True friends come in all shapes and sizes
What an absolute little gem of a book. I’m still all warm and fuzzy and smiling here five hours after I finished it.
This story was so different from what I expected. I picked it on behalf of it being a bestseller from one of Switzerland’s most popular contemporary authors, and had only half skimmed the blurb. So I was expecting something whimsical, a fairytale, maybe some magical realism. But instead I got a story that blends hard science, edge-of-your-seat suspense, eco-idealism, ethical and philosophical musings on creation versus evolution the sacredness of life. And a very beautiful love story in more ways than one.
The book starts with Schoch, a middle aged homeless alcoholic, who lives in a cave on the river banks in Zürich. He’s pretty content. He knows all the places to go to get decent coffee and adequate food, and he could give up drinking any time he wanted to. Giving up drinking is easy – he’s done it lots of times.
But one day, he wakes up to find something extraordinary in his cave: a 40 cm tall, pink, glow-in-the-dark elephant. At first, he assumes he’s hallucinating. As you would. But the little pink elephant is still there when he sobers up. She is very real. And very much in danger.
Schoch had admitted to himself long ago that he was an alcoholic. But he was a disciplined alcoholic, he kept telling himself. He had his alcoholism under control. He could stop whenever he wanted, as he proved several times already. Stopped and, because he’d managed it, started again. He’d stop for good when there was a compelling reason to do so.
Was a pink elephant a compelling reason?
The story jumps back and forth in time and shifts around in perspective between several different characters, starting with Schoch finding the elephant and his developing relationship with her and shifting back to tell us the story of her creation.
The tiny creature, whom Schoch names Sabu, turns out to be the creation of Dr. Roux, a geneticist who pushes the boundaries of science to create animals that can dazzle the world and, more importantly, make him rich and famous.
Sabu was smuggled out of the circus where she was born, because Kaung, the Burmese elephant whisperer, believed that such a unique being should be safeguarded from exploitation.
But Dr Roux and the Chinese organisation behind him is hell-bent on getting her back, and will stop at nothing to do so.
Now, how exactly Sabu came to be in Schoch’s cave, and just to what lengths people will go to track her down, you must read for yourself, or I will spoil too much.
But I will tell you that Schoch seeks help from the vet, Valerie. Together they nurture Sabu and do everything they can to protect her from exploitation. And Schoch’s story becomes as much about personal redemption as it is about protecting Sabu, as his bond with this tiny creature gives him a sense of purpose he thought he’d lost forever.
It’s abundantly clear that Suter did extensive scientific research for this book. Did I really need so many details on the proteins responsible for primordial dwarfism or a mini anatomy lesson covering every intricacy of an elephant’s birth canal? Probably not. But hey, now I know.
And obviously the novel raises the pressing ethical questions: Where do we draw the line in genetic experimentation? Who gets to decide what’s natural, and at what cost? Is life valuable in itself? There is no question on Suter’s own moral standing here: that the potential dangers of genetic engineering in the hands of unscrupulous scientists far, far outweighs any possible benefits. The divide between good and evil is very black and white in this book. The characters are pretty one-dimensional. It’s all a little on the nose, and just maybe a little too easy.
But you will allow it, and you will smile while you do, because Elefant is just a delightful little story.
““It was a tiny elephant, no more than forty centimeters long and thirty high. It had the proportions of a young animal and the skin of… a marzipan pig! Just a little wrinkled. And with pink hairs on its back.”
Elefant is funny and exhilarating and full of tenderness. It is a story about connection and about second chances. And through it all, there’s a gentle warmth — a belief in love and redemption that makes the story shine brighter than Sabu herself.
You won’t be prepared for how much you might come to care about a tiny glowing pink elephant and her scruffy, reluctant protector.
Not your thing? Check out my other suggestions for books to read from Switzerland!
