this is a wonderful book, it touched my heart.its really sad.its about a gorilla named Ivan .Ivan`s parents died by our kind. his sister tag died after being capture. after this he is taken to a big top mall, where he meets Stella a elephant, bob a stray dog, Mack the owner(the one who captured him), George,the custodian, and Julia(George`s little girl.)soon they get a new elephant who is named ruby,people come to see them perform. soon reporters come to interview them, there is a secret when the animals don't obey, Mack uses a claw stick to hit them when people see this they protest .they say these animals belong in the wild,or in a zoo.soon they close the mall and Ivan,ruby and everyone else go to zoo ,but before that Stella dies because she use to work in a circus and her foot got hurt, so they sended her to the big top mall,but soon her foot got infected and she died.everyone is happy that these creatures are in a place they call home.