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Description
A vivid, daring novel about the devastating power of family secrets--beginning in the poignant, lurid world of a Depression-era traveling circus and coming full circle in the transformative 1950s.
On a summer evening in 1931, Lilly Blackwood glimpses circus lights from the grimy window of her attic bedroom. Lilly isn’t allowed to explore the meadows around Blackwood Manor. She’s never even ventured beyond her narrow room. Momma insists...
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English
Description
"Avita was born to be a star. Her tent sells out nightly, and every performance incites bloodcurdling screams. She's the most lucrative circus act from Texas to Tacoma, the crown jewel of the Family Fortuna, and Avita feeds on the shrieks, the gasps, the fear. But when a handsome young artist arrives to create posters of the performers, she's appalled by his rendering of Bird Girl. Is that all he sees? A hideous monster--all sharp beak and razor teeth,...
Author
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English
Description
The Electric Woman is Tessa Fontaine's astonishing audiobook memoir about a life-affirming journey of loss and self-discovery. Narrated by the author, this audiobook recounts Tessa's life on the road with the last traveling American sideshow and her relationship with an adventurous, spirited mother. Turns out, one lesson applies to living through illness, keeping the show on the road, letting go of the person you love most, and eating fire: The trick...
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English
Description
Pint-sized Seattle middle school teacher and gay dating blogger Hayden McCall and his best friend Hollister are invited to a fundraiser for Bakers Without Borders. The celebrity performer, Kennedy Osaka, is the artistic director of Mysterium, an upscale circus arts show combining magic, acrobatics, and a Michelin-star dinner. But Kennedy is a no-show--until she's found dead in her hotel suite. When frenemy Sarah Lee is discovered in the room with...
Author
Language
English
Description
From ancient Egypt to the modern-day circus, the role of the clown can be traced throughout history. But how much do you really know about the profession that takes comedy very seriously? This fascinating book takes the reader on a journey through the ages, explaining how clowns such as the whiteface and auguste came to be. You'll read about history's best-loved performers such as Joseph Grimaldi, the father of modern clowning, and learn about the...
Author
Language
English
Description
"The first major biography of P.T. Barnum in a generation, a vivid account of the forefather of American entertainment. P. T. Barnum was the greatest showman the world has ever seen: the cocreator of the Barnum & Bailey Circus and the man who made worldwide sensations of Jumbo the Elephant, General Tom Thumb, and the "Swedish Nightingale," Jenny Lind. He was the champion of wonder, joy, trickery, and "humbug." He was, as Barnum argues, one of the...
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Appears on these lists
Adult Winter Reading Challenge
Adult Winter Reading: Books set in a different country
Note to Shelf: July 2023
Shelf-worthy: July 2023
Adult Winter Reading: Books set in a different country
Note to Shelf: July 2023
Shelf-worthy: July 2023
Description
"Mrs. King is no ordinary housekeeper. Born into a world of con artists and thieves, she's made herself respectable, running the grandest home in Mayfair. The place is packed with treasures, a glittering symbol of wealth and power, but dark secrets lurk in the shadows. When Mrs. King is suddenly dismissed from her position, she recruits an eclectic group of women to join her in revenge: A black market queen out to settle her scores. An actress desperate...
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English
Description
"From beloved bestselling author Ursula Hegi, a new novel about three mothers, set on the shores of the Nordsee, perfect for fans of Water for Elephants and The Light Between Oceans. In the summer of 1878, the Ludwig Zirkus has come to the island Nordstrand in Germany. Big-bellied girls rush from St. Margaret's Home for Pregnant Girls, thrilled to see the parade and the show, followed by the Sisters who care for them. The Old Women and Men, competing...
Author
Pub. Date
2016.
Language
English
Description
The true story of two African-American brothers who were kidnapped and displayed as circus freaks, and whose mother endured a 28-year struggle to get them back.
The year was 1899 and the place a sweltering tobacco farm in the Jim Crow South town of Truevine, Virginia. George and Willie Muse were two little boys born to a sharecropper family. One day a white man offered them a piece of candy, setting off events that would take them around...
The year was 1899 and the place a sweltering tobacco farm in the Jim Crow South town of Truevine, Virginia. George and Willie Muse were two little boys born to a sharecropper family. One day a white man offered them a piece of candy, setting off events that would take them around...
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Language
English
Description
"Sixteen-year-old Noa has been cast out in disgrace after becoming pregnant by a Nazi soldier and being forced to give up her baby. She lives above a small rail station. When Noa discovers a boxcar with dozens of Jewish infants bound for a concentration camp, she snatches one of them and flees. Noa finds refuge with a German circus, but she must learn the flying trapeze act so she can blend in, spurning the resentment of the lead aerialist, Astrid....
14) Meet Miss Fancy
Author
Language
English
Description
A ten-year-old African American boy wants to welcome the circus elephant named Miss Fancy to her new home in a nearby park, but he is disappointed to see a sign: "No Colored Allowed".
Author
Language
English
Description
A vibrant and enchanting debut novel about an orphan girl who discovers a magical circus, perfect for fans of Kelly Barnhill and Rebecca Stead!
Maddy Adriana knows that magic is real. All her life, her heart has pulled her towards things too perfect to be ordinary. One day, that tug leads her to a magical street circus, hidden in plain sight among the canals and boardwalks of Venice Beach.
For the first time in Maddy's
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English
Description
In his thirteenth year, Will Sparrow, liar and thief, becomes a runaway. On the road, he encounters a series of con artists-a pickpocket, a tooth puller, a pig trainer, a conjurer-and learns that others are more adept than he at lying and thieving. Then he reluctantly joins a traveling troupe of "oddities," including a dwarf and a cat-faced girl, holding himself apart from the "monsters" and resolving to be on guard against further deceptions. At...
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English
Description
Every circus tent contains a surprise, and every wild storm takes Harper closer to solving a fantastic mystery.
Late one evening as the stars begin to twinkle, Harper and her friends are flying on her magic scarlet umbrella when they see a girl running on air. She leads them to the Circus of Dreams, a menagerie of wonders suspended in the sky.
There, they meet the mesmerizing mermaid acrobat, the spectacular circus baker, and the mysterious...
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Language
English
Description
Once there was a girl named Harper who had a rare musical gift. She heard songs on the wind, rhythms on the rain, and hope in the beat of a butterfly's wing. Harper lives in the City of Clouds, an enchanting place where it rains every day and an umbrella is always a good idea. With her Aunt Sassy, her beloved cat, Midnight, and all of her neighbors in the Tall Apartment Block, every day is full of possibility. But when every cat in the city goes missing-including...
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Language
English
Description
A gripping historical fiction friendship story that will grab everyone by the heartstrings and never let go.
A giant, a dwarf, and three doomed circus animals . . .
By her fourteenth birthday, Babe Killingsworth measures 6ʹ9ʺ and weighs 342 pounds. In 1896, what other options does a giant have but to join a carnival?
Her only real talent is handling animals: "Critters is folks to me." The cheap outfit her feckless father sells her off to offers...
Author
Language
English
Description
P. T. Barnum, best-known for his own use of hoaxes in his popular Barnum & Bailey Circus, found that the use of hoaxes was acceptable when the audience was getting the entertainment they paid for. When it came to religious hoaxes, fraud, and swindling, Barnum was avidly against it. He even went so far as to offer $500 to any medium who could prove that they actually could reach the dead. In this exposé of humbugs and the scams they perpetuate, he...
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