User:Lbocgn/tct

The Catch Trap is a circus themed novel by Marion Zimmer Bradley, and one of her few books not to contain fantasy or science fiction elements. Set in the 1940s and 1950s in the USA it weaves the main characters into the fictionalized history of the flying trapeze. It also centers on the love between the two male protagonists.

Plot introduction
The Catch Trap centers on a family of circus artists, known as the Flying Santellis, who have been travelling trapeze artists for several generations before and after ther emigration from Italy to the United States. The book follows the members of the family between 1944 and 1953 and is split in two main parts and a brief intermediate sequence of only two chapters. The majority of the story is told from the point of view of the Santellis' young apprentice Tommy.

Book One: The Flyer (1944 - 1947)
The first part opens with the introduction of the young Tommy Zane, the son of a lion tamer in a small circus touring the West South Central States of the USA. When the Italian American Santelli family join the circus as flying trapeze act, Tommy discovers his own passion for flying. At first only observing the Santellis during their rehearsal he soon is approached by the family's young flyer, Mario. Mario is currently working on the triple or salto mortale, a triple backward somersault, at that time only performed by a handful of artists and considered one of the most difficult - and lethal - of trapeze tricks.

Mario starts to teach Tommy his first steps on the flying trapeze, acting as his catcher.

Characters in The Catch Trap
Tommy, b. 1 May 1930

Mario, b. Feb (1-19) 1923

Papa Tony

Angelo

Johnny

Stella

Liss

Lucia

Joe

Barbara

Clay

Major themes
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Literary significance and reception
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References to actual history, geography and current science
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