Oliver the elephant looks elsewhere for employment after learning that the circus already has enough elephants.

At school, Olivia tells about her summer vacation and how, when she went to the circus and all the performers were out sick, she saved the day, becoming Olivia the Tattooed Lady, Olivia the Lion Tamer, The Amazing Flying Olivia, and more.

Meridon knows she does not belong in the dirty, vagabond life of a gypsy bareback rider. The half-remembered vision of another life burns in her heart, even as her beloved sister, Dandy, risks everything for their future.

Over a half century, a small Indiana town hosts a circus troupe during the off-seasons in linked stories "as graceful as any acrobat's high-wire act" (San Francisco Chronicle).
A Story Prize Finalist
From 1884 to 1939, the Great Porter Circus made the unlikely choice to winter in an Indiana town called Lima, a place that feels as classic as Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio, and as wondrous as a first trip to the Big...

"Even though his awful great-aunt Gertrudis doesn't approve, Micah believes in the stories his dying Grandpa Ephraim tells him of the magical Circus Mirandus: the invisible tiger guarding the gates, the beautiful flying birdwoman, and the magician more powerful than any other--the Man Who Bends Light. Finally, Grandpa Ephraim offers proof. The Circus is real. And the Lightbender owes Ephraim a miracle. With his friend Jenny Mendoza in tow, Micah sets...

In turn-of-the-century America, a young girl dreams of a world that stretches beyond the confines of a quiet life on the family farm. With little more than her wit and a cigar box of treasures to call her own, Mable steps away from all she knows, seeking the limitless marvels of the Chicago World's Fair. There, a chance encounter triggers her destiny - a life with a famed showman by the name of John Ringling. A quarter of a century later, Lady Rosamund...

"In 1931, Lilly Blackwood was sold to the circus. More than two decades later, nineteen-year-old Julia Blackwood inherits her parents' estate and returns home hoping to erase painful memories of strict rules and forbidden rooms. Instead, she becomes immersed in a mystery involving a hidden attic room and circus photos featuring a striking young girl."--

"Magnolia returns to explain the many downsides to bringing a circus to a local library"--

A circus gorilla scares away the people who have come to see him, and when he tries to find them, he gets lost himself.

Ten turkeys performing circus acts block a country road, much to the frustration of an angry farmer in a pick-up truck who tries to shoo them away.