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    The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel
    Unavailable
    The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel
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    The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel
    Audiobook8 hours

    The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel

    Written by Julia Stuart

    Narrated by Jonathan Cowley

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Brimming with charm and whimsy, this exquisite novel set in the Tower of London has the transportive qualities and delightful magic of the contemporary classics Chocolat and Amélie.

    Balthazar Jones has lived in the Tower of London with his loving wife, Hebe, and his 120-year-old pet tortoise for the past eight years. That's right, he is a Beefeater (they really do live there). It's no easy job living and working in the tourist attraction in present-day London.

    Among the eccentric characters who call the Tower's maze of ancient buildings and spiral staircases home are the Tower's Rack & Ruin barmaid, Ruby Dore, who just found out she's pregnant; portly Valerie Jennings, who is falling for ticket inspector Arthur Catnip; the lifelong bachelor Reverend Septimus Drew, who secretly pens a series of principled erot­ica; and the philandering Ravenmaster, aiming to avenge the death of one of his insufferable ravens.

    When Balthazar is tasked with setting up an elaborate menagerie within the Tower walls to house the many exotic animals gifted to the Queen, life at the Tower gets all the more interest­ing. Penguins escape, giraffes are stolen, and the Komodo dragon sends innocent people running for their lives. Balthazar is in charge and things are not exactly running smoothly. Then Hebe decides to leave him and his beloved tortoise "runs" away.

    Filled with the humor and heart that calls to mind the delight­ful novels of Alexander McCall Smith, and the charm and beauty of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise is a magical, wholly origi­nal novel whose irresistible characters will stay with you long after you turn the stunning last page.


    From the Hardcover edition.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateAug 10, 2010
    ISBN9780307751591
    Unavailable
    The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise: A Novel

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    Reviews for The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise

