The remarkable true story of a family who move into a rundown zoo-already a BBC documentary miniseries and excerpted in The Guardian.
In the market for a house and an adventure, Benjamin Mee moved his family to an unlikely new home: a dilapidated zoo in the English countryside. Mee had a dream to refurbish the zoo and run it as a family business. His friends and colleagues thought he was crazy.
But in 2006, Mee and his wife with their two children, his brother, and his 76-year-old mother moved into the Dartmoor Wildlife Park. Their extended family now included: Solomon, an African lion and scourge of the local golf course; Zak, the rickety Alpha wolf, a broadly benevolent dictator clinging to power; Ronnie, a Brazilian tapir, easily capable of killing a man, but hopelessly soppy; and Sovereign, a jaguar and would-be ninja, who has devised a long term escape plan and implemented it.
Nothing was easy, given the family’s lack of experience as zookeepers, and what follows is a magical exploration of the mysteries of the animal kingdom, the power of family, and the triumph of hope over tragedy. We Bought a Zoo is a profoundly moving portrait of an unforgettable family living in the most extraordinary circumstances.
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Sexual Content - 0/5
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Violence - 0/5
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Language - 4/5
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Drugs and Alcohol - 1/5
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Summary
I’ve had We Bought a Zoo on my TBR list for some time now. Generally being a sticker for reading the book before watching the movie, I finally decided to pick it up for a book-to-movie reading challenge I’m working on. It ended up being a good read. It’s the story of a British man and his family who decided to buy an old, broken-down zoo and revitalize it. I can’t quite decide if Benjamin Mee is very brave, a little crazy (in a good way), or both. I think it probably requires some of both to take on a project of this magnitude. It would be daunting enough to purchase a zoo that was in good working order and didn’t have any major problems. Taking on one that’s been going downhill for years and has already lost its zoo license because of its decline is a monumental task even for an experienced zoo director, let alone one who’s never done anything like this before. I have to commend Mr. Mee and his family for taking such a risk, and then pouring so much love and energy into it. Not to mention, the bulk of the work was undertaken both during his wife’s unsuccessful battle with brain cancer and immediately after her death, which made it all the more impressive. At least he had his mother, brother, and children there supporting him (although his kids were quite young at the time), along with moral support and some financial support from two other siblings, so it was really a group effort. But still, it had to have taken some serious nerve, along with boundless fortitude and energy to succeed in their endeavor. And succeed they have. It’s been ten years since this book was written, but I looked up the website and found that the Dartmoor Zoo is still going strong and looks great, so kudos to the Mee family for making their dream a reality.
As for the book itself, it mainly chronicles the time from when they first got wind of a zoo being for sale and started thinking about possibly buying it, all the way up to the opening day of the new, revamped park. It was quite the journey to getting there with lots of bumps and hiccups along the way, not to mention the major tragedy of Mr. Mee losing his wife, but it seems to have been an immensely rewarding one. For me, the most interesting parts, and what I thought were the strongest parts, were the individual stories of the various animals, as well as some of the more personal details of his wife’s illness, more so than the business woes. However, I admit that was also part of the overall story of how the zoo came to be. It’s just that IMHO, sometimes the narrative was a bit meandering, and didn’t always seem to follow a linear path. This meant there were some sections that held my attention better than others. Overall, though, as a huge animal lover, I enjoyed the book, and I think others like myself probably will, too. However, as much as I love animals, it has also proven to me that I definitely don’t have what it takes to be a zoo director.:-) I’ll leave that to the Mees and others like them, and simply visit whenever I get a chance. In fact, if I ever make it across the pond, I just might have to put the Dartmoor Zoo on my itinerary.
Review provided by The Hope Chest Reviews (http://www.thcreviews.com)