A Trip to the Light Fantastic: Travels With a Mexican Circus [Paperback]

Katie Hickman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1995

The author of this book spent a year travelling round Mexico with a circus - big top, clowns, elephants and all. She and her husband, photographer Tom Owen-Edmunds, lived with the circus - riding the elephants and playing clowns as part of the show. Further afield they tracked down the remains of ancient Mayan civilizations and hunted down the last, dying members of Pancho Villa's famous outlaw army. This travel book records the sights seen on their travels as well as featuring the people and characters of the circus and those they met en-route. By the author of "Dreams of the Peaceful Dragon" and "The Quetzal Summer".

Product Details

• Paperback: 301 pages
• Publisher: Harpercollins (May 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0006377157
• ISBN-13: 978-0006377153
• Product Dimensions: 7.6 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,603,296 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Grand grand circuses, July 14, 2000

By 

yanipoo - See all my reviews

This review is from: A Trip to the Light Fantastic: Travels With a Mexican Circus (Paperback)

This book follows an English woman and her husband's year with a Mexican Circus. She talks about the people, the places, and the tragedies with such great love and fondness. It is a great read, and although I felt it was not always well written and prone to the side of sentimentality that occasionally distracts what is of interest to a reader. I also wished she paid more attention to the minor characters in the book, because each and every one of them seemed to have a story to tell, in fact those minor stories seemed to have more changes, tragedies and secrets to reveal. Instead Hickman concentrated on the powerful, the stars, and the family behind the circus.

Criticisms aside it was a wonderful travelogue and fulfilled a lot of my childhood fantasy of running away with the circus. The characters in the book are real, with their flaws and their good sides exposed. The details of how the circus is put together, the hopes and dreams of the people, the feeling of performance are all encompassed. The book does give you a sense of the great dramas, loves, and loyalties that involve a moving, roaming group of people. I know I used a lot of grand words to describe the book, but it is because circuses are a grand endeavor.