Oh, how I adored this book! Fun fact: The first, say, fifteen to twenty pages were not the strongest start to a book. In fact, I was downright wary of it. BUT. Things changed, and they changed quickly. As soon as Ellie pops (get it? Like a balloon?) back in time, into 1988 East Berlin, the whole tone of the book shifts. It goes from feeling like a campy contemporary in the first few pages to a magnificent story with an incredibly important social commentary in a matter of pages, then doesn’t let up. And now, I shall explain how and why.

-The most striking aspect of the story is its eternal relevance. Yes, it is centered in two very specific points in history: The tail end of the Berlin Wall’s oppression, and the Holocaust. But looking at our current political and social climate, it’s clear that this story applies to not just Germany’s history, but is the tale of an ongoing struggle that humanity is always in the midst of. It’s a story of the brave people who stood up against evil, against wrong. And if that isn’t a lesson we need now more than ever, I don’t know what is.

-Using the character of Ellie, a modern day teen, to see the atrocities of the past was a perfect choice. At first, Ellie seemed quite vapid to me, quite mundane. But I feel like that might have been the author’s intention, looking back on the story. Ellie was all of us. Living her daily life, worried about her friends and family and classmates and what she’d be doing in her free time, and how she looked. But in the literal blink of an eye, Ellie was transported to something more than her normal cushy American life. Ellie navigating this world felt relatable because she was such a normal girl, thrust into a dangerous and important time.

-Ellie’s lessons extended beyond the historical ones. The bonds she formed while she was in East Berlin were so incredible. She found the power of female friendship, of love, of mentors. She had to navigate who could be trusted, how to handle herself in dangerous situations, how to make tough choices. And certainly she made mistakes, but again, I think that was important to the story.

-The story was incredibly emotionally provocative. The flashback chapters to the Holocaust were positively gutting. And the tension in East Berlin was absolutely palpable, the danger apparent and imminent.

Bottom Line: This was exquisite. I am absolutely looking forward to the next book set in this world, and while I think an epilogue or even a sequel would be amazing, I do understand why the book ended as it did. Apart from a bit of a slow start, this book completely captivated me.

Me, a self-proclaimed history devourer & wannabe SPONGE (Red Balloon reference, anybody?), travelling to Berlin in her summer holidays, OF COURSE requested this on NetGalley - not really expecting too much... boy, was I was blown away (gettit, like a balloon is blown away? Looool)

SO, FOR YOU HISTORY NERDS OUT THERE, we have:
- (fictional) first hand accounts of being a Jew in 1942 in Berlin, in Łódź ghetto AND in Chełmno concentration camp
-the majority of the book set in the DDR, East Berlin in 1988 (one year before the Berlin Wall comes down, but obvs the character from that time period don't know that)
- a dark-skinned Romani living in East Berlin in 1988 (where racism is still rife, against Jews and Romani - who were statistically most impacted by the holocaust)
- a gay girl with blue hair (!) living in East Berlin in 1988
- and references to other strifes in the 1980's, i.e. South Africa, Iran etc etc
... and all of these storylines intertwine with a girl from the present, a girl with a red balloon.

FOR YOU MAGIC BELIEVERS AND READERS, we have:
- people born with magic in their veins
- this magic can make you invisible, make things fly, make words glow & hence have a magical impact, and TIME TRAVEL (controversially)
- magic communities fighting against oppression, helping people escape from East Berlin over the wall, and from other places of oppression, with magic flying balloons
- MAGICIANS GONE ROGUE
- watch-dogs that watch over the magical communities

