Jumbo

by Stephens Gerard Malone

There was, perhaps, no living creature more famous in the nineteenth century than Jumbo the elephant. Born in 1860 and taken from the wilds between Sudan and Eritrea at the age of two, he was sold to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris, and then to the London Zoological Gardens, before becoming the prized possession of notorious American showman P. T. Barnum. “Jumbomania” swept England, embroiled the Houses of Parliament, erupted into open warfare in the British and American press, and monopolized popular kitsch and culture. By the time Jumbo sailed into New York City in 1882, thousands scrambled for a chance to see “The Sun of the Amusement World.”

In this magnificent feat of historical fiction, Jumbo’s story is told by Little Eyes Nell Kelly, The World’s Smallest Singing, Dancing, Horse-riding Woman and Barnum’s star attraction. Initially jealous of her gargantuan new co-star, Nell keeps a close eye on Jumbo and his reclusive and dedicated trainer, Matthew Scott. But Nell soon realizes that she and Jumbo are simply two caged creatures in a circus full—and Jumbo’s confinement is slowly killing him. As The Greatest Show on Earth criss-crosses North America, Nell must brave greedy circus showmen, backstabbing trapeze artists, and the relentless pursuit of the cruel animal trainer, Elephant Bill, to keep the curtain from closing on her career—and her very life.

Taking readers from the deserts of Sudan to Buckingham Palace, to the manor houses of Connecticut and the dizzying heights of the Brooklyn Bridge, and every “one-saloon-three-church town” in between, Jumbo is a menagerie of riotous colour that brings Jumbo’s incredible story to life, and a masterful novel that explores exploitation, unrequited love, and the unbreakable bond between living things.

Genres: Historical Fiction, Historical, Canada

209 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 8, 2023

About the author

Endless Bay (Mercury Press) 1994
Miss Elva (Random House Canada) 2005
I Still Have a Suitcase in Berlin (Random House Canada) 2008
Big Town (Nimbus Publishing/Vagrant Press) 2011
The History of Rain (Nimbus Publishing/Vagrant Press) 2021
Jumbo (Nimbus Publishing/Vagrant Press) 2023
The Unnameable (Nimbus Publishing/Vagrant Press) April 28, 2026

Reviews

[ATLANTIC BOOK REVIEWS · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stephens Gerard Malone you have squeezed my heart tight with sadness, outrage, sympathy, empathy and love. Your exquisite telling of this horrific tale of the human exploitation of an animal has left me absolutely gutted while at the same time knowing I have just read some of the most beautiful writing I have ever read.

The human protagonist and teller of this story, Little Eyes Nell, is the world’s smallest singing, dancing, horse-riding woman and P.T. Barnum’s star attraction before Jumbo. Her story intertwined with Jumbo’s highlights perfectly all that is wrong in our society - then and now. Our human fascination with those labelled different, strange, freaks of nature is explored so masterfully here.

Passages of this book left me breathless. A scene describing the elephant hunt will stay with me always.

I wished similar fates to those that would exploit, I applauded and cheered those who showed empathy and I wept at the words you strung together to tell this affecting story.

Historical fiction at its very finest. Worthy of accolades beyond my humble review.

Thank you Olivia at Nimbus Publishing and Vagrant Press for sending along a PDF. I look forward to purchasing my copy. Having Stephens sign it would be a thrill.

[George Ilsley · Rating 4 out of 5]

The true story of a large African elephant named Jumbo who was made famous through his ill-fated career in the Barnum and Bailey circus.

(The word "jumbo" was also popularized through the fame of this elephant and has morphed into paradoxical word salads such as "jumbo shrimp." But I digress.)

The story is told through the device of the character "Nell" who is a smaller-sized woman and also a circus performer.

Nell's horrific abuse at the hands of "Elephant Bill" makes for difficult reading, and in fact the scenes of animal — and human — abuse were enough at times for me to put the novel aside and pick up something more placid, such as Pet Library Aquarium Guide.

The novel's language is lush, the mood frequently transcendent, and the characters, both minor and major, are richly detailed and evocative. In a way, it is really Nell's novel, since it opens and closes with a focus on her, and Jumbo the elephant was a large complicated presence in Nell's professional and personal life.

