Book Review: Love in the Elephant Tent: How Running Away with the Circus Brought Me Home by Kathleen Cremonesi

Format: Hardcover

Pages: 400 pages

Publisher: ECW Press

Published: May 12, 2015

Genre: Memoir

Synopsis (from Publisher): 

“If you live life without a net, what happens when you fall?

Kathleen Cremonesi knew early on she wanted to be different. Determined to avoid following in her mother’s footsteps to an ill-fated marriage, Kathleen left Oregon in her early 20s to travel across Europe. On a whim, this former administrative assistant with wanderlust took a job as a dancer in a circus and, working her way up, became an ostrich-riding, shark-taming showgirl.

Kathleen bonds with the exotic animals that could strike and kill at any moment, but instead bring her a peace she has never known. And when she stumbles into the arms of Stefano, the sexy elephant keeper, she finds a man who understands her wild spirit.

With thrilling prose and vivid descriptions, Kathleen takes the reader around the Mediterranean, where she discovers unexpected friends and learns how to cook, forgive, and love — across language barriers.”

There is always that one thing, either it is a trip or an event, that has a significant impact on your life. For Kathleen Cremonesi, that was running away. I don’t normally read memoirs. But after reading this one, maybe I’ll start reading them, especially they will be personal and relatable, just like this one. As you read, you embark on Kathleen’s journey on not only finding love, but on finding your place in the world, a feeling most of us has felt at least once in our life.

With Kathleen’s descriptive imagery and intriguing storytelling, this memoir manages to absorb you into another world, very different from your own. Kathleen’s remarkably honest nature and personality immediately pulled me in and captivated me until the very last page. Her determination to find her own place in not only at the circus, but a place in the world on her own terms, was so inspirational. Kathleen did things in her young 20s that would most likely cripple us with fear. But she didn’t let her fear burden and that really speaks to her gutsy spirit.

Her relationship with Stefano may not be ideal in romantic eyes but, honestly, I don’t think true love is supposed to be this idealistic idea and Kathleen’s and Stefano’s tribulations prove that. I think true love is perfectly described in this quote:

True love isn’t a vow to live happily ever after, but a promise to overcome the challenges of entwining two lives and two hearts, two pasts and two futures. True love understands its own worth.

Both Kathleen and Stefano had to go through a lot of painful trials to really truly understand the meaning of true love, not this idealistic notion of it. And that is what make their relationship so real.

Love in the Elephant Tent  is a perfect coming-of-age memoir fill with beautiful scenic descriptions, fascinating adventures, and an emotional journey through the human heart that will have you engrossed until the very last page. This intriguing memoir shows what Kathleen was always striving to live by: It’s okay to be different. Because you never what you will find a long the way.

Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Note: I received this book from ECW Press for an honest review.