    4/5

    408 ratings97 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 2/5
      Review: 109 of seventy-fiveTitle: [THE TOWER, THE ZOO, AND THE TORTOISE]Author: [[JULIA STUART]]Rating: 2* of five The Book Description: Brimming with charm and whimsy, this exquisite novel set in the Tower of London has the transportive qualities and delightful magic of the contemporary classics Chocolat and Amélie. Balthazar Jones has lived in the Tower of London with his loving wife, Hebe, and his 120-year-old pet tortoise for the past eight years. That’s right, he is a Beefeater (they really do live there). It’s no easy job living and working in the tourist attraction in present-day London. Among the eccentric characters who call the Tower’s maze of ancient buildings and spiral staircases home are the Tower’s Rack & Ruin barmaid, Ruby Dore, who just found out she’s pregnant; portly Valerie Jennings, who is falling for ticket inspector Arthur Catnip; the lifelong bachelor Reverend Septimus Drew, who secretly pens a series of principled erotica; and the philandering Ravenmaster, aiming to avenge the death of one of his insufferable ravens. When Balthazar is tasked with setting up an elaborate menagerie within the Tower walls to house the many exotic animals gifted to the Queen, life at the Tower gets all the more interesting. Penguins escape, giraffes are stolen, and the Komodo dragon sends innocent people running for their lives. Balthazar is in charge and things are not exactly running smoothly. Then Hebe decides to leave him and his beloved tortoise “runs” away. Filled with the humor and heart that calls to mind the delightful novels of Alexander McCall Smith, and the charm and beauty of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise is a magical, wholly original novel whose irresistible characters will stay with you long after you turn the stunning last page. My Review: A couple whose marriage has crumbled under the weight of grief for their dead son live on in silence. Cutesy things happen to them. She leaves him. Cutesy things keep happening to them. The characters around them, all nonsensically daffy and wacky, do a variety of handstands and pirouettes for our amusement. She comes back to him, and all ends with a nice, pert little bow slapped on the fanny of the book.I gave it two stars because I laughed out loud twice. And then I stopped.Do not read unless you're in a desperately bad mood and want to become so furious you'll forget why you were grumpy, or you feel the need to immerse yourself in a vat of sugary stickiness and squoodge it between your toes and pack it into each orifice on your person before being rushed to the hospital for insulin therapy. Repetitious verbiage-o-phobes are strongly cautioned.
    • 3/5
      I'm sure this is a very funny book if you can get past the fact that the main character and his wife have lost a child. Losing a child is one of my worst nightmares and it tainted the book for me. There were tons of funny scenarios and but I just couldn't really enjoy the book. The Pythons would have a blast with this book.
    • 5/5
      Unique characters, captivating story, enchanting setting.
    • 5/5
      Delightful!
    • 5/5
      Entertaining!
    • 4/5
      I've now read this twice and it is still charming. Hooray for the quirky people!
    • 3/5
      I chose this book because in reading a few reviews it was compared to The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society but I didn't get the same feel or the same charm from it. I enjoyed reading about the lives of the Beefeaters and the stories of the queen's menagerie, which was new to me, but I felt like those parts were long and drawn out. There were also fun and poignant moments with couples and potential couples through out the story. But my favorite parts were about Hebe Jones and her hunt to find the owners of items turned in to the London Underground Lost Property Office. These adventures could become a funny series within themselves. I actually started wondering if the US has its own job of this variety and where do I apply.
    • 2/5
      As a reminder to me: After a couple years, husband and wife finally face the grief of the death of their very young sons; and they begin anew their life together at the London Tower. Also an insight on the life of the resident guards, "beefeaters", at London Tower.
    • 4/5
      Balthazar Jones is a Beefeater at the Tower of London, where he lives with his wife Hebe and the tortoise that has been in the family for over a century. Ever since the death of his son, he and his wife have not been able to talk of Milo and Balthazar has the odd habit of collecting rainwater, much to Hebe's chagrin. But their lives carry on until the fateful day when the equerry gives Balthazar a new assignment: the queen's animals are going to be relocated from the London Zoo to the Tower, and Balthazar will now be in charge of their care.This is a quiet sort of humorous story about quirky characters that kind of creeps up on you with how much their lives end up mattering to you as a reader. Several different characters - Hebe and her co-worker at the Lost Property Office, the chaplain Septimus, and Ruby Dore the landlady at the Beefeater's pub - have their own side stories that intersect with Balthazar's as he navigates the challenges of animal husbandry and grief for his loss.
    • 4/5
