What's the Name of That Book??? discussion

Maybe ya'll can help me with this one: I read this a few years back and in hindsight I thought it was by Heinlein, but none of the synopses of books by him I have since looked up seemed to match.

I can't remember the setup, but later in the book, there is a scene presented where a chimpanzee has found a machine gun (or at least a rifle of some sort) and is riding around on the back of an elephant. I can't remember much else about the book, but this scene stuck in my head and is bugging me. Does it ring a bell with anyone else?

How long ago is a few years back?
A few questions that may jog your memory:
-anything stick out about the cover?
-Setting? (Earth, Mars, parallel world, etc)

If there is anything else you remember, no matter how small, feel free to post it. It may jog someone else's memory.

It was probably about 5 or 6 years ago that I read it, but it was not a new book even then. Unfortunately I read it as an ebook, so I didn't have a cover picture to go by. I am fairly certain it was set on Earth; at first I had thought it might have been The Puppet Masters, until I went back and read that. If I had to guess, if not Heinlein, it was another sci-fi author of that time period. I am fairly sure that, if not aliens involved in the story, then it was probably one of those where scientists get to playing around with some chemical/biological discovery that seems to improve people but has unintended side effects. Perhaps the chimp was an escaped test subject?

This sounds a bit like "Our Neural Chernobyl" - a short story by Bruce Sterling.

Either that or "Brainwave" by Poul Anderson

Followed up on Andy's suggestion and just skimmed through Brain Wave; yes, there's a scene like that, near the end of chapter 8.

The book's premise: one day, everyone, human and animal, just starts getting smarter. They find out the reason (view spoiler)[all life evolves to a certain level of intelligence, but there's a damping field traveling through space; we evolved while in the damping field, and when it goes away again the electromagnetism changes and our neurons send impulses faster (hide spoiler)]. The story is really about what happens to the people and animals as their thinking ability changes drastically.

Been decades since I read it, but I've always looked back on it fondly.

Serendi wrote: "Followed up on Andy's suggestion and just skimmed through Brain Wave; yes, there's a scene like that, near the end of chapter 8.

And it's the cover picture in the link in your post!

Good point - I just linked, didn't even notice. (I have it in A Treasury of Great Science Fiction, Volume Two.)

How'd I miss THAT????

That certainly sounds like it might be the one. Many thanks, ya'll....it was bugging me that I could not remember the name of the book.

Will have to go check that out.