Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

I can't remember the last time I visited the circus. However, after reading Overton's review I think I might see it in a different way (if the author can hold my interest), then I am willing to look past the fact that clowns roam the circus, just like flies roam... You know what I mean. Enjoy the review.

Water for Elephants

I do not read romance novels as a general rule. I have nothing against them, but I generally prefer non-fiction or action novels. So I was pleasantly surprised when I read Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen. At its heart it is a love story, really a love triangle. Jacob, who has just dropped out of college, finds himself falling for Marlena, who is married to the abusive August. And that story is well drawn, and definitely holds the reader’s interest throughout the novel. Jacob is such a good man, and yet is put in such a difficult situation; it is fascinating watching him try to navigate the morality of his precarious situation.But what really makes this novel shine is the setting. I do not like circuses. I never go to circuses. I have turned down free tickets to go the circus. So I have no real love of the circus, but in Gruen’s capable hands the circus came alive in a way I could never imagine.

The novel is set in the depression, and Jacob catches up with a train circus. The lingo, the description, and the social order on the train are all just fascinating realities that make this novel so interesting, and so much more than just a romance novel. It makes you want to go to a big top somewhere and spend the day looking at the things which are described in such detail in the novel.

The other layer to the novel is that the entire story is being told by Jacob in a nursing home, as he is now 93 and remembering his life as a young man. This detail allows the novel to explore aging, death and the purpose of life. Jacob as an old man can be very cranky and forgetful, but he is still lovable. And the way the book ends in one of the best touches of the entire novel, showing that even at 93 Jacob still has some life left in him. This was really a fantastic book, and it works on so many different levels, that most people will find something to enjoy.