Water for Elephants

The story, Water for Elephants (by Sara Gruen) is told as a series of memories by Jacob Jankowski, a ninety-three year-old man who lives in a nursing home.

He tells his tale as a 23 year old, almost college grad, whose life is turned upside down by the tragic death of his parents.

With his life all planned the tragic death of his parents sent Jacob on downward sprial that lands him in the employ of , The Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth,a traveling circus.

Based on somewhat true events, this historical fiction, tells of the day to day life for those who lived and worked on a traveling train circus in the 1930s. There are handful of unforgettable characters that make this novel really work.

I mean really, how can you have a traveling circus without the world's fattest woman, a tyrannical ring master, a beautiful showgirl and a temperamental yet lovable elephants?

One thing I really loved about this book was that at the beginning of each chapter (save a few) there were pictures from the real traveling circuses of the 1930's. Makes me want to go out and do some research on them. Pretty interesting subject, I think.

There is a movie coming out at some point, hopefully the screenwriters won't totally screw it up. You can go here to find the full list of cast and crew, Which includes Robert Pattinson, Resse Witherspoon and Christoper Waltz.

I really enjoyed this book and will probably read it again one day. It was a fairly quick and easy read. However, if you are the modest type, I should warn you..... there are some fairly sexual themes throughout the story.

You've been warned!!!

All in All, I thought it was fantastic!

5 stars!!

How many have you read?

"From the moment I picked up your book until I laid it down, I was convulsed with laughter. Someday I intend reading it." -- Groucho Marx

100 Books People should have Read

The BBC believes most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here. How do your reading habits stack up?

1. Pride and Prejudice- Jane Austen
2.The Lord of the Rings-JRR Tolkien
3.Jane Eyre- Charlotte Bronte
4.Harry Potter Series- JK Rowling
5.To Kill a Mockingbird- Harper Lee
6.The Bible
7.Wuthering Heights- Emily Bronte
8.Nineteen Eighty-Four- George Orwell
9.His Dark Materials- Philip Pullman
10.Great Expectations- Charles Dickens
11.Little Woman- Louis M. Alcott
12.Tess of the D'Urbervilles- Thomas Hardy
13.Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare ( This really should be it's own list!)
15. Rebecca- Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit- JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong- Sebastian Faulks
18. Catcher in the Rye- J.D. Salinger
19. The Time Traveler's Wife- Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch- George Eliot
21.Gone with the Wind- Margaret Mitchel
22. The Great Gatsby- F. Scott Fitzgerald
23.Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24. War and Peace- Leo Tolstoy
25. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy- Douglas Adams
26. Brideshead Revisited- Evelyn Waugh
27. Crime and Punishment- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28. Grapes of Wrath- John Steinback
29. Alice in Wonderland- Lewis Carroll
30. The Wind in the Willows- Kenneth Grahame
31. Anna Karenina- Leo Tolstoy
32. David Copperfield- Charles Dickens
33. Chronicles of Narnia- C.S. Lewis
34. Emma- Jane Austen
35.Persuasion- Jane Austen
36. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe- C.S. Lewis (Why is this not included with number 33?)
37. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hossein
38. Captain Corelli's Mandolin- Louis De Bernieres
39.Memoirs of a Geisha- Arthur Golden
40. Winnie the Pooh- A.A. Milne
41. Animal Farm- George Orwell
42. The Da Vinci Code- Dan Brown
43. One Hundred Years of Solitude- Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44. A Prayer for Owen Meaney- John Irving
45. The Woman in White- Wilkie Collins
46. Anne of Green Gables- L.M. Montgomery
47. Far From the Madding Crowd- Thomas Hardy
48. The Handmaid's Tale- Margaret Atwood
49. Lord of the Flies- William Golding
50. Atonement- Ian McEwan
51. Life of Pi- Yann Martel
52. Dune- Frank Herbert
53. Cold Comfort Farm- Stella Gibbons
54. Sense and Sensibility- Jane Austen
55. A Suitable Boy- Vikram Seth
56. The Shadow of the Wind- Carlos Ruiz Zafo
57. A Tale of Two Cities- Charles Dickens
58. Brave New World- Aldous Huxley
59. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time- Mark Haddon
60. Love in the Time of Cholera- Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61. Of Mice and Men- John Steinback
62. Lolita- Vladimir Nabokov
63. The Secret History- Donna Tratt
64. The Lovely Bones- Alice Sebold
65. Count of Monte Cristo- Alexandre Dumas
66. On the Road- Jack Kerouac
67. Jude the Obscure- Thomas Hardy
68. Bridget Jone's Diary- Helen Fielding
69. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70. Moby Dick- Herman Melville
71. Oliver Twist- Charles Dickens
72. Dracula- Bram Stoker
73. The Secret Garden- Frances Hodgson Burnett
74. Notes from a Small Island- Bill Bryson
75. Ulysses- James Joyce
76. The Inferno- Dante
77. Swallows and Amazons- Arthur Ransome
78. Germinal- Emile Zola
79. Vanity Fair- William Makepeace Thackeray
80. Possession- A.S. Byatt
81. A Christmas Carol- Charles Dickens
82. Cloud Atlas- David Mitchell
83. The Color Purple- Alice Walker
84. The Remains of the Day- Kazuo Ishiguro
85. Madame Bovary- Gustave Flaubert
86. A Fine Balance- Rohinton Mistry
87. Charlotte's Web- E.B. White
88. The Five People You Meet in Heaven- Mitch Albom
89. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90.The Faraway Tree Collection- Enid Blyton
91. Heart of Darkness- Joseph Conrad
92. The Little Prince- Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93.The Wasp Factory- Iain Banks
94.Watership Down- Richard Adams
95. A Confederacy of Dunces- John Kennedy Toole
96. A Town like Alice- Nevil Shute
97. The Three Musketeers- Alexandre Dumas
98. Hamlet- William Shakespeare
99. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory- Roald Dahl
100. Les Miserables- Victor Hugo


