Ella by Bill Peet

Ella is a story about a circus elephant that becomes spoiled because everyone wits on her. She one day decides she is too big of a star and that the circus is not treating her like thinks she should be treated. She decides to hide when everyone is getting on the train. She realizes that it is a mistakes right away but is sure they will realize she is gone and find her. As she is walking along she comes across a farm where a nasty farmer named Lucifer Kirk lives. He makes her work on his farm for one year doing all sorts of hard jobs. She one day hears the distinct sound of the circuses train whistle and breaks out of the barn and finds her circus friends. She now always pitches in to help and is no longer spoiled. I chose this story because I picked up another book with an elephant on the cover. In this story as well as the others his style of writing shines through in the vocabulary that he uses. He uses word in his writing that would be difficult words for a child but manages to somehow make the meaning easy to understand. Out of the ten books that I checked out from the library four of them had elephants. All of the circus elephants looked alike. The circus setting is in this book as well as others. The farm setting is another popular setting for his books.