A reviewer on Goodreads put it well: This is a gorgeous wedding cake. But there's barely any filling and it tastes like fondant. I struggled to keep up with the fractured timeline, I cared about none of the characters (maybe a little about Herr Thiessen but that's it), there weren't any real stakes, the rules were never properly explained, the ending was unsatisfactory. Far too long for the little plot there was. The redeeming quality was the setting of the circus but even that one became boring eventually.