      Beefeaters, London, animals, and eccentric, endearing characters make up this book. It is somewhat disconnected in its entirety concerning the numerous characters, but the British humor and the silliness kept me reading.You will meet Balthazar Jones and his wife Hebe who live in the Tower of London and who are in charge of the Tower....Balthazar is a Beefeater who became the keeper of the animals that had been gifts to the Queen. Hebe works in the London Underground Lost Property Office. She and her friend, Valerie Jennings, document everything that has been left on the London Underground and hope that people will eventually stop to reclaim their lost item. There are many strange items retrieved such as an urn with the remains of Clementine Perkins, thousands of pairs of false teeth, and an eyeball.I really enjoyed Hebe the most.....I loved the strength she portrayed in dealing with the death of her son and her husband's lack of conversation about their son or just about anything. I also enjoyed the Reverend who pined for Ruby Dore and lived with rats that nibbled at his cassocks and the church kneelers and who secretly wrote erotic novels. The most action takes place at the London Underground lost property office....even love. There are many unique characters that will make you laugh out loud in this whimsical book. Oh, and we can't forget Mrs. Cook the 100-year-old tortoise who had a history of her own. Be ready for a confusing but delightful ride through the lives of the characters who all have some heartache and/or secret. Don't give up because of the way the book begins.....I almost did, and it would have been a mistake. I enjoyed the book because of its history lesson and overall different theme. 4/5
    • 3/5
      There are some sweet and genuinely affecting moments in this novel, but I found the combination of the contemporary timeframe and the Hogwarts-like setting of the closed world inside the Tower confusing, and overall I thought the tone of charming eccentricity self-conscious and somewhat strained.
    • 3/5
      I may be in a minority, but the quirkiness of The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise just didn't work for me.The story centers on Beefeater Balthazaar Jones, collector of rain and resident of the Tower of London, still in despair over the death of his son, Milo, some years previous. His wife, Hebe, works at the London Underground Lost Property Office, home to an eclectic assortment of objects, up to and including an Egpytology section. Neither of them can bring themselves to discuss their son's death with the other, and the issue hangs between them, unresolved, and haunts their increasingly static marriage. Other notable characters include Hebe's coworker Valerie Jennings, a woman of considerable size who keeps finding her way into costumes abandoned on the Underground, who is slowly forming a relationship with "tattooed ticked inspector" (one of my issues with the novel: the continued repetition of certain phrases) Arthur Catnip. Another notable is Rev. Septimus Drew, curate at the Tower and writer of steamy ficton, obsessed by catching rats and possessed of "extraordinarly long legs."The novel opens with a list of the cast of characters and a sentance describing each of them, and I felt like we never got much further into their characters than that brief introduction. With Balthazaar and Hebe, it's true, we do see more into their grief and ongoing pain, so there is character development there. With each character, in fact, we see a bit of the lonliness plaging them. But beyond seeing that the characters have quirky jobs, characteristics, and a tendancy to be lonely without a love interest, I didn't feel that there was much else there. Valerie can only get stuck in a costume before meeting with Catnip so many times before it stops being funny; Drew can only build so many devious rat-catching traps; the ghost of Sir Walter Raleigh can only make so many ill-timed appearances for comic relief before it begins to feel repetitive.In the line of repetition, we are introduced to facts about the Tower of London-- again and again. Beefeaters, we learn, provide tours of the Tower and are hence repositories of knowledge of trivia about the Tower. So that trivia comes up, over and over. The quirky fact is cute once, but telling the same joke over and over just doesn't hold up that well. Or at least it didn't for me. I felt that, if Stuart had wanted to play the angle of dishing out Tower gossip from over the years, she could have surely kept the reader stocked with a fresh supply of facts and information. She could have played the tour guide, so to speak. Instead, she played one of those tour cassettes, until it wore out.The novel ends rather neatly, happy endings all around. I suppose that's not a complaint; the novel isn't exactly billing itself as a tragedy. But things do wrap up awfully neatly, awfully quickly. Which leads me to the question of who I'd recommend this to: I'm not sure. Would I recommend it to fans of quirky, unusual reads? I'm not sure I would, because the theme of Milo's death and the persistent lonliness of the characters runs so heavily throughout the book. I'd be afraid that this would make the book to depressing, undercut the levity for people looking for a cheery little light read. On the other hand, I couldn't recommend it to people looking for a book about themes of estrangement because of the silliness factor, because they would feel that the forced quirkiness cheapens the themes of isolation. So I'm not sure who I'll loan this one to. In the end, I suspect it'll sit on my shelf. What can I say? This book and I just didn't hit it off.
    • 2/5
      Didn't really enjoy this one all that much. I did end up caring a little bit about Balthazar Jones, who lives in the tower of London, and I hoped he would make up with his wife. Most of the people in this book seemed depressed and plagued by odd and dismal circumstances, but it does turn out better for most of them in the end. But I wouldn't recommend it.
    • 4/5
