The Final Confession of Mabel Stark
by Robert Hough | Literature & Fiction | This book has not been rated.
ISBN: 0871138700 Global Overview for this book
ISBN: 0871138700 Global Overview for this book
2 journalers for this copy...
Synopsis (from Barnes & Noble)
In the 1910s and '20s, during the golden age of the big top, Mabel Stark was the superstar of the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus, and one of America's most eccentric celebrities. A tiny, curvaceous Kentucky blonde in a white leather bodysuit, Mabel was brazen, sexually adventurous, and suicidally courageous. The Final Confession of Mabel Stark is Robert Hough's brilliant, highly acclaimed novelization of her fantastic life. It is 1968 — Mabel is just turning eighty and is about to lose her job at Jungleland, a Southern California game park. Devastated by the loss of her cats, she looks back on her life and her five husbands: the fifth would one day be tragically mauled by her one true love, her ferocious yet amorous 550-pound Bengal tiger Rajah. Starting with her escape from a mental institution to begin her circus career as a burlesque dancer, Mabel's exquisitely voiced confession is a live wire of dark secrets, broken dreams, and comic escapades. It is a brilliant, exhilarating story of an America before television and movies, when the spectacle of the circus reigned and an unlikely woman captured the public imagination with her singular charm and audacity.
USA Today
The Final Confession of Mabel Stark is one of the most rollicking, good-time books of the year. — Virginia Holman
Biography
Robert Hough has made his name writing narrative-driven nonfiction about characters "who live beyond our culture's conception of normalcy," for such magazines as Saturday Night and Toronto Life. Circus life in general and Mabel Stark in particular are tailor-made subjects for his first novel, in that the circus was a travelling sanctuary for misfits, waifs and strays — including Mabel Stark.
In the 1910s and '20s, during the golden age of the big top, Mabel Stark was the superstar of the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus, and one of America's most eccentric celebrities. A tiny, curvaceous Kentucky blonde in a white leather bodysuit, Mabel was brazen, sexually adventurous, and suicidally courageous. The Final Confession of Mabel Stark is Robert Hough's brilliant, highly acclaimed novelization of her fantastic life. It is 1968 — Mabel is just turning eighty and is about to lose her job at Jungleland, a Southern California game park. Devastated by the loss of her cats, she looks back on her life and her five husbands: the fifth would one day be tragically mauled by her one true love, her ferocious yet amorous 550-pound Bengal tiger Rajah. Starting with her escape from a mental institution to begin her circus career as a burlesque dancer, Mabel's exquisitely voiced confession is a live wire of dark secrets, broken dreams, and comic escapades. It is a brilliant, exhilarating story of an America before television and movies, when the spectacle of the circus reigned and an unlikely woman captured the public imagination with her singular charm and audacity.
USA Today
The Final Confession of Mabel Stark is one of the most rollicking, good-time books of the year. — Virginia Holman
Biography
Robert Hough has made his name writing narrative-driven nonfiction about characters "who live beyond our culture's conception of normalcy," for such magazines as Saturday Night and Toronto Life. Circus life in general and Mabel Stark in particular are tailor-made subjects for his first novel, in that the circus was a travelling sanctuary for misfits, waifs and strays — including Mabel Stark.
Journal Entry 2 by carlissa at Panera Bread - Falls in Miami, Florida USA on Monday, November 9, 2009
Released 14 yrs ago (11/9/2009 UTC) at Panera Bread - Falls in Miami, Florida USA
WILD RELEASE NOTES:
WILD RELEASE NOTES:
in book basket
in book basket
brought home over a year ago but forgot to journal. will one day get around to reading
Moving and need to downsize my book collection so donating to Good Will
