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The Elephant Keeper (Hardcover)

by Christopher Nicholson (Author)

3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

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Product Details

Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: William Morrow; 1 edition (Jul 27 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0061651605
ISBN-13: 978-0061651601
Product Dimensions: 23.1 x 15 x 2.8 cm
Shipping Weight: 477 g

Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

Amazon.ca Sales Rank: #104,026 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

Review

"Nicholson's light touch and sly humor ensures that the animal-human dialogue is entirely natural and intensely moving. (An) exceptional novel." (Boston Globe )

"This elegant story is not just for animal lovers. In it, readers see how the bonds of friendship go beyond time, age or species. Definitely one to put on your "to read" list." (Deseret Morning News )

"While deftly portraying 18th century village and estate life as well as the dark, fog-bound streets of London, The Elephant Keeper examines themes such as human choice, fate and the cruel British class system." (Minneapolis Star Tribune )

"A sensitive boy suddenly becomes groom to Timothy and Jenny, the first pair of young elephants brought into England in the 1700s. This informative, engaging and moving book has clear insight into the impact of poverty, alienation and isolation that is as relevant today as it was then." (San Francisco Chronicle Book Review )

"An extended meditation on human needs and how our choices shape a better or lesser existance. [A] poignant, heartfelt novel." (St. Louis Post-Dispatch )

"An endearing account of a virtually telepathic relationship between man and animal." (Booklist )

"[A] remarkable debut. An unforgettable picture of an elephant/human relationship so close that, as the elephant learns to think like a human, she teaches her human to think like an elephant. This is one of the best books of the year." (BookPage )

"A captivatingly original novel.This is a wonderful feat of story-telling, remarkable for its ability to wrench your heart without resorting to easy sentimentality." (Daily Mail (London) )

"Endearing...Like the elephant at its centre, Nicholson's book is gentle, profound and sweet-natured." (The Guardian )

"Christopher Nicholson traces the arc of Tom and Jenny's surprising journey with delicate empathy. He confronts sex, violence and power, but he does not shy away from less dramatic themes, such as gentleness and companionship, which help to make The Elephant Keeper such a rewarding book." (Times Literary Supplement (London) )

"[Nicholson's] lush new novel of the late 18th century.Jenny is a magnificent character.She gives the book its weight, in every sense.the sheer richness of the story's texture. The Elephant Keeper evokes 18th-century village and estate life beautifully, and is stuffed with fascinating data from medical and veterinary history." (The Independent (UK) )

"A pleasingly ambling tale." (Financial Times )

Product Description

"I asked the sailor what an Elephant looked like; he replied that it was like nothing on earth."

England, 1766: After a long voyage from the East Indies, a ship docks in Bristol, England, and rumor quickly spreads about its unusual cargo—some say a mermaid is on board. A crowd forms, hoping to catch a glimpse of the magical creature. One crate after another is unpacked: a zebra, a leopard, and a baboon. There's no mermaid, but in the final two crates is something almost as magical—a pair of young elephants, in poor health but alive.

Seeing a unique opportunity, a wealthy sugar merchant purchases the elephants for his country estate and turns their care over to a young stable boy, Tom Page. Tom's family has long cared for horses, but an elephant is something different altogether. It takes time for Tom and the elephants to understand one another, but to the surprise of everyone on the estate, a remarkable bond is formed.

The Elephant Keeper, the story of Tom and the elephants, in Tom's own words, moves from the green fields and woods of the English countryside to the dark streets and alleys of late-eighteenth-century London, reflecting both the beauty and the violence of the age. Nicholson's lush writing and deft storytelling complement a captivating tale of love and loyalty between one man and the two elephants that change the lives of all who meet them.

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3.5 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)

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3.0 out of 5 stars Because in the end...,, Sep 30 2009

By	Schmadrian - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

Once again, a novel with a wonderful premise...told by a voice that just didn't do it justice.

First-person narratives pretty determine a novel's effectiveness. If the voice is strong, then the storytelling has a good chance of being strong. If the voice is weak...well, as I've said elsewhere, there's a place for a 'non-aggressive' voice, but it has to be counteracted by some other element(s) of the novel, or perhaps it's used as a means to express certain elements of the story, maybe in contrast.

'The Elephant Keeper' has a wuss of a narrator.

There. I've said it.