      Yes, the Beefeaters that patrol the London Tower do actually live there, and their lives are tied closely to the centuries of history at London's oldest prison. This book is quite delightful, and the characters are very enjoyable. I feel like I know Balthazar Jones and his wife Hebe and his wife Hebe who works at the Lost Property Department of the London Underground and he has many friends such as the Reverend Septimus Drew and the lady who runs the Rack and Ruin Pub. They are all so unique and funny. This book made me laugh out loud numerous times and it made me shake my head many times more. The book centres around the Royal plan to move her animals that she has received as gifts from the London Zoo to the Tower and to recreate an historical event when there was a Royal menagerie at The Tower. Balthazar is put in charge of the move and the animals, and he forms a bond with them all, even up to the lovelorn albatross. It was such a fun and enjoyable book , so if you're in the mood for whimsy, give it a try.
    • 3/5
      There are some sweet and genuinely affecting moments in this novel, but I found the combination of the contemporary timeframe and the Hogwarts-like setting of the closed world inside the Tower confusing, and overall I thought the tone of charming eccentricity self-conscious and somewhat strained.
    • 3/5
      I may be in a minority, but the quirkiness of The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise just didn't work for me.The story centers on Beefeater Balthazaar Jones, collector of rain and resident of the Tower of London, still in despair over the death of his son, Milo, some years previous. His wife, Hebe, works at the London Underground Lost Property Office, home to an eclectic assortment of objects, up to and including an Egpytology section. Neither of them can bring themselves to discuss their son's death with the other, and the issue hangs between them, unresolved, and haunts their increasingly static marriage. Other notable characters include Hebe's coworker Valerie Jennings, a woman of considerable size who keeps finding her way into costumes abandoned on the Underground, who is slowly forming a relationship with "tattooed ticked inspector" (one of my issues with the novel: the continued repetition of certain phrases) Arthur Catnip. Another notable is Rev. Septimus Drew, curate at the Tower and writer of steamy ficton, obsessed by catching rats and possessed of "extraordinarly long legs."The novel opens with a list of the cast of characters and a sentance describing each of them, and I felt like we never got much further into their characters than that brief introduction. With Balthazaar and Hebe, it's true, we do see more into their grief and ongoing pain, so there is character development there. With each character, in fact, we see a bit of the lonliness plaging them. But beyond seeing that the characters have quirky jobs, characteristics, and a tendancy to be lonely without a love interest, I didn't feel that there was much else there. Valerie can only get stuck in a costume before meeting with Catnip so many times before it stops being funny; Drew can only build so many devious rat-catching traps; the ghost of Sir Walter Raleigh can only make so many ill-timed appearances for comic relief before it begins to feel repetitive.In the line of repetition, we are introduced to facts about the Tower of London-- again and again. Beefeaters, we learn, provide tours of the Tower and are hence repositories of knowledge of trivia about the Tower. So that trivia comes up, over and over. The quirky fact is cute once, but telling the same joke over and over just doesn't hold up that well. Or at least it didn't for me. I felt that, if Stuart had wanted to play the angle of dishing out Tower gossip from over the years, she could have surely kept the reader stocked with a fresh supply of facts and information. She could have played the tour guide, so to speak. Instead, she played one of those tour cassettes, until it wore out.The novel ends rather neatly, happy endings all around. I suppose that's not a complaint; the novel isn't exactly billing itself as a tragedy. But things do wrap up awfully neatly, awfully quickly. Which leads me to the question of who I'd recommend this to: I'm not sure. Would I recommend it to fans of quirky, unusual reads? I'm not sure I would, because the theme of Milo's death and the persistent lonliness of the characters runs so heavily throughout the book. I'd be afraid that this would make the book to depressing, undercut the levity for people looking for a cheery little light read. On the other hand, I couldn't recommend it to people looking for a book about themes of estrangement because of the silliness factor, because they would feel that the forced quirkiness cheapens the themes of isolation. So I'm not sure who I'll loan this one to. In the end, I suspect it'll sit on my shelf. What can I say? This book and I just didn't hit it off.
    • 2/5
      This wasn't a bad book. It's just not my type of book. The characters were so quirky that they began to get on my nerves. I really didn't care about any of them. I did find the portions of the book dealing with Balthazar and Hebe's dead son heartbreaking. This book reminded me a lot of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society. I was also lukewarm about that books. So, it's not the book, it's me.
    • 4/5
      This was a charming book. The advance reviews compare it to works like The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, and they're not wrong. It's not quite that good, but it's definitely enjoyable. It's a quick, light, read that also manages to have touching moments that the author manages to fit naturally into the story. If it were available a couple of months earlier, I'd suggest taking it to the beach. That's absolutely what you should do if you can get your hands on an advance copy.
    • 4/5
