46 pages • 1 hour read
Cassie BeasleyCircus Mirandus
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2015A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 21-30Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 21 Summary: “Mr. Head’s Menagerie”
Jenny is especially excited about the menagerie, running around to pat and feed the wondrous creatures, including a miniature hippopotamus, blue bats, and long-haired goats reading a magazine with an iguana. Micah has the feeling that he is being watched. He sees a large, silver fish in a tank, which seems to flip its tail at Micah in recognition, accompanied by a plaque explaining that it was donated by Ephraim Tuttle. An aqua-colored baby unicorn is escorted into the room; Jenny is thrilled. Micah teaches Big Jean, the world’s smartest elephant, how to tie knots.
The circus owner, Mr. Head, introduces himself to Micah. Jenny joins them. Micah is embarrassed when Jenny tells Mr. Head that she is impressed with the various tricks and illusions of the circus. A tiger, which had been invisible a moment before, materializes next to them. Mr. Head points out that it would be difficult to genetically modify a tiger to become invisible and suggests that they should go to a show.
Chapter 22 Summary: “Obviously VIPs”
Micah is snappy and short with Jenny, who doesn’t understand what she has done to upset Micah.
They go to the Lightbender’s tent. Micah explains that his grandfather needs a miracle. Jenny clarifies that Ephraim knew one of the Lightbender’s predecessors and that it might comfort him in his old age to spend time with the Lightbender, not believing that it could be the same man whom Ephraim saw as a 10-year-old. With an air of disappointment and dislike, the Lightbender asks Jenny how old she is.
The Lightbender assures Micah that he will do all that he can for Ephraim and encourages them to come to his show so that they can understand him better.
Chintzy urges the Lightbender to talk to Micah about something unspecified. Micah correctly guesses that it is Victoria, his grandmother, and asks whether the Lightbender and Chintzy knew her.
Chapter 23 Summary: “The Bird Woman’s Final Performance”
The narrative flashes back to when Micah’s grandmother, Victoria, is a child.
Victoria, initially charmed by the idea of being the star of her own show, becomes bored of Circus Mirandus; she thinks its goal of appeasing “silly” children is a waste of her significant talents.
She tries to convince the Lightbender to leave with her, but he is disgusted by her dreams of power and greatness and her dismissal of the circus’s goals as unimportant.
In her last show, Victoria shocks and appalls the children by ordering the birds to attack each other and plummet into the ground, killing themselves.
The Lightbender controls the situation by making the children no longer see the chaos and death, and they are led from the tent.
The Lightbender tells Victoria that faith enables magic. She falls from the sky, no longer able to fly; he catches her. Mr. Head tells her to leave the circus and to never return.
Chapter 24 Summary: “The Illusionist”
The narrative returns to the present. Jenny and Micah are led into the main part of the Lightbender’s tent for his show. Micah is reeling from what he learned about his grandmother, Victoria, when she worked at Circus Mirandus.
Jenny starts to ask whether the Lightbender uses cameras. The Lightbender says that he doesn’t usually perform for children with her point of view.
The show begins. Micah finds himself in a freezing ice landscape and then at a jungle rockpool; he is in swimming shorts and enters the water. He is suddenly dry. He runs sand through his fingers in a desert, looking at a pyramid, but in the next scene, the sand has disappeared. Micah realizes that the Lightbender is an illusionist and therefore cannot save his grandfather from death. The Lightbender appears and apologizes to Micah; he says that Ephraim knows that he can’t save him. He recommends that they visit Rosebud’s wagon for something to make Ephraim feel more like himself.
The Lightbender quietly reflects that he wishes that Ephraim had asked him for a smaller miracle.
Chapter 25 Summary: “A Mite of Help”
Micah angrily walks towards the entrance. Beside him, Jenny is reflecting that she doesn’t think that the Lightbender uses cameras—she now thinks it is real. She convinces Micah to visit Rosebud’s wagon.
The enormous Rosebud, who has a pink-painted bald head and a wagon full of intriguing animals and potions, mixes a tea for Ephraim.
They leave the wagon and realize that it’s morning; they rush to their bikes and home.
Chapter 26 Summary: “Old Lies”
Aunt Gertrudis is waiting when Micah arrives home; she is furious. She recognizes Ephraim’s old bootlace tied around his wrist and tries to rip it off, saying that Ephraim’s lies should die with him. Micah yells at her that Circus Mirandus is real.
Micah makes a cup of the tea that Rosebud gave him for Ephraim and then goes to school.
