WATER FOR ELEPHANT [0]
“Lively with historical detail and unexpected turns. . . . Water for Elephants is a rich surprise, a delightful gem springing from a fascinating footnote to history that absolutely deserved to be mined.”
—The Denver Post
“So compelling, so detailed and vivid, that I couldn’t bear to be torn away from it for a single minute.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Gruen unearths a lost world with her rich and surprising portrayal of life in a traveling circus in the ’30s. An emotional tale that will please history buffs—and others.”
—People
“[An] arresting new novel. . . . With a showman’s expert timing, [Gruen] saves a terrific revelation for the final pages, transforming a glimpse of Americana into an enchanting escapist fairy tale. . . . Water for Elephants resembles stealth hits like The Giant’s House, by Elizabeth McCracken, or The Lovely Bones, by Alice Sebold, books that combine outrageously whimsical premises with crowd-pleasing romanticism.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Sara Gruen has written a rare book that is a great story, well written and bearing one of the happiest endings you will ever read.”
—Rona Brinlee, NPR’s Morning Edition
“[This] sprightly tale has a ringmaster’s crowd-pleasing pace.”
—Entertainment Weekly
“Gritty, sensual and charged with dark secrets involving love, murder and a majestic, mute heroine (Rosie the Elephant).”
—Parade
“You’ll get lost in the tatty glamour of Gruen’s meticulously researched world, from spangled equestrian pageantry and the sleazy side show to an ill-fated night at a Chicago speak-easy.”
—The Washington Post
“[A] riveting story. . . . Gruen is an old-fashioned storyteller, who, in keeping with John Updike’s blueprint for fiction, ‘can keep an organized mass of images and characters.’”
—The Toronto Globe and Mail
“Sara Gruen offers love, drama and thrills under the big top. Only the most hardened of audience members will be able to resist.”
—The Tampa Tribune
“A fascinating setting and a richly anecdotal story that is enjoyable right up to the final, inevitable revelation.”
—The Onion
“Gruen sets her story among the freaks and geeks and captive animals of a traveling circus during the Great Depression. It’s a good move. . . . She ratchets up the tension bit by tiny bit, luring us into the weird world of the roustabout and the candy butcher, the fat lady and the cooch coach.”
—Veronique De Turenne, NPR’s Day to Day
“Gruen performs a double trick in her novel: She gives an engrossing picture of circus life as well as a taste of what it’s like to grow old.”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune
“A beautiful book.”
—John Searles, CBS’s The Early Show
“A piercing look at Depression-era circus life, where violence, laughter managed to coexist. . . . Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants captures the sounds, smells and sights of the circus. . . . Delicious.”
—The Charlotte Observer
“Novelist Sara Gruen sweeps her readers off their feet in the opening pages of Water For Elephants—and doesn’t let go until she deposits them at the end of her fantastic tale of passion, madness and fancy. . . . The last notes of Water for Elephants linger long after the book ends. The alternating glamour and squalor of the circus world Gruen expertly conjures may truly be one of the greatest shows.”
—The Grand Rapids Press
“You need this elephant in your life. . . . Water for Elephants is a keeper.”
—Baton Rouge Journal
“Jacob’s search for lost time is vivid and atmospheric, his story told with passion and an eye for the curious and entertaining detail.”
—Bookmarks magazine
“A love letter to a colorful but terrifying past and an exciting story from cover to cover. . . . This is sheer fun.”
—Richmond Times-Dispatch
“Endlessly surprising and superior in its attention to detail, the novel is the unknown adventure saga we can’t believe we’ve never heard.”
—The Kansas City Star
“Vivid, riveting, and surprisingly poignant.”
—Pages
“A rich, rolling epic of a story. It’s like those circus posters of days gone by: ‘You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you won’t believe your eyes.