AND IF YOU JUST WANT TO READ A REALLY GOOD BOOK, we have:
- brilliant structure. The book is split into a few point of views, but bare with me - it's not confusing at all, I promise. In the beginning, we are in 2017 with our mc Ellie, a Jewish girl, the granddaughter of a holocaust survivor, on a school trip to Berlin. With a little help from a red balloon, we now have Ellie's POV from East Berlin in 1988 - sometimes we have Kai's (who found Ellie in 1988, works for the people with the red balloons) POV. Also, emotively, we have a young Jewish boy's POV on his life through the Nazi rise in power, the Łódź ghetto and the beginning of arriving in a concentration camp, Chełmno.
- great pace! I was never bored, the swell of characters meant there was always something going on, plenty of dialogue, and a steady unravelling of mystery (remember that MAGICIANS GONE ROGUE I mentioned? Yeah, that)
- romance between a Jewish girl from the future and a Romani boy from the past....... kills me
- all the characters. Just all of them. Ellie is the mc and is, understandably, wanting to get back to her own time period at the same time as being eager to learn about the time period and what came before it to understand her family's history, her character development is great and I loved the contrast between the present-day "I use my best friend to hide behind" and the 1988 Ellie who finds the courage to ignite a fire & is willing to burn for her best friends
- Kai, who ran away from the only community he ever knew to save his sister when they wanted to institutionalise her, is fierce and passionate and everything I wish I was brave enough to be.
- Mitzi will stay with me for a long time - her character is so beautiful. Unapologetically who she is; fearless, german, gay.
- I even loved the more minor characters, Sabina without a home, Aurora weighed down by the pressure of time, Felix with his obligations to his job.

Reading the first page about Ellie on the U-Bahn in Berlin, whilst I was on the U-Bahn in Berlin, was an experience to treasure, just like this book is... so many important lessons are conveyed, with all of my favourite things: the lessons of history, conflicting opinions, the importance of human rights and the influence of a little glitter and magic every now and then. Thanks for this one Locke, I'll remember it.

"One time, I spent six months back in time. I fell in love with a boy who had no obligation to love a world that only gave him gray skies and loneliness. I fell in love with a girl who loves so fiercely that she holds the world together. I fell in love with a few good people who used their magic for good, and I fell in love with a few more people who used it questionably but whose hearts meant well. I fell in love with believing in magic. If you give a girl a red balloon, she’ll believe in magic and memory. If you give a girl a red balloon, she’ll never want to let go."

// Thanks to NetGalley & the Publisher who provided me with a copy of this in exchange for an honest review //

[quote]“If the story was happy, you’d care less about that tiny little bit of freedom . . . We wouldn’t like the daylight if it wasn’t for the night. We wouldn’t notice the stars if not for the endless dark of night. All the story, like you said? That’s the important part. The sad parts are all about surviving. We are a people that survives. We endure. We will endure this too.”


At first glance, this book seemed to be exactly in the middle of my wheelhouse. WWII historical fiction with a touch of magical realism that was such an intriguing premise. We follow , a time-traveler who has heard stories from her grandfather about this red balloon and the girl who saved him her whole life. When she goes on a school trip with her class to Eastern Berlin, she gets transported into the dangerous world of 1988 East Berlin.

And the story takes off from there, where it goes into a bunch of boring times when Ellie is stuck at home and feels like a prisoner, falls in love and has a romantic fling that's completely unnecessary, makes the most bada*s feminist friend that she could ever want, and make things explode with her impulsive anger. This is a brief summary of the events that was going on, none of them are spoilery, just vague enough to keep someone interested or unimpressed.

There is a diverse cast of characters, a Jewish MC, a Romani MC, and one of the side characters is queer. I really appreciate that the author was able to so seamlessly incorporate the identities of these characters into the story. It's hard to get multiple POVs chapters done, and it rarely impresses me and that's the same case for here. In some ways I felt like Benno's perspective was kind of the most boring one, and would have been better explained otherwise (in the form of a bedtime story or storytime) instead of making it a consistent chapters throughout.

Also the character of Ellie herself, felt like the stereotypical high school girl who takes selfies, is well of, and can't imagine a world without all of this technology at her fingertips. Problem is, and this might be a me problem, is that I felt no emotional connection to this character. I think that the reason for that was that she wasn't compelling or "brave" or "marvelous" like Kai often praised her to be. She was just an average person who I didn't care about what happened to her; which makes me feel almost guilty when people call this book a tearjerker but for me it just didn't click.

Honestly another thing that ticked me off was how little actual history/setting we were getting. I wanted politics, revolution, resistance and none of this appeared in the content on page. The atmosphere of this book didn't portray an intense dark picture of fear, death, the authorities, etc that were definitively present during that time period. Maybe this is a fault of the writing itself, but I just thought that we should have gotten more details on the actual passage of the people holding the balloons, more details about the magic system, more details about who gets selected and how,etc.