Mr. Nicholson would have been better off (as would have the novel, and the reader's experience) using an omniscient third-person point-of-view. The tale could have been so much richer, so much more breadth and depth might have been afforded it. As Tom, the character referenced in the title, is a wuss, with very little to say other than the facts (and facts, as we all know, do not themselves determine a story's value or merit, but the way they're relayed), the novel ends up a disappointment.

That's not to say there aren't some very lovely bits in it. (As someone who writes stories in which stuffed animals are 'animated' -including two elephants- I was especially moved by Tom's 'conversations' with Jenny the Elephant.) And the way in which the styles of the bulk of the book and its 'coda' are so very different, displayed Mr. Nicholson's abilities in at least this sense.

But with the storytelling voice being so limp, and with so much having been left out, 'The Elephant Keeper' earns at best hardly more than a half-trunk salute from this pachyderm aficionado.

(Personal rating 7/10)

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4.0 out of 5 stars "It is not alright. It is all wrong", Aug 25 2009

By	Michael Leonard "MikeonAlpha" (Silver Lake, Los Angeles, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

It's almost impossible not to be moved by this tender-hearted novel of life in 18th century England which revolves around the powerful journey of one young man and his pet elephant who wander the country from one grand estate to another, eventually settling in an exotic menagerie in London. The novel beings as Tom Page, a loyal elephant keeper is encouraged to write a book in the history of the elephant by the kindly Lord Bidborough and his colleague Dr Goldsmith. Assured he will be doing a service to mankind, Tom is delighted but also daunted by the prospect to write about such a noble beast. Plagued with doubts, about whether his account would be entirely accurate, Tom's memories are sparked by years of looking after Timothy and Jenny, the elephants he first meets on the Bristol docks just after they've arrived as an unusual cargo from the East Indies. Accompanying Mr. Harrington, the lord and master of Harrington Hall to Bristol, Tom is appalled at the condition of the animals. The elephants are near collapse lying on their side "deep in ordure," their hind legs in shackles. Tom is astonished at their two huge ear flaps, four thick legs and the single snake like protuberance dangling from the center of their faces. But then this impressionable young man touches the elephants for the first time, exploring the dry wrinkled and warmth quality of their skin, "as warm as that of a human being," and suddenly he is spellbound, the encounter once and for all cementing his close relationship with them.

Mr. Harrington accepts that Tom should be the sole keeper of Jenny and Timothy, his advanced experience in the training and care of horses a perfect ticket into this bizarre world of the "most powerful beasts in the Kingdom." It isn't long before Tom is riding the elephants everyday, controlling them merely by the power of speech, communicating by making certain signs and sounds. Obviously Tom adores both Jenny and Timothy and is quick to notice that although they occasionally misbehave they are never malicious and have no conception of evil, their faces shining with love and innocence. When Mr. Harrington makes it known he intends to sell the animals and Lizzy, one of the local girls, tells Tom that he cannot tie himself for ever to an elephant, Tom is determined to stay loyal and to protect the animals from an impossibly harsh existence in this world where humans fail to understand them.

From the bucolic landscapes of Somersetshire to the vast Easton Estates, Tom imagines Timothy and his ivory tusks and a grown moon-colored curving into the moon-light, the poor animal eventually sacrificial lamb, "the blindfold, the hood, the slash of the sword, the spray of blood." The Elephant keeper and Jenny eventually comes under the care of the kindly Lord Bidborough, and are later forced into an impoverished life in Cross's Famous Menagerie where many of the animals dying, the treatment of the survivors inhumane and depressing. It is in London where Tom suffers on increasing affronts, becoming a drunken scoundrel, a villain choosing from armies of whores plying their constant trade, seeking refuge in drink and more drink, his senses so befogged and befuddled. Meanwhile, Jenny continues to speak ever more clearly, "as clearly as any human ever spoke," forever attached to Tom, her plight always in Tom's hands. Narrated in the somber tones of a Hardy novel, the story combines the hardscrabble elements of 18th century life with themes of the kinship that exists between animal and man "we inhabit the same world, we breathe the same air beneath the same sky." The often horrible treatment of the elephants, the corrupt practices of life back in Tom's town of Thornhill, the scenes of a big, noisy and fog-laden London, the daily existences of the poor and the sick are all viewed through the eyes of Tom and Jenny as they try to survive with Tom sometimes believing he is both man and elephant. At its heart this novel is often gentle and lumbering just like the creatures who wonder throughout its pages even as Nicholson ruminates on what constitutes a human being and what is a brute. Mike Leonard August 09.

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