Ringling, The Last Laugh

On a snowy spring night in New York, in 1936, John Ringling, the Great Circus King, exited Madison Square Garden through a dark back alley. He walked out to 49th Street and met an old friend he hadn't seen in decades. Ringling, almost seventy, was disheveled and alone. The two of them sat at a bar near Union Square, where John Ringling recounted the story of the five Ringling brothers, their circus, and John's story as the last one on the lot. Seemingly in ruin then, John Ringling has had the Last Laugh, not only on those who forsook him but on the amusement world and the art world. Michael Lancaster is the great grandson of Charles Ringling, one of the five Ringling brothers. He is a sculptor and a fourth generation artist. He has spent over thirty years listening to the stories of the famed Boys From Baraboo. This is his first novel. It is not just a circus story, although there is a circus story in it; this is an American story.