Lastly that ending, man, it gets a thumbs down from me.

**Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own.**

Thank you very much for allowing me to read this title; I am trying to read as widely as possible ahead of the Carnegie/Greenaway nominations and awards for 2018 and your help is much appreciated.
As a Carnegie/Greenaway judge, I'm not allowed to comment about my opinions on specific titles so I can't offer an individual review on any title as I stated on my profile.

I don’t know what I expected when I picked this book up a few months ago. If I'm honest, I had barely paid attention to the synopsis. All I knew was that it was a novel about Germany, time travel, and red balloons. All I knew was that I wanted to read it.

What I did not expect was for it to hit me the way that it did, or to be nearly as good as it was.

This novel is fairly short, the hardcover is set to have only 256 pages, and yet it is so full of beautiful writing and heartwarming moments.

The story is about a Jewish girl named Ellie, on a school trip to Germany when she finds an abandoned red balloon, almost as if it had been waiting for her. Once she goes to hold it she finds herself transported back in time to 1988 on the eastern side of the Berlin Wall. There she meets Kai, an English Romani, and Mitzi, a gay, native East Berliner: two people facing terrible judgment for being different in a cruel and unforgiving world. Two people, who in spite of it all, are doing their best to sneak people into the safety of the West through the use of magical red balloons.  

It also is about a boy named Benno, in 1941 Berlin. He's a young Jew in during World War II. At first, his presence seems out of place. The point of views alternate between Ellie and Kai in 1988, and Benno in 1941. Then, all of a sudden, you see how the stories connect and how every event leads to another, all connecting in a wonderfully crafted circle. The two time periods play off one another, showing the dark moments of Germany's recent history. They also show the heart and the hope of the people who lived through them.

I tend to avoid books about the Holocaust. I am not Jewish. I have no ties to Germany. I have no connections to any of the events that happened during those hateful years of the World War. And yet, I do not think that any of that is necessary to feel something so deep inside your soul. Books dealing with those events always break my heart. The injustice of it all kills me every time, and this book made me feel it all. This book made me laugh, it also made me cry. It is so real, and yet, so magical. Also, that ending was absolutely wonderful and heartbreaking, and everything that it needed to be.

This book has a little bit of everything and could easily appeal to anyone. It's part historical fiction, part science fiction, part time travel adventure, and part fantasy. If you are looking for a good book, I totally recommend this one. 

**I received an advance copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.**

This book, you guys. THIS BOOK. I didn’t know what to expect going into The Girl with the Red Balloon. Historical fiction is my favorite genre, and I’ve always been fascinated by the Berlin Wall and the division of Germany post-World War II. I went into this book expecting historical fiction set in East Berlin in the 80’s with a touch of magic, but what I got was one of the most emotionally powerful stories I have ever read. This book affected me on such a deep, unexpected level.

The story follows our protagonist, Ellie, who starts out on a trip to Berlin with her high school German class. She is visiting the ruins of the Berlin Wall when she sees a stray red balloon, grabs onto it, and is accidentally transported to the exact same spot in East Berlin in 1988– a year and a half before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Ellie gets swept up into the world of the Balloonmakers, who use a peculiar, equation-based (and super fascinating) type of magic written on balloons to transport people from East Berlin to the other side of the Wall, and consequently, to freedom. You would think a story with balloon magic would be whimsical and fun, but you would be wrong with this book. The Girl with the Red Balloon certainly leans toward the darker side of YA fiction. It raises so many important, difficult questions about morality, history, oppressive governments, fear, and everything in between.

In addition to the main plot, this book is part family saga: not only do we read from Ellie’s perspective, but also from that of her grandfather, Benno, who escaped a concentration camp and survived the Holocaust with the help of the first ever Balloonmaker in the 1940’s. The family element in this story is huge, and it really helped tie everything together. Oh man, it was heart-wrenching. This book does not shy away from the horrors of the Holocaust or from the anti-semitism rampant in Germany during that time, so take care while reading if those things are triggering for you.

