From the Bookshelf of 2025 & 2026 Reading Challenge…

Water for Elephants

Sara Gruen

Start date: September 1, 2020

Finish date: September 30, 2020

Discussion: November 2025 Group Read

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Showing 2 of -14 topics — 179 comments total

November 2025 Group Read

The Travelling Cat Chronicles: Mid-Reading Discussion
By Winter , Group Reads · 3 posts · 21 views

last updated 13 hours, 27 min ago

The Travelling Cat Chronicles: Pre-Reading Discussion
By Winter , Group Reads · 5 posts · 28 views

last updated 15 hours, 49 min ago

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What Members Thought

May 27, 2008 Rhonda rated it really liked it

This book about a Depression-Era train circus was especially interesting to me because I spent a number of years living in both Venice, FL (where a long-time "winter home" and training facility for the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus was located) and also Sarasota, FL (the final location for the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Clown College - which originated in Venice, FL before moving to Baraboo, WI before it's final relocation back to Sarasota, FL before closing in 1997). Sarasot ...more

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Mar 10, 2010 Judy rated it it was amazing

This is one of those books that I have read several times. I read this book when it was first published, again a year ago, and earlier this week, I listened to the book while coming home from spring break. Water for Elephants is told in flashback by Jacob Jankowski, either 90 or 93 years old and living in an assisted living facility. At age 23, while Jacob is preparing for his final examinations at Cornell's Vet School, his parents are killed in an automobile accident and the bank takes his pare ...more

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Feb 22, 2010 Blessedutopia rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Fabulous story, heartbreaking account of the cruelty to animals but also the cruelty to mis-understood humans. Every bookworm should read this one...the story is just too magnificent

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Apr 28, 2011 Tamarah rated it it was amazing

loved it. hope the movie does it justice

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Jan 24, 2008 Elana rated it liked it

I think this book got a bit more hype than it deserved. Granted, it was interesting to learn about the circus culture in the early days but I really couldn't connect with many of the characters enough to care about the outcome of the story. ...more

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