[D.A. Brown · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a fabulous book. Wrenching, sad, triumphant by turns, this is the tale of Little Eyes Nell and Jumbo the elephant, and their time in PTBarnum’s “employment”.
Nell meets Jumbo and his keeper, Scotty when Barnum arranges to purchase him during an exhibition tour in London. Nell, the world’s smallest woman, and Jumbo, the world’s biggest elephant, become an unmissable double act.
But it isn’t that story that makes this such an exceptional book. Malone creates a rich, deep, and complex world for his tale. Finishing it, I feel lonely for (most of) the characters (there’s a baddie I am quite glad to see the end of). The tragedy of the treatment of animals and people in circuses is well- described without being melodramatic.
Well worth a read and an example of how to do this kind of story. A writer’s read.

[Ariela · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have a lot to say about this book!

What really kind of stuck with me when I read this book was the difference between this book and Swan by Sidura Ludwig. (You can read my book review for Swan by clicking here!) These are two very different books, but they both follow the same sort of formula, in a way. After reading Swan, I had a certain lasting impression from that book. When I read Jumbo, I found a lot of comparisons between these two books. I found Anna Swan from Swan, and Little Eyes Nell Kelly from Jumbo to be a lot alike. For some context, Little Eyes Nell (but we just call her Nell) is a performer in P. T. Barnum’s show. To be exact, she’s his star performer, and the most famous person in the world at this time. Nell is also the shortest woman in the world. That’s her special trait, and she performs in P. T. Barnum’s shows riding horses, elephants, and jumping through rings of fire, and more. While Nell is the shortest woman in the world, Anna is the tallest. Although they might seem like polar opposites of each other I found a lot of similarities.

When Nell is a child, she desires one thing; to be taller. To grow, to not be so small as a child. Since Anna Swan is a child through the course of her book, her main character motivation is to shrink, to be smaller or average height. Both girls are out of the ordinary and just want to be ordinary. While Nell’s character motivations change as she grows older, I find it interesting how, as little girls, they both want to change their heights. Anna goes so far as travelling to Halifax in search of a shrinking potion, and Nell is convinced to leave her mother to go off to the circus because she is promised a growing potion. Although they are opposites, they are alike.

Another compare and contrast point that I will discuss is that Jumbo portrays P. T. Barnum in a more negative light than Swan does. In Swan, P. T. Barnum comes across as more of an opportunity, a chance to really showcase Anna Swan to the world. Anna is much older than Nell was when Nell was taken to be a part of the circus, but Anna was granted the freedom of choice to tour with Barnum. Swan portrays him in a more positive light because he is seen as a good thing for Anna. Reading Jumbo really offers a different perspective on the character of P. T. Barnum. I also think that it’s really worthwhile to read Swan and Jumbo back to back. One is an origin story of how one girl became a worldwide sensation it’s very sweet overall, and Jumbo is a more mature, heavy-handed story of the ins and outs of a life in the circus.

Okay, enough comparisons, I did this last time also with Swan and Tall Girl lol. Jumbo by itself plays out very well, very cinematically. I could really imagine this book as a movie, the character descriptions, and emotions and the tone of this book, and the visuals. I think the author really wrote this book to appeal to the reader’s senses, and I really loved how he handled that. Nell is also a very good character, I loved seeing her relationship with Jumbo and how she grew as a person. Jumbo himself doesn’t do a whole lot though, as an elephant he can’t do a whole lot except for be a character motivation to the characters, the two main characters being Nell and Scotty, Jumbo’s handler.

This book is such a roller coaster, and I love how it was all inspired by true events. I didn’t know much about Jumbo’s story before, so this book really helped me learn. This book tells a compelling story of what life would be like living in a circus, and I would definitely recommend it for more mature audiences, there’s quite a bit of swearing and mentions and references to things that aren’t really for younger audiences.

I hope you consider checking out Jumbo by Stephen Gerhard Malone, and I’ll see you in the next book review! Goodbye!

[Sarah Butland · Rating 5 out of 5]

A strange mix of horrible truths, haunting fiction and spell-binding storytelling. With scenes that made me cringe, choke back tears and work to settle my stomach, Stephens Gerard Malone somehow captured tragedy eloquently.

