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A review by elleyotter
Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
5.0
Water for Elephants had a sort of tatty beauty about it that I absolutely fell in love with. Glitz, glamour, and grit. Sara Gruen's writing style is very real, natural and flowing, while at the same time exciting and prodding you into a frenzy to know what will come next. The characters are all very REAL and multi-dimensional, and no one is out-and-out a good guy or a villian. Like real people, Gruen's characters are made up of good characteristics and bad, painted in shades of grey and cast into situations where they make the wrong choices for the right reasons (and vice versa).
The plot... Oh, the plot. It's JUST bizarre enough to make the story compelling, just believable enough to suck you into Gruen's world. A tale of running away to join the circus during the Great Depression, about the illusions and grandeur of the circus and its (often bizarre) folk, of love and adventure and danger and excitement.
I started reading Water for Elephants at 8:30 on a Saturday evening and didn't put it down until 3 a.m. when I'd turned the last page AND read the author interviews and author's note at the back of the book. It's extremely well-researched, which likely attributes to the very natural flow and realistic setting of the book. I was shocked to learn that Gruen took many of the more outrageous events of her book from real-life facts (and legends).
Water for Elephants was beautifully written, and I absolutely recommend it to everyone, everywhere.
The plot... Oh, the plot. It's JUST bizarre enough to make the story compelling, just believable enough to suck you into Gruen's world. A tale of running away to join the circus during the Great Depression, about the illusions and grandeur of the circus and its (often bizarre) folk, of love and adventure and danger and excitement.
I started reading Water for Elephants at 8:30 on a Saturday evening and didn't put it down until 3 a.m. when I'd turned the last page AND read the author interviews and author's note at the back of the book. It's extremely well-researched, which likely attributes to the very natural flow and realistic setting of the book. I was shocked to learn that Gruen took many of the more outrageous events of her book from real-life facts (and legends).
Water for Elephants was beautifully written, and I absolutely recommend it to everyone, everywhere.