Ape House

Ape House

by SaraGruen (Author)

Synopsis

Isabel Duncan, a scientist at the Great Ape Language Lab, doesn't understand people, but animals she gets - especially the bonobos. Isabel feels more comfortable in their world than she's ever felt among humans ...until she meets John Thigpen, a very married reporter who braves the ever-present animal rights protesters outside the lab to see what's really going on inside. When an explosion rocks the lab, severely injuring Isabel and 'liberating' the apes, John's human interest piece turns into the story of a lifetime, one he'll risk his career and his marriage to follow. Then a reality TV show, Ape House, featuring the missing apes debuts under mysterious circumstances, and it immediately becomes the biggest - and unlikeliest - phenomenon in the history of modern media. Ape House delivers great entertainment, but it also opens the animal world to us in ways few novels have done, securing Sara Gruen's place as a master storyteller who allows us to see ourselves as we never have before.

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More Information

Format: Paperback
Pages: 320
Edition: Export ed
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton Ltd
Published: 17 Feb 2011

ISBN 10: 1444715992
ISBN 13: 9781444715996
Book Overview: From the bestselling author of Water for Elephants comes another immensely engaging novel ... Sam, Bonzi, Lola, Mbongo, Jelani, and Makena are no ordinary apes. These bonobos, like others of their species, are capable of reason and carrying on deep relationships - but unlike most bonobos, they also know American Sign Language.

Media Reviews
DON'T MISS YOUR BUS STOP . . . reading this week's talking-point book, Ape House by Water for Elephants author Sara Gruen. It's a funny, provocative lampoon of pop culture, about a group of sign-language-speaking bonobo monkeys who are liberated from a science lab, only to wind up on a reality TV show. * Grazia *
Ape House is gripping, emotionally exhilarating and, by a large margin, the best novel I've read in the past 12 months. Or perhaps 24.... A twisting pacy plot . . . vivid page-turner . . . mining the same literary vein as Jodi Picoult and TC Boyle whose strong, conflicted characters and ethically charged plots deliver brilliant but challenging fiction. * James Urquhart, Independent *
If you love animals like I do, it's a must read. * Ellen DeGeneres, host of the Ellen Show *
had me instantly enraptured * Dallas Morning News *
Gruen's astute, wildly entertaining tale of interspecies connection is a novel of verve and conscience - the fate of the bonobos is a brilliantly satirical surprise. * Booklist (starred review) *
It is a page-turner written with flair, imagination and a sharp sense of irony. * Globe and Mail *
Very, very few novels can change the way you look at the world around you. This one does. * Robert Goolrick, author of A Reliable Wife *
Consider reality TV, meth labs, over-the-top animal-rights activists, Botox, tabloids and Internet diatribes, and you, too, might come to the conclusion: People should be more like animals. Sara Gruen's entertaining, enlightening new novel will certainly leave you thinking so. * Miami Herald *
Has the dramatic tension of a crime thriller... Twists and turns, lies, and treachery abound in this funny, clever, and perceptive story. * Library Journal (starred review) *
Ape House is difficult to put down, filled as it is with genuine hilarity and heartbreak. * Toronto Star *
The biggest accomplishment of Ape House is that it brings bonobos to life. The writing is effortless, as though Gruen sat down and wrote the book in one breezy afternoon. * Vanessa Woods, New Scentist *
Gruen delivers a tale that's full of heart, hope, and compelling questions about who we really are. * Redbook *
Propulsive... Gruen writes with the commercial breathlessness of a cozier Dan Brown. * Entertainment Weekly *
'Ape House is a moving account of a close bond between human and ape - and human and human too.' * Take a Break (Fiction Feast) *
'enlightening and believable' * Guardian *
'Gruen writes about her animal characters with energy and empathy. . . . [she] has a lovely, noticing eye. Fron tiny silver flecks drifting off champagne cork foil, to a dogbowl sliding away from a rescued pit bill, there is plenty of surface detail to detain the reader.' * Financial Times *
Author Bio
Sara Gruen is the internationally bestselling author of Water for Elephants and At The Water's Edge. Her works have been translated into forty-three languages and have sold more than ten million copies worldwide. Water for Elephants was adapted into a major motion picture starring Reese Witherspoon, Rob Pattinson, and Christoph Waltz. She lives in Western North Carolina with her husband and three children. saragruen.com facebook.com/SaraGruenBooks twitter.com/saragruen