I've been struggling for almost 2 weeks to finish this. It's a super interesting story, but it's sooo hard to read. It's a story of a zookeeper and his family, but also interspersed with all of of these other general facts about Warsaw at the time and it's just so choppy and hard to read. I would have rather a historical fiction novel written about the family, or just finding a better way to tie everything together. It seems 1 in 3 chapters deal with the family and I'm having such a hard time staying interested. That said, this feels super bratty to complain about a book about the Holocaust...but other people have done it better, so I just give up.

By all accounts, I should have adored this book. But I didn't. It was historically based. It had animals (a whole zoo!). It offered a different take on WWII. The main characters, the Zabinski's, used their decimated zoo to smuggle Jewish people to safety - in Poland, right under the Nazi's noses!

However, it was a massive struggle to get this one finished. I thought about stopping many times, but held out hope that it would get better. It never did. I thought at first that maybe it was because I listened to the audiobook vs. reading the actual book, but I think I would have struggled even with a hard copy.

I felt like Ackerman bounced around WAY too much - the fact that almost all the zoo's animals were killed in bombing raids was all but glossed over, but I felt like she described the hidden wall compartments for an hour. Lots of historical info - too much at times. I wish she had focused more on the personal stories of the people who came through the zoo. This was done at times, but not nearly as much as long-winded narratives were given about the cold winter or Antonina's phlebitis. It just felt overwhelmingly random at times, which is disappointing. All the elements of a great novel were here, but the construction of the story was too unorganized to create any sustained interest for me.

The Zookeeper's Wife is a wonderfully detailed, real life account of the dangers of living in Nazi-occupied Warsaw. Ackerman, in true naturalist form, pulls you in and places you smack-dab in the middle of this war-torn city.

Not my favorite, mostly because of the way Ackerman chose to write the story. She went off on a lot of tangents and could have presented a truly amazing war story in a more compelling manner.

Allison selected.

I wanted to enjoy this book so bad, but it just didn't measure up. The story in itself was decent, but the writing style was just so choppy and sporadic. The author would go on long tangents about things that didn't seem to make a large difference in the story (ex. what bugs were in the insect collection). Sometimes these tangents would run pages, breaking up any sense of story. A lot of these diversions were about people such as the zookeeper's wife's husband and son, acquaintances, guests, etc. This made me wonder why the book was even called the Zookeepers Wife, since most of the book didn't seem to be about her (I realize there was the sentence at the end where Jan said his wife was the real hero). Along with the long tangents, there were also a lot of short mentions of things that were oddly placed. For example, about a third of the way into the book, the author starts talking about how Antonina was bed ridden. Here it mentions he being pregnant, but this isn't mentioned again for another 100 or so pages. Just odd.

I really enjoyed this book. Jan and Antionia built a human Noah's Ark. Such couragous people opening their home, heart and zoo to those in need. Book is based on Antionia's journals and historical records.

The people in this book deserved a better writer. A truly missed opportunity.

Not quite sure what it was about this book. It never really grabbed my attention from the beginning. A real struggle to finish.

I made the mistake of starting this right before the holiday season and, since there was no way I could focus on it during the craziness, I had to put it down for awhile. At first I was afraid I had lost some of the rhythm of the story, but luckily, when I picked it back up, I was able to become just as wonderfully lost in the second half of the story as the first.

The story of the Warsaw Zoo and its crazy guests, both animal and human, is unlike any other WWII story I have ever read. The incidents of the animal and human guests go from comical to horrifying within the same page, and all will, I believe, prove to be memorable characters. The zookeeper's wife, Antonina, was especially inspiration, and Diane Ackerman's insight into the natural world gave the story a unique look that I don't think a simple historian could have given it. Who knew that the Nazis were such strange environmentalists? Or that the very same people who ordered the deaths of so many people were concerned about causing too much pain in earthworms?

If you're looking for a slightly more unique look at WWII, read this book.