Yikes. This book is honestly appalling. An elephant "gets the big head", and decides she's too good for the circus -- so she runs away and is enslaved, and learns how to be better. She escapes her slavery only through the intervention of a male dog, and returns to the circus with relief; she is now thrilled to do more than her share. [return][return]So, basically, being imprisoned, beaten and whipped turned out to be good for her. Not recommended unless you're seeking a valuable lesson for toddlers whom you intend to sell into a life of chattel slavery. ( )

Adorable. I like how Peet teaches lessons straightforwardly, but not didactically. ( )

This is Bill Peet at his (almost) best -- and he's always good. Ella the elephant is a spoiled, conceited circus elephant who runs away from her pampered life in the circus and becomes very sorry that she did. To an adult, the story is utterly predictable which is why I withhold one star, but of course to a six-year-old the story is wonderful. The more I read of Bill Peet's books (and I'm up to about 20 by now), the more I appreciate his drawing style: he makes it look easy, and yet it takes great skill to give animals and landscapes such color and just the right details with shades of darkness because there's always a dark side in a Bill Peet story. Here the dark side is being put to work on a farm by a cruel farmer. (Another reviewer here calls this "enslavement," but I wonder if the reviewer has ever seen work-animals on a farm.)

Peet's poetry isn't his strong point -- he's better at straight narrative. I winced at a few lines such as:

Then her robe was sent out to be dry-cleaned and pressed
And also they fluff-dried her ostrich-plume crest.

but it's for six-year-olds, for Pete's sake, so as an adult reader I can accept it as an element of Peet's innate (and delightful) silliness. I simply love how he draws landscapes and old barns, and we get at least one two-page spread here. ( )

Yikes. This book is honestly appalling. An elephant "gets the big head", and decides she's too good for the circus -- so she runs away and is enslaved, and learns how to be better. She escapes her slavery only through the intervention of a male dog, and returns to the circus with relief; she is now thrilled to do more than her share.

So, basically, being imprisoned, beaten and whipped turned out to be good for her. Not recommended unless you're seeking a valuable lesson for toddlers whom you intend to sell into a life of chattel slavery. ( )