Journal Entry 1 by leeny37 from Melbourne, Victoria Australia on Sunday, March 08, 2009

Received through BookMooch.com - I mooched this specifically for the Southern Cross 2009 Monthly Exchange on BookObsessed.com.

From Amazon.com:
With its spotlight on elephants, Gruen's romantic page-turner hinges on the human-animal bonds that drove her debut and its sequel (Riding Lessons and Flying Changes)—but without the mass appeal that horses hold. The novel, told in flashback by nonagenarian Jacob Jankowski, recounts the wild and wonderful period he spent with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth, a traveling circus he joined during the Great Depression. When 23-year-old Jankowski learns that his parents have been killed in a car crash, leaving him penniless, he drops out of Cornell veterinary school and parlays his expertise with animals into a job with the circus, where he cares for a menagerie of exotic creatures[...] He also falls in love with Marlena, one of the show's star performers—a romance complicated by Marlena's husband, the unbalanced, sadistic circus boss who beats both his wife and the animals Jankowski cares for. Despite her often clichéd prose and the predictability of the story's ending, Gruen skillfully humanizes the midgets, drunks, rubes and freaks who populate her book. 

Journal Entry 2 by leeny37 at Forest Hill, Victoria Australia on Saturday, January 02, 2010

Released 2 yrs ago (1/7/2010 UTC) at Forest Hill, Victoria Australia

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:

Sending this wishlist book to Ms. January, bemaia, as part of the Southern Cross 2009 Monthly Exchange on BookObsessed.com. Enjoy! :) 

Journal Entry 3 by bemaia from Sydney, New South Wales Australia on Friday, March 19, 2010

Beautiful book, loved reading it!

Sent to Mrs. March, Jubby, as part of the Southern Cross Exchange on BookObsessed.com 

Journal Entry 4 by jubby from Sydney, New South Wales Australia on Monday, March 22, 2010

Thank you Leeny37. I received this in the post today.