Chapter 27 Summary: “Rosebud’s Mite”
After school, Great Aunt Gertrudis, who has grounded Micah, makes him do a variety of disgusting chores.
Micah is thrilled and overwhelmed when Ephraim appears, looking well and fully dressed, and suggests that he and Micah should go out together to celebrate the fact that he’s feeling better. Aunt Gertrudis angrily tells Ephraim that he’s dying.
Ephraim and Micah go to the movies; they watch two movies, eat popcorn and candy, and then go to mini-golf.
At home, they go to the treehouse, and Micah tells Ephraim all about Circus Mirandus. Ephraim clarifies that he didn’t ask the Lightbender to save him, as he knows that this is impossible. Instead, he asked for something “strange and magnificent” (304), but he doesn’t tell Micah what it was.
Micah ties a knot in the bootlace to represent Jenny so that Ephraim can get an idea of who she is.
Ephraim tells Micah that, when he was a young man, he tried to return to Circus Mirandus.
Chapter 28 Summary: “Ephraim and the Bird Woman”
The narrative flashes back to Ephraim and Victoria as young adults.
The day Victoria leaves the circus is the same day that Ephraim tries to rediscover the circus. Ephraim is 19 and caring for his younger sister, Gertrudis, after his mother’s death. He takes Gertrudis to Chicago in search of Circus Mirandus. Gertrudis is excited about Ephraim’s dream of learning from the Lightbender and joining the circus.
They bump into Victoria on the way, who convinces Ephraim to come with her instead; she assures him that they can go to the circus later. Ephraim and Victoria get married. Ephraim realizes that Victoria tricked him but forgives her, although he dreams of the circus as he works hard to provide for the family, including Gertrudis, who is now 11.
Victoria gains the ability to fly again but keeps it secret from everyone, apart from Ephraim.
Determined to dissuade Ephraim from joining Circus Mirandus, Victoria decides to convince Gertrudis, who faithfully believes Ephraim’s stories about Circus Mirandus, that magic is made up. Gertrudis jumps off the roof, sure that Victoria will finally show Gertrudis her ability to fly, but Victoria doesn’t, and Gertrudis breaks her arm.
Chapter 29 Summary: “The Wrong Answer”
The narrative returns to the present as Ephraim finishes his story. After Gertrudis broke her arm, Ephraim asked Victoria to leave. Later, a baby was left on Ephraim’s doorstep with a feather. The baby was Micah’s father, Ephraim and Victoria’s child. Ephraim reminds Micah, who can barely remember his parents, that they were wonderful people.
Ephraim and Micah are grateful to have had the night together. They leave the treehouse. Ephraim’s cough is back.
His health declines again in the next few days.
The doctor is called; Ephraim only has a few more hours to live.
Chintzy arrives and says that the Lightbender’s answer is “no.” Ephraim tells Micah that he has to go to Circus Mirandus and bring the Lightbender to him.
Micah calls Jenny’s parents’ house and asks her to meet him there, but she is about to go to school and is not sure whether she can get there.
Chapter 30 Summary: “A Really Big Gorilla”
Micah reaches the circus, but Geoffery insists that he cannot come in as he doesn’t have a ticket. Micah hears the invisible tiger growl and leaves, trying to think of how to get in.
Micah goes and steals a giant inflatable gorilla that is staked outside of the recreational center. He ties it to himself and floats into the sky. He unties himself when he is over the circus. He crashes down into a tent and comes to with the Lightbender’s face over him. He determinedly tells the Lightbender that he must go to see Ephraim because “no” is the wrong answer.
Chapters 21-30 Analysis
Circus Mirandus continues to epitomize Mystery and Magic in these chapters through the wondrous sights and sounds witnessed by the visiting children. The menagerie contains “a miniature hippopotamus,” “bright blue bats,” “a two-headed camel,” birds that transform into mice, and an invisible tiger (230-31). Micah’s connection to the strange and wondrous place continues to be established; the fish that his grandfather supplied to the circus “[flips] his tail in a way that might have been recognition” (232). Micah is recognized and welcomed in a way that suggests that his arrival is predestined and inevitable.
