The novel is set in the fictional town of Abalone, Arizona. A circus owned by a Chinese man named Dr. Lao pulls into town one day, carrying
legendary creatures from all areas of
mythology and
legend, among them a
sea serpent,
Apollonius of Tyana (who tells dark, yet always truthful, fortunes), a
medusa, and a
satyr. Through interactions with the circus, the locals attain various enigmatic peak experiences appropriate to each circus patron's personality. The tale ends with the town becoming the site of a ritual to a pagan god whimsically given the name Yottle (possibly an allusion to the
Mesoamerican god
Yaotl, whose name means "the enemy"). The ritual ends when the god himself slays a virgin, her unrequited lover, and his own priest. The circus over, the townsfolk scatter to the winds. Apparently few of them profit from their surreal experiences. The book's appendix is a "catalogue" of all the people, places, items, and mythological beings mentioned in the novel, summing up the characters pithily and sardonically, revealing the various fates of the townsfolk, and listing a number of
plot holes and unanswered questions not addressed in the narrative. List of Dr. Lao's exhibited creatures and persons: •
Satyr: 2,300 years old, he was captured in Tu-jeng, China, near the
Great Wall. He was born of the union of a
goatherd and one of his goats. •
Medusa: She is very young and wears very little clothing. She has many species of snakes in her hair, of which three are mentioned:
Tantillas, brown with a black ring around their neck;
night snakes, gray with black spots; and faded snakes (
Arizona elegans). She is a Sonoran medusa from northern Mexico. •
Roc chick, "Really not as big as
Sinbad thought it was, but plenty big enough to do all that he said it did." It hatches from an egg that sweats salt water. • Hound of the hedges: Created when water touched a dry rice field for the first time in many years. His tail is made of ferns; his fur is green grass; instead of teeth he has rose thorns; his blood and saliva are
chlorophyll. •
Mermaid: She was captured in the
Gulf of Pei-Chihli the same day as the sea serpent. Her tail is sea-green and sleek scaled; her tail fin is as pink as a trout's. Her hair is seaweed green; her human half is young and slender with slight breasts. •
Sphinx: A hermaphroditic, African sphinx. Its head is blunt nosed and womanlike; it has breasts like a woman. •
Chimera: The chimera is male, unlike the chimera of Greek myth, thus its body is different. Although it has a lion's body and a snake's tail, it has eagle's wings and a metal barb at the end of its tail with which it can strike like a scorpion. (It seems that Finney describes something closer to a
manticore.) •
Sea serpent: He is 80 feet long and dark gray; his tongue is as thick as a man's arm and bright yellow. His eyes are bronze with black slits for pupils. His tail is paddle shaped like a sea snake's. The Sea Serpent is the only animal that did not become tame after being captured. He plans to escape with the mermaid and return to the sea. •
Werewolf: She starts her transformation as a large gray wolf. ("Not the American lobo. Probably some species from the Carpathians or Urals.") When she transforms, she changes into an old woman, not the young lady the men are expecting. •
Unicorn: Has a metal "horn". •
Golden Ass:
Lucius Apuleius, who turned into an ass "with the help of Fotis". ==Film adaptation==