      I started this book en route to London and loved it. It encouraged me to make another visit to the Tower of London and to revisit several other places in the city rather than making day trips outside of London. Each time I rode the Underground, I contemplated trying to find the lost and found office. The cast of characters are amusing much of the time, but also face challenges in life and their relationships with others. I highly recommend this book to anyone who has or plans to travel to London.
    • 5/5
      Take an unlikely setting, say, the Tower of London. Add in some unusual characters, like the Beefeaters who both live and work there. Now mix in a man who collects different types of rain, the Lost and Found department of the London Underground, a second Royal Menagerie on the Tower grounds, a marriage falling apart, an unexpected pregnancy, the oldest tortoise in the world, and a bearded pig who may or may not be on the loose and you've just scratched the surface of the delights in this book. Funny, sad, and chock full of historical tidbits about the Tower (some real, some made up), this delightful book is well worth a read.
    • 4/5
      A very humorous book. Balthazar Jones, a Beefeater working at the Tower of London, is charged by the Queen as Keeper of the Royal Menagerie, which is being relocated from the London Zoo to the Tower of London. Personal struggles, animal mayhem, and a cast of zany characters keep this book going and will bring a smile to your face many a time. Perfect as a light summer read.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed reading this book. It was a light read, though the subject matter wasn't always light. I just loved the snippets of history about the Tower of London and British history and it is the first book in a long time to make me laugh out loud.
    • 3/5
      Enjoyable light reading. Humorous with a strong touch of the tragic. A tower guard and his wife struggle with mourning the death of their son. She works in the lost and found for the London Underground (the funniest bits) and he is put in charge of a new menagerie for the Queen at the Tower. The struggle in their grief nearly consumes them. Many laughs - but predictable, but not in an unpleasant way.
    • 4/5
      What a fun book this was to read! Julia Stuart is very witty and incorporates the history of London Tower and the Beefeaters into a rollicking story full of mishaps in love, unusual animals, and lost objects. Balthazar Jones is a Beefeater, a former military officer who ostensibly guards the Tower of London in a long-standing tradition, but whose day to day work is comprised of trying to catch pickpockets and acting as a tour guide. His wife, Hebe, works at the London Underground's Department of Lost Things, trying to reconnect travelers with the things they lose: briefcases, an urn of ashes, 157 pairs of false teeth, a gigolo's diary, and other wild and wacky items. Despite their enormous love for each other, they are growing apart as they mourn the death of their son. When Balthazar is asked to take charge of a menagerie that is to be created at the Tower, mayhem ensues around their crumbling marriage. One of the joys of this book is the cast of characters: from the Reverend Septimus Drew who is in love with the barmaid of the Tower's Rack & Ruin pub and writes erotica in his spare time, to the Ravenmaster, whose charges are responsible for Mrs. Cook, the Jones's ancient tortoise, losing the tip of her tail. Each character has his or her own preoccupations, secrets, and loves which are described in hilarious but kind detail. In addition, the animals reflect the emotions, and appearance, of the humans around them to humorous effect.I highly recommend this light but intelligent read for when you need a pleasant distraction.
    • 4/5
      Beefeaters, London, animals, and eccentric, endearing characters make up this book. It is somewhat disconnected in its entirety concerning the numerous characters, but the British humor and the silliness kept me reading.You will meet Balthazar Jones and his wife Hebe who live in the Tower of London and who are in charge of the Tower....Balthazar is a Beefeater who became the keeper of the animals that had been gifts to the Queen. Hebe works in the London Underground Lost Property Office. She and her friend, Valerie Jennings, document everything that has been left on the London Underground and hope that people will eventually stop to reclaim their lost item. There are many strange items retrieved such as an urn with the remains of Clementine Perkins, thousands of pairs of false teeth, and an eyeball.I really enjoyed Hebe the most.....I loved the strength she portrayed in dealing with the death of her son and her husband's lack of conversation about their son or just about anything. I also enjoyed the Reverend who pined for Ruby Dore and lived with rats that nibbled at his cassocks and the church kneelers and who secretly wrote erotic novels. The most action takes place at the London Underground lost property office....even love. There are many unique characters that will make you laugh out loud in this whimsical book. Oh, and we can't forget Mrs. Cook the 100-year-old tortoise who had a history of her own. Be ready for a confusing but delightful ride through the lives of the characters who all have some heartache and/or secret. Don't give up because of the way the book begins.....I almost did, and it would have been a mistake. I enjoyed the book because of its history lesson and overall different theme. 4/5
    • 4/5
      This was a sweet, funny, poignant story of a beefeater who was commissioned to care for the Queen's menagerie at the Tower of London, and the story of his relationshsip with his wife.I loved this charming little book!
    • 5/5
      There may be a couple mild spoilers here. Not giving away anything major but just small incidents that I thought were so funny.

