Zoo Story

[Bethers]

Yesterday, while picking up a prescription for Jean, I came across a book review for a new non-fiction book called Zoo Story by Thomas French. This is where e-books can hurt me - that review made me really want the book. Barnes & Noble have it - and I downloaded it just a bit ago. Have started it and so far am so glad I did. Zoos are so controversial- it's interesting to read it from the various views - will be back after I finish it to tell you if it was worth it.

[AlmostThere]

So did you get the Nook, Beth?

I'll go look at it. Thanks!
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Ok, I'm back. It does look interesting although it seems to reiterate what we already know now about animals in captivity. Looking forward to you review.
Here is an online review:

From Publishers Weekly
Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist French goes behind the scenes at Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo in this absorbing and balanced account that reveals extinction, conservation, and captivity issues in all their moral complexities and featuring a very memorable cast. The author introduces readers to Herman, the lovable species-confused chimpanzee who has reigned at Lowry Park for three decades; Enshalla, whose family history was like a Greek tragedy, and her mate Eric, Sumatran tigers whose attempts at mating captivate the zoo staff; Ladybug, the black bear who likes oranges and peanut butter; Lex Salisbury, the ambitious CEO who holds the fate of the zoo animals and humans in his hands; and the trainers who witness the circle of life and death among their charges. We are forced to reconsider our notions of freedom and captivity when presented with such scenarios as 11 partially sedated wild South African elephants being moved to U.S. zoos to escape slaughter at home. A thoughtful and moving but unsentimental portrait of life in captivity and a broad introduction to some of its most salient—and intractable—dilemmas. (July)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Product Description
Welcome to the savage and surprising world of Zoo Story, an unprecedented account of the secret life of a zoo and its inhabitants, both animal and human. Based on six years of research, the book follows a handful of unforgettable characters at Tampa's Lowry Park Zoo: an alpha chimp with a weakness for blondes, a ferocious tiger who revels in Obsession perfume, and a brilliant but tyrannical CEO known as El Diablo Blanco.
Zoo Story crackles with issues of global urgency: the shadow of extinction, humanity's role in the destruction or survival of other species. More than anything else, though, it's a dramatic and moving true story of seduction and betrayal, exile and loss, and the limits of freedom on an overcrowded planet--all framed inside one zoo reinventing itself for the twenty-first century.

Thomas French, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter, chronicles the action with vivid power: Wild elephants soaring above the Atlantic on their way to captivity. Predators circling each other in a lethal mating dance. Primates plotting the overthrow of their king. The sweeping narrative takes the reader from the African savannah to the forests of Panama and deep into the inner workings of a place some describe as a sanctuary and others condemn as a prison. All of it comes to life in the book's four-legged characters. Even animal lovers will be startled by the emotional charge of these creatures' histories, which read as though they were co-written by Dickens and Darwin.

Zoo Story shows us how these remarkable individuals live, how some die, and what their experiences reveal about the human desire to both exalt and control nature.

[Bethers]

I'm reading it slowly - love it. It's like watching a PBS show on this subject - or Discovery show - but I have to use my imagination to see it all. Yes, we know a lot of it and some of us are on the different sides of whether we should have zoos or not - etc etc - and the book realizes that. Will let you know more after I finish it. Say I'm reading it slowly- but had 2 other books going when I got this - finished one of the others - now it is one of 2 - so maybe will just stick with it. So far it's made me cry and made me laugh out loud. I do love animals. I hate to see or hear about any being hurt - in the wild or in a zoo - and I could just picture the alpha chimp with the fondness for big-busted blondes. Won't tell you more - cuz it's in the book and was one of my big laughs. Although it's sad, also.

Haven't bought yet - reading it on my computer. Can't take my puter to bed - so fell asleep reading it last night on the couch -

[AlmostThere]

Going to Kindle to download a sample....

[Bethers]

It's just getting better and better - the laughs and the tears. And the shame on you feelings, too.

[mtngal]

Thanks Beth, sounds interesting! I'll try a sample too.

[Bethers]

I finished Zoo Story and it's an excellent read - if you like something that's more on the documentary feel. I was sad, happy, laughing, crying. Because it was about a time in the period of that zoo - the last couple chapters were more about the politics, etc than the animals. That was interesting - but I knew where it was going. All the stories about the animals - just kept me so intrigued. Zoos are in an interesting place today - not the places of my childhood, but now they are "saving" animals that would otherwise be extinct. So how does that make me feel? Still not so sure. Read the book and you can't help but wonder if some of the animals are better in zoos than in the wild the advocates want them in - and at other times you feel just the opposite. It's not an easy life in the wilds where they are hunted for no reason or there are too many of them in areas smaller and smaller and causing them to starve. Or the climate is changing, or we've introduced something into their territories unknowingly that kills them off - or simply they succumb to an illness that couldn't have been foreseen and wipes them all out. On the other hand, in a zoo they don't have freedom. What is freedom, anyway? Is it not freedom because it's not their natural habitat?

Anyway - those are all things I've been thinking (and more) while reading and since reading the book. But it did it in a way that entertained - as the animals themselves are wonderful creatures with stories of their own.

I'm very impressed with how the author put this together. At one point I thought he was siding with one side, then at another thought, ok, no he's not. I think, like me, he's undecided on lots of the issues.

Well worth the read for me.

[AlmostThere]

I downloaded the sample and what you said, Beth, is pretty much what I felt from that short excerpt I read. I'm still not sure whether I will download the entire book.
I am having allot of fun searching the Kindle library and adding books to mine. Beth, you need to get your Nook asap!! It's great fun.

[Bethers]

I'm having enough fun right now with the app on my computer - don't need the Nook just yet. Have been downloading lots of free classics - building back up my "library" that I had to give away to have this lifestyle. Eventually will have The Nook itself, but for now, this works good. Learned I can make notes on things I'm reading - like people do on pages. That's neat. Course, I never do that anymore, but maybe I'll start.