An Elephant in the Garden by Michael Morpurgo

199 pages

"Lizzie and Karl’s mother is a zoo keeper; the family has become attached to an orphaned elephant named Marlene, who will be destroyed as a precautionary measure so she and the other animals don’t run wild should the zoo be hit by bombs. The family persuades the zoo director to let Marlene stay in their garden instead. When the city is bombed, the family flees with thousands of others, but how can they walk the same route when they have an elephant in tow, and keep themselves safe? Along the way, they meet Peter, a Canadian navigator who risks his own capture to save the family. 

As Michael Morpurgo writes in an author’s note, An Elephant in the Garden is inspired by historical truths, and by his admiration for elephants, 'the noblest and wisest and most sensitive of all creatures.' Here is a story that brings together an unlikely group of survivors whose faith in kindness and love proves the best weapon of all." -Amazon

This is a fast, sweet story. It is inspired by a true story of a zookeeper in Belfast who kept an elephant in her backyard to save it after the zoo ordered all large animals shot in the event of a bombing. Another part of the story was inspired by the widow of one of the men who tried to assassinate Hitler. The author changed the story to take place in Dresden, Germany. The family is helped by a Countess who is the widow. It is told from Elizabeth's perspective (the daughter of the zookeeper) as an old woman living in a nursing home. She recounts the events of that time to a nurse and her son who looks a lot like Elizabeth's younger brother did at that age and who has the same name. Karl believes Elizabeth's story from the beginning but his mom takes some convincing. 

Elizabeth, her mom, her brother, a Canadian RAF pilot and the elephant walk hundreds of miles west of Dresden after it is bombed. The relationship with the elephant, who has experienced the loss of her mother, is a special one for all of them. In a way, it's the elephant that keeps them going as they travel at night and rest during the day. The story reads so fast that I felt like it was a little hard to really care about the characters because you didn't have enough time to get to know them, but I liked how the story ended and what the author had to say about elephants and people:

"There is a third inspiration for the story though: elephants themselves. I have always thought they are the noblest and wisest and most sensitive of all creatures. I think in my next life, I would like to be an elephant, please. Then I could write about people, who, as you can tell from this story, and from human history, are often not nearly as noble and wise as they should be, sadly."