      Wow! This was different. I thought this was beautifully written. I just loved the style. The portrayal of the sadness and the joys and the absurdities of life and the very unusual setting was enthralling. The humor and timing was just incredible. I'm sitting here laughing out loud, again, at the upside down parrot diving and screaming "f..k me ravenmaster" - completely caught me off guard and I thought it was hilarious. Valerie Jennings was a great character - my favorite. The positions she found herself repeatedly caught in by Arthur Catnip were great - "May the force be with you" - too much. All the characters were drawn so well. I'll likely read this again.
    • 4/5
      This novel is an immensely charming story about a couple healing from the loss of their 11-year-old son, set in the historically fascinating Tower of London and complemented by a menagerie of obscure animals and quirky characters. It's about relationships and love in all forms - from mating for life (albatross) to admiration from afar (the chaplain and the barmaid). The writing is witty, and I love her device of attaching specific adjectives to each character every time they are mentioned (I am particularly fond of the bearded pig's fulsome buttocks).
    • 3/5
      For book club. At first I found this book rather unbearably twee, but its undercurrent of sadness and rather sweet understated writing won me over. Rather British, and everything works out in the end. Even for the albatross.
    • 3/5
      3.5***

      Yeoman Warder Balthazar Jones and his wife have lived in the Tower of London since he took the post as a Beefeater some eight years ago. His hobby is collecting rain samples, which he keeps in Egyptian perfume bottles in a case designed for that purpose. Hebe Jones works as a clerk for the London Underground Lost Property Office, where she tries to reunite patrons with their lost items. Their only pet is an ancient tortoise, Mrs Cook; in fact she is the oldest tortoise in the world. When Her Majesty decides that the Tower Menagerie should be reinstated to house the animals given to her as gifts, Balthazar is named the zookeeper on the premise that if he’s kept Mrs Cook alive and well all these years, then he can surely handle Her Majesty’s animals.

      The central story revolves around Balthazar and Hebe, and their struggle to cope with the loss of their son. Stuart lets the reader get to know these two wounded souls by watching them at work. Balthazar’s adventures with the menagerie constantly remind him of his son and his marriage. Hebe’s work trying to find the owner of recovered cremation urn and helping a local courier recover the ice chest with a donated organ brings out her compassion and introduces her to people suffering losses every bit as heart-wrenching as hers. Interspersed with their stories we have tidbits of Tower factoids, a reverend with a secret secular life, a randy Ravenmaster, tourists behaving badly, a developing love interests between more than one couple, and an escape-artist tortoise bent on revenge.

      The result is a quirky love story, a mini-lesson in history, and a whimsical social commentary all rolled into one. Some of the scenarios were a little too over-the-top, but I was interested from beginning to end and enjoyed it overall.