Winner of the 2007 bookbrowse award for most popular book. When jacob jankowski, recently orphaned and suddenly adrift, jumps onto a passing train, he enters a world of freaks, drifters, and misfits, a second-rate circus...Winner of the 2007 bookbrowse award for most popular book. When jacob jankowski, recently orphaned and suddenly adrift, jumps onto a passing train, he enters a world of freaks, drifters, and misfits, a second-rate circus struggling to survive during the great depression, making one-night stands in town after endless town.