Every once in a while, there's a book that seems written for you. It speaks to you in a way books you love haven't. You don't just visualize the author's words, they leap off the page, and rather than watching the movie in your mind, you are living it. You feel the pain, the joy, the laughter. When the book is finished, you're more than disappointed. You feel invigorated, and you search eagerly through the author's books to see what, along the same vein, she has to offer. You search readers' recommendations to find the books that leave the same imprint on you. Inevitably, though the books satiate your appetite, they don't resonate in the same way. Welcome to Sara Gruen's Water for Elephants.

In the prologue, we're privy to a murder. We see it as Jacob sees it, and tries in vain to stop it. Though the victim and murderer aren't named, as we're introduced to them, it becomes clear in our mind who filled those roles.

Then we start from the beginning, in the midst of the Great Depression. Jacob is in class, during the final few weeks at Cornell preparing for his finals before he becomes a doctor of veterinary medicine.
In a moment, the Dean will enter and change his path. Jacob was to go home and set up shop with his father, working with the animals in his town. Instead, he goes home to identify the remains of his mother and father. He sees the sign his father added to their on-site practice: Jankowitz and Son Veterinary Practice. After identifying his family, he visits the lawyer, who tells him he has nothing. The bank owns the house and everything in it. The explanation as to why his parents mortgaged the house shatters him. He returns to school to finish his finals and finds that he can't.

Jacob flees and seeing a train pass, tries to jump aboard. Once on, he realizes it is a circus train. An old man, Camel, vouches for him and works to get him a job within.
As soon as the boss finds he is Ivy League educated, degree or no degree, he becomes the animal man. With such a prestigious job within, he straddles the division between the higher ups and performers, and the lower echelon who helped secure his place.

One performer in particular, Marlena, fascinates him. She reminds him physically of the girl he left behind at school, and emotionally captivates him. She matches his love of animals. Married to August, who has the boss' ear, she is off-limits, but a friendship develops anyway.

Later comes Rosie, an elephant pilfered from a circus that has gone defunct. Rosie suffers August's wrath many, many times. Jacob is stunned by her human like qualities. Understanding, pain, anger, empathy, happiness all emanate from her big brown eyes.

Following the story, I felt all of the emotions Rosie feels (except perhaps, the pain). Astonishment at the goings on to keep the circus running smoothly. The love Jacob develops for many people who help him in the course of creating a new life for himself, free of the memories surrounding his past. Sadness at the loss of animals, anger at the treatment of the animals and the red lighting of, as they're called today, carnies.

The characters came alive to me, as did the setting. As soon as I finished this book, I eagerly went to Sara Gruen's website to read excerpts of other novels she had written. While good, they didn't capture me the way this did. And I wanted more of this. So I went to Amazon's recommendations Disappointedly, I moved on to Barnes and Noble. No dice. So I tried the next best thing. Research. I wanted to read first hand accounts of the circus the way it was back then. The more I read, the more I craved.

Then, as though they knew my hunger, work offered me discounted tickets to the circus. I'm still debating. On the one hand, it's the circus. Elephants that feel things like people do! Horses that synchronize! How can I say no? On the other hand, it's not the 1920s. It's almost 100 years later. What if it's not the same? I mean true, we're in the middle of a depression (point 4 of pros: It's almost the same!). But people are categorically different than they were then. Theoretically, this extends to performers as well right?

But alas, I have chosen to forego the circus at this moment, because I fear, like the recommendations of Barnes and Noble and Amazon, it may fall short. So I will hold onto the satisfaction this book gave me, and the hunger for more of the same. Hopefully, there will be another book that catches my attention like this one. And soon.