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