Chapter Eighty-Seven: The Swan Gondola

The setting--Omaha, Nebraska, the World's Fair, 1898--is almost as fascinating as the characters in this novel by Timothy Schaffert.  The Swan Gondola follows the story of "Ferret" Skerritt, an orphaned thief-turned-ventriloquist who falls in love with a young actress, Cecily, after meeting her once, briefly, and determines that he will find her at the World's Fair and win her love.  While the plot follows a pretty classic boy-meets-girl-then-loses-girl story arc, Ferret's uniqueness and the appeal of the setting help differentiate this novel from the herd and make it a bit more interesting.  There are a few Wizard of Oz nods, too, which are a bit corny but fun nonetheless.  Billy Wakefield is an average villain with a steampunkish silver hand, easy to dislike; supporting characters August and Rosie are your typical eccentric sidekicks; Mrs. Margaret adds a creepy carnie to the cast; the Sisters Egan are classic spinsters; oddly, Cecily, ostensibly the center of Ferret's attention, is a bit of a non-character, defined more by Ferret's feelings about her than by her own personality.  This is a slow, lazy kind of book, ideal for reading on a lazy summer day.