Written with such authority that made me believe every word, I was delighted to see references to the research he used to base his story.

Jumbo has such celebrity already, this tells the dark side of possibilities within a circus. Dubbed "The Children's Friend" is in great contrast to the enemy of men, shackled and tortured by all, even Matthew Scott in ways. Scott, the man who refused to leave his side.

Nell, the main character next to Jumbo, showed another side of cruelty, forgiveness and surviving such terror. To read the darkness wrapped in marketing, ticket sales and glamour was both a blessing and a curse as bits of hope drove this story along.

Beyond the story, the packaging is exquisite.

[Mr. Kovach · Rating 4 out of 5]

In many ways, basically the same novel as Water for Elephants. A good and interesting read, but SO sad. It's frustrating to think that that rogue PT Barnum got away with what he got away with in the name of entertainment. Different times.

[Ainslee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic mix of fiction and fact - I would imagine some of the fiction is more true then we would want to believe. A great perspective on the storey of the great Jumbo and the circus from the view point of a fellow performer, Little Eyes Nell.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I picked this up since I've heard a bit of the story, but struggled with the writing style.

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Jumbo, Stephens Gerard Malone’s latest masterful melding of fact and fiction, is an unflinching, at times brutally heartrending, portrait of 19th-century circus life. The story begins in Cape Breton. Nell’s impoverished mother has been exploiting her daughter’s diminutive stature at the local market, charging folks a penny for a peek of the doll-size youngster, spicing up the entertainment value by rouging Nell’s cheeks and getting her to sing and dance. Word spreads, and soon Nell’s act has drawn the attention of a woman who strikes a deal with Nell’s mother and spirits the girl south to the US, where Nell ends up a featured performer in the famous Barnum & Bailey circus. By 1875 Nell “Little Eyes” Kelly is P.T. Barnum’s star attraction, a miniature celebrity whose fame has spread far and wide, to the extent that Barnum takes her to England to meet Queen Victoria. But Barnum, a consummate showman and hard-nosed opportunist, is always on the lookout for the next big thing, and when in 1882 he purchases a giant African elephant named Jumbo from the London Zoo, Nell’s celebrity takes a nosedive. The narrative is third-person, told from Nell’s perspective as someone who has made a living out of being gawked at and has every reason to fear redundancy when the circus spotlight shifts to her gargantuan four-legged colleague. But Nell knows intimately the hardship and squalor of circus life behind the scenes and, witnessing day after day the suffering inflicted on helpless animals, including Jumbo, her bitterness does not last. Malone’s novel chronicles the intimate, sometimes difficult, ultimately tragic bond that springs up between Nell, Jumbo and the elephant’s devoted trainer and protector, Englishman Matthew Scott, for whom Nell develops tender feelings (to which Scott, most of the time adrift in an alcoholic fog, remains oblivious). Nell quickly adjusts to her diminished position within the circus hierarchy and willingly steps aside to let Jumbo take centre stage. Over time, as she gains the animal’s trust, the two become protective of each other until, one fateful night in 1885 outside St. Thomas, a town in Ontario, disaster strikes. As he’s demonstrated in numerous previous historical fictions, Stephens Gerard Malone knows how to immerse his reader in precise period detail, in this case persuasively evoking the utilitarian, unsentimental spirit of the times with sharp dialogue and equally sharply drawn characters whose destinies we follow with great interest and empathy. The reader will not be surprised to learn that prevailing attitudes in late 19th-century America were favourable to neither women nor animals, governed as they were by a male power structure that valued little beyond accumulating wealth and maintaining its dominance. Barnum and his ilk were businessmen first and foremost, and the circus business was all about selling entertainment. Barnum acquired performers for his “menagerie,” exploited their talents for as long as it was profitable and discarded them without a second thought when they were no longer fit to serve his purpose. The unhappy tale of Jumbo the circus elephant does the human race no credit. Malone sugarcoats nothing, serving up a brimming plateful of harsh reality. (Reader be warned: the cruelty depicted in these pages is occasionally breathtaking). But ultimately, Jumbo is a moving account of resilience and survival against huge odds and demonstrates that the human-animal bond has the power to provide solace under the most trying of circumstances.