I heard so much about how great this book was but when I read it, I was rather disappointed. This book tells the story of a young guy Jacob whose world falls apart on him virtually overnight. He runs away and accidentally joins the circus. The circus of the early 1900's was a terrible place--only concerned with the bottom line. Even the love story through out the book is not a very happy one. All these horrible events are told as the present day, 93 year old Jacob has to deal with the loneliness and sadness of a nursing home.

While this book was really easy to read and the story line was interesting, this was a depressing book. The poor guy Jacob deals with one horrific situation after another in his life. Apparently his life after the circus was pretty good, but we see none of that in the book. It just switches
from the horror of his early life to the current horror of his present life.