CULTIVATING DELIGHT was the first Ackerman book I read. It was about a flower garden. Ackerman is a genius at conveying the wonder in nature. She almost can't help herself, and she's at it again here with THE ZOOKEEPER'S WIFE. Early on in the book, she fixates on some linden trees in the park near the zoo she should be describing. She can't help but add another chapter at the end about Bialowieza, the primeval Polish forest.

Ackerman's original purpose was to show how Jan and Antonina Zabinski managed to hide over 300 Jewish refugees during WWII in the their villa and in vacant cages right under the noses of the Nazis. Once again Ackerman is better at describing the Zabinski's animals and pets than she is in describing the Zabinski's human charges. The tough little badger who survived the bombing by tunneling under his cage and swimming the river, Balbina the half wild house cat, and Wicek the bully of a rabbit are much more real than the human characters who wander in and out of the book. Which isn't to say that there aren't memorable humans as well. There's a German bug man who was so fascinated with ghetto detainee Dr. Tenenbaum's roach collection that he didn't notice Jewish men and women were being smuggled out of the ghetto right under his nose, and there's Magdalena Gross, a famous sculptress who used the zoo animals as her subjects, and pediatrician Henryk Goldszmit, who could have escaped the ghetto but instead stayed with the ghetto orphan children and went with them to the gas chamber.

We also learn something about Nazi experimentation on animals. Nazi zookeeper Lutz Heck had a program to try to back breed modern cattle to the giant auroch seen on prehistoric cave walls.

Jan Zabinski was also part of the Polish resistance from the invasion on, eventually being sent to a prison camp, and he helped smuggle dozens of Jewish detainees out of the ghetto. His wife Antonina was also adept at fooling the Nazis. When a Nazi storage area near the zoo was set on fire, she blamed it on soldiers who took their girlfriends there and were careless with their cigarettes. Ackerman also includes a frightening scene where Rhys, her son, comes close to death at the hands of an SS soldier.

I guess I was also surprised by the number of Polish civilians who were willing to risk their own lives to help the Jews, many more according to Ackerman than we have been led to believe in the history books.

Dave Schwinghammer's unconventional mystery, SOLDIER'S GAP, is available on authorsden.com and at Amazon.com, new and used. Thank you.