We Bought a Zoo

We Bought a Zoo by Benjamin Mee

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


The Amazing True Story of a Young Family, a Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Wild Animals That Change Their Lives Forever.

An unforgettable memoir about the mysteries of the animal kingdom, the power of family and the triumph of hope over tragedy.

In the market for a house and the adventure of a lifetime, the author decided to uproot his family and move them to an unlikely new home: a dilapidated zoo in the English countryside, complete with over 200 exotic animals. The author, who specializes in animal behavior, had a dream to refurbish the zoo and run it as a family business. Naturally, friends and colleagues that he was crazy.

His pipe dream became a reality in October 2006, when he and the rest of the clan -- wife, son (ago six), daughter (age fou), brother, and his seventy-six-year-old mother -- relocated to the Dartmoor Wildlife Park and met their new neighbors, including Solomon, an African lion and scourge of the local golf course; Zak, the elderly Alpha wolf, a benevolent dictator clinging to power; Ronnie, a Brazilian tapir easily capable of killing a man but hopelessly wimpy; and Sovereign, a jaguar who had devised a long-term escape plan and implemented it.

The grand reopening of the zoo was scheduled for spring, but there was much work to be done and none of it easy for these novice zookeepers. Tigers broke loose, money ran low, the staff grew skeptical, and family tensions reached a boiling point.

Then tragedy struck, and the situation went from difficult to unimaginable. His wife had a recurrence of a brain tumor, forcing the author and the children to face the heartbreak of illness and the devastating loss of wife and mother. But inspired by her memory and the healing power of the incredible family of animals they had grown to love, the author and the kids resolved to move forward. The family opened the gates of the revitalized zoo in July 2007 to great success.

Brimming with energy and insight, We Bought a Zoo is a profoundly moving portrait of an ordinary family living in the most extraordinary circumstances.
~~front & back flaps

This is a grand book! The marvelous, gut-wrenching adventure of owning your own zoo -- who could have imagined? What impressed me most was the requirements for a zoo -- and if they're not met, the zoo doesn't open. Or is closed down. Fascinating details of behind-the-scenes operations, and insights into the philosophy behind zoos and how that's changed as our world and our society has changed.

I would have given this book a five star rating, but for the intertwined story of the illness and death of the author's wife. I understand that in some ways it was important to the story, but for me it was a distraction, and therefore an irritation. The story of anyone's death is a profoundly moving experience, and deserves its own center stage. Here, it jostled with the main story for attention, and for top billing. I think these two stories could have been separate books, and I think each of the stories was diminished because of the push-me-pull-you aspect that combining them brought to the book.

This book was made into a television series in England. I wish I could have seen it!