Imagination Versus Rigidity continues to be explored through Jenny’s and Micah’s contrasting interpretations of the circus. Through Jenny’s characterization, Beasley suggests that academic intelligence isn’t the only thing of value; Jenny is the smartest student in her class, but her constant search for intellectual understanding initially prevents her from understanding and appreciating Circus Mirandus. It also leads her to be inadvertently rude. Micah accepts that the circus is magical and inexplicable, finding joy and wonder at its strangeness; on the other hand, Jenny insults Mr. Head:
[T]he way she complimented things was all wrong. It was “What a clever trick you’ve used over here to make this torch look like it’s really floating” and “You must have a wonderful team of geneticists working with you to create bioluminescent bush babies” (239).
Micah, who grasps the magical underpinnings of the circus, is embarrassed at Jenny’s inability to accept the inexplicable nature of their surroundings; her well-meaning compliments, which are actually insulting, convey her lack of belief in magic, wounding Mr. Head, whose life mission is to instill faith in magic in children. Micah tries to excuse Jenny, revealing his frustration at her rigid inability to be open-minded to Circus Mirandus’s wonder: “‘She doesn’t mean it!’ Micah said. ‘She’s just . . .’ Rigid, his brain whispered. ‘She’s just having a hard time with all of this’” (240). The Lightbender also notes Jenny’s rigidity when she interrupts Micah as he is requesting that the Lightbender grant Ephraim a long life by saying, “He knew one of your predecessors, you see” (250). Jenny’s comment denotes her belief that Micah’s request is ridiculous and unrealistic, revealing her lack of belief in Ephraim’s stories of the circus’s wonder and magic; she also reveals her skepticism that the Lightbender could be the same man who spoke to Ephraim when he was a child.
The Lightbender, Mr. Head, and the other performers at Circus Mirandus believe that imagination and belief in magic are delicate qualities that must be nurtured and kept alive for as long as possible. The Lightbender believes that it is a tragedy that Jenny has lost her wonder and openness to magic at such a young age. Similarly, Mr. Head is devastated at Victoria’s violent demonstration, pointing out, “[F]aith is such a fragile thing” (271). The Lightbender demonstrates this to Victoria; as soon as he places doubt in her mind about her ability to fly, she falls from the sky “like a stone” (272). This simile denotes the abruptness of Victoria’s loss of her power—which was a fragile thing maintained only by her own faith—as well as alluding to the devastation that this loss causes for her.
The Lightbender’s show is an important turning point for Jenny, forcing her to confront the reality of magic given the incredibly immersive experience of his illusions. She tells Micah, “I don’t think the Lightbender uses cameras” (285). Jenny is revealed to be a dynamic character who changes and grows. She determinedly pushes Micah to remain in the circus to visit Rosebud’s wagon to find something that will help Ephraim, illustrating her newfound faith in the circus’s magic. Later, Jenny urges Micah to return to the circus, which confuses Micah and reveals the extent of Jenny’s changed beliefs: “It [is] strange for her to be the one convincing him that magic [is] the answer to his problems” (297). Jenny’s newfound faith illustrates The Importance of Loving Family and Friends, as she is able to support Micah when his faith wavers.
Similarly, Gertrudis, who also epitomizes rigidity and skepticism, is revealed to be a more complex character than initially suggested. The narrative reveals that she originally believed wholeheartedly in magic but was let down by Victoria, who let her fall from the roof rather than reveal her ability to fly. This anecdote explains the severity of her reaction to reminders of magic, such as Ephraim’s bootlace: “[S]he saw the bootlace wrapped around Micah’s wrist. Something Micah hadn’t expected flitted across her face—recognition. An angry flush reddened her cheeks” (292). For Gertrudis, references to magic remind her of being betrayed and hurt by her caretakers.
On the other hand, Micah feels doubt and skepticism for the first time in these chapters when he realizes that the Lightbender is a talented illusionist who cannot actually change the facts of life. Micah reflects that although he felt like he was holding sand only a moment earlier, now his “hands [are] empty” (279). At this moment, Micah realizes that the sand was a clever illusion and that therefore the Lightbender can’t stop his grandfather dying. Micah’s grief at this revelation is likened in a metaphor to a floating kite: “Micah [feels] like a kite with a cut string, tumbling through the air, the ground falling away beneath him” (280-81). Micah’s belief in the Lightbender’s ability kept him metaphorically tethered to hope and happiness, but he realizes that his belief in the illusionist was misplaced. As Micah grapples with this revelation, the reader learns that Ephraim’s miracle request is not to be kept alive, as Micah had mistakenly assumed. Instead, Ephraim has requested something that is “strange and magnificent” (304). Tension builds towards Ephraim’s inevitable death as well as the reveal of the mysterious miracle.