The number I have read = 14 ( shown in bold)
The number I have sitting on shelf waiting to be read = 7

How many have you read?

Lucky Man

We all know him as Alex P. Keaton or Marty McFly. I, myself and my friends grew up watching him. We loved him and I'll admit I still do. I honestly think that he is one of my favorite people. Well of the people I don't actually know. Although after reading this book I feel I know him that much better.

Michael J. Fox's memoir Lucky Man, is exactly that. A memoir. He writes about his childhood, his career and his diagnoses of Parkinson's Disease in 1990/91. He tells of the good, the bad, the ugly, the beautiful and the wonderful. He talks about life. His life.

Like I mentioned before he is one of my favorite people. That's one reason I was so excited to read this book (and his other two as well....reviews will follow later!) and of course I read it with his voice in my head. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone and you should go read it right now! It's not a particularly fast read but once you get going you won't want to stop, no matter how long it takes you.

Despite the feeling I've had of late of being to generous with my "stars" I still give this one 5 of 5!

Also, I think autobiographies are becoming my favorite genre for reading. I love to look into the lives of others, guess I'm just a little too nosy sometimes!

Marley and Me

"I laughed, I cried, It moved me Bob."
--Larry the Cucumber



I have fallen in love with this story! John Grogan has a way of simple bringing you in and making you feel like you were actually there. This story is heartwarming, heartbreaking, wonderful, rolling on the floor funny and balling your eyes out sad. It will take you through every emotion know to man but it will be worth it.

Like Julia and Julia, I watched the movie first, so through out the entire novel I had Owen Wilson in my head. And I have to say Owen Wilson in my head isn't so bad, he can be pretty funny! If you are an animal lover, especially a dog lover, you will love this book.

I'm sure you have heard by now, unless you live under a rock and if you are living on a rock you probably aren't reading something on internet so let's just safely assume you aren't under a rock, you know this story has a somewhat sad ending. But read it anyway, I wasn't sure I would be able to handle it and in some ways I wasn't. Reading about the end of Marley's long and happy life I couldn't help but think of my own puppy and hoping that last day with him with be a long way off. I bawled like a big fat baby!!! But it was worth it, this is one of the greatest stories I have ever read and will read it again and again.

If you haven't seen this movie or read the book I suggest you do both. If you have seen the movie but not read the book, the screen play stays pretty true to the story. All Marley's antics actually happened and there are tons more just like them!

5 of 5 stars!!!

OH Yeah, if you are interested in reading more about Marley or seeing photos check out John Grogan's page, there are also links to other Marley Books.