I don't know why I thought this was historical fiction when I picked it up, but I was glad to quickly find out that it is nonfiction about Antonina and Jan in real life. I thought from the description that the book would focus more on the Jews hiding in cages, when the author focused more on the "guests" that lived in the villa and only mentioned the others in empty zoo buildings (as opposed to cages) when someone was going to feed them. Apart from that, I was astonished by Jan and Antonina's bravery, their decision to hide friends from the ghetto "in plain sight" of the Germans, and the increasing risks they were willing to take. Definitely an inspiring and amazing story, and the audiobook was very well done.

Not eager to read something else by this author, although this was a decent read. Interesting historical information and info about animals. Book was a little slow at times.

I really thought this was going to be an interesting book, but it was a struggle for me to get through. I think that it could have been edited better to not be so much. Also there were times where I felt like I was getting information cut. It's like just because you can describe ever little detail doesn't mean it is necessary: less is more in many ways. All in all it was wonderful to read about this Jewish underground in Poland and the fight that so many polish citizens put up. I was also kind of under the impression that the zoo animals would have survived some how and they kept raising them. I should have known better, but there you are. This is really an inspiring story, but it just wasn't executed well.

The story of the Zookeeper and his wife is very interesting in and of itself. Unfortunately, the book is full of sometimes off topic meandering branches of details that stray away from the focus of the story. Additionally, there's a bit of name dropping -- Irene Sendler and Janusz Korczak, as if the author was trying to fill pages and connect more directly to wider Holocaust narrative. Since the subject of the story is fascinating in and of herself, it would have been better to just focus on their story.

Too much in between fiction and a history textbook. Potential for a good story was there.

Historical account of zoo in Poland during WWII. After the zoo was bombed, the keepers saved many hundreds of people by hiding them in the animal cages. Great writing, great story.

This was the first book in a long time that I just didn’t like. Since it has already been made into a movie, I figured it had to be good, but I was very disappointed. I seemed like the author kept forgetting the family she was writing about and would go off in so many different directions. The intense description of EVERYTHING was also annoying.

This book has been on my shelves since February 2017, a month before the film adaptation was released. Before that, I had neither heard of Ackerman's account as detailed in the book nor the Żabińskis who ran the Warsaw Zoo prior to and during World War II. The story itself is amazing, but the account by Ackerman left me a little dissatisfied.

While Ackerman certainly does a thorough job, her relayed tone and information felt choppy — particularly when she wandered outside the zoo to run a few reconnoissance laps around the war-torn area. Also, despite the wonderful woman Antonina Żabińska clearly was — her husband Jan is not to be ignored — which is difficult to manage when the book is named for Antonina, albeit not even by her given name, and instead by her identity as related to her husband, the zookeeper.

I felt Ackerman's struggle between providing all extraneous details as the war inched along over the course of those six years, and the more poetic and flowing writing of the diarist, Antonina — whom she quoted often. The some 300 souls saved by way of the zoo and the actions of the Żabińskis, felt difficult to parse, and Ackerman must've had a hard time focusing on a representative few because the stream of people on the page and hidden at the zoo felt too often beyond my reach and Ackerman's grasp.

I wanted more depth from this one and less of the minutiae — more personalized accounts and less dry detailing. I started this one in print — paperback in hand — but had to switch to the audiobook after 25% of the way through. Dry, reporting-style nonfiction makes its way into my head better via my ears than my eyes. Despite that, it was around the halfway point where I no longer had any interest in watching the movie adaptation — I feel as though I've gotten the entire story through Ackerman's eyes that can be managed. I'd love to possibly read more directly from Antonina's diary entries in the future . . . or at least a curated bunch of excerpts.

Audiobook, as narrated by [a:Suzanne Toren|315737|Suzanne Toren|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png]: Toren did a great job — and even helped the bulk of the work by slipping into an accented voice to help differentiate between standard text and quoted dialogue or entries from the diaries. It would've been quite a struggle for me to finish this, had I not turned to the audiobook version a quarter of the way through.