Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

Jacob Jankowski is a ninety-something year old man “living” in a nursing home. In his younger days, at the beginning of the Great Depression, he spent seven years traveling with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth. While his mind is no longer as sharp as it once was, he can recall details of those seven years as if they were yesterday. He carries those memories, and a long-kept secret, as he wages a daily war against the indignities of old age.
Sara Gruen’s, Water for Elephants, is a captivating book filled with colorful, complicated characters in a rich, vivid, exotic setting. Gruen has combined a beautiful love story with a page-turning mystery. At the same time, she manages to capture all of the dark splendor and seediness of life under the big top. Gruen takes the reader into the world of the circus, with its peculiar rituals, rules and laws. One can’t help but get swept away with Jacob and his traveling companions as they experience joy and despair in 1930’s America.
Using Jacob’s insightful narration, Gruen also reminds us that an aging body may still house a youthful soul and a passionate spirit. - MM