I want to talk about characters, because the characters in this novel will stick with me for a long time. Of course, we have Ellie, our protagonist, and Benno, her grandfather. Ellie was such an easy protagonist to root for. I couldn’t help but feel for her and her situation. Her reactions to all of the craziness that had befallen her life felt so realistic. She was headstrong and brave, and her character development over the course of her time in East Berlin was absolutely beautiful. One thing I also loved about Ellie is that she is a practicing Jewish main character. It’s rare to see religious protagonists in YA at all, and even rarer to see any who partake in religious traditions other than Christianity. (The Jewish rep in this book is #ownvoices, by the way. Yay!) Then we have Kai, our love interest, who is also a POV character. I loved him so, so much. Again, I couldn’t help but feel for him. He is Romani, so he already feels like an outcast in most of the world, but he also is an outcast from his own Romanichal community back in England, which he had to flee when people started to persecute his younger sister, Sabina, for her magic. He would do anything to protect his family. He’s fiercely loyal. We also have Mitzi, the last of our main trio. Though not a POV character, Mitzi was impossible not to love. She is a lesbian in East Berlin, and started helping the Balloonmakers once her parents kicked her out of the house because of her sexuality. Mitzi seems abrasive at first, but she’s such a wonderful friend to both Kai and Ellie. These three and their friendship, man. It tugged so hard at my heartstrings. There was just such an abundance of love and loyalty among the three of them, and they were always, always there for one another. This wonderfully diverse cast of characters is one of my new favorites in any book, ever.

The romance between Kai and Ellie was completely swoonworthy. The beautiful friendships and romances that developed over the backdrop of such a bleak world added so much hope to this story. One thing I especially appreciated about the romance here is that there was no “woe is me, I love this boy, but we are from different times… whatever shall I do?!” narrative from Ellie. She loved Kai, and she just let herself love him without all of the angst, and vice versa. This story and these characters already had enough angst without an unnecessarily angsty romance, so that was much-appreciated. They had undeniable chemistry, and seriously, I’m not usually a shippy person, but I will go down with this damn ship. They deserved the happiness the other person brought them in such a bleak world, okay???

Obviously, the setting was dark as hell. I mean, one timeline chronicles a Jewish boy during the Nazi regime through his time in the ghettos and in a concentration camp, and the other chronicles three people of historically persecuted groups in freakin’ communist East Berlin in the 1980’s. I have read books set during the Holocaust, but none set in East Germany. I really enjoyed (that’s a strange verb to use, but whatever) reading about this particular city during this particular time. You really got a sense of the fear and hopelessness that had settled over the city by this point, but also of the spark of rebellion that stayed alive til the very end and ultimately helped bring about the demise of this oppressive regime. So, yes, the setting is decidedly grim– and Locke doesn’t shy away from the horrors of either of these time periods– but the relationships and the characters are what make the story bearable to read instead of just a giant black hole of sadness.

I don’t want to go too into detail here about the magical elements, because I think they’re fun to discover on your own. I will say that I thought the balloon magic was incredibly unique; I’ve never read anything like it. I love that it was equation-based– it was rooted in logic, but also it wasn’t entirely logical, because, like, it was still magic. I hope we get to learn more about the magic of this world in the next installment! I still have so many questions. The story also features a mystery element. I mean, clearly Ellie was not supposed to end up at the point in time where she did, and throughout the book the characters try to puzzle out how a malfunction in the balloon that caused her time travel could even be possible. The “whodunnit” was admittedly pretty predictable, but nonetheless gutwrenching to read about. Oh, also, you might be wondering why I only gave this book 4.5 stars instead of a full 5, since I loved it so much. The pacing felt a little bit slow to me at some points– there was a lot of Ellie just sitting around in the safehouse apartment toward the middle of the book. However, the rest of the book completely made up for the slightly off pacing at certain points.

Again, The Girl with the Red Balloon brought up so many questions I haven’t stopped thinking about since I finished it, especially about morality. This book is so deceptively deep. There are pages where you read a seemingly simple interaction or statement, but then the next thing you know, you think about it a little more and end up questioning your entire life and your beliefs. I should probably also mention the fact that this book had an astronomical emotional impact on me– this is the most I’ve cried while reading a book in years. YEARS. Probably since Clockwork Princess came out in 2012. Not only did I cry at random points throughout the book when something touched me, but I straight-up sobbed through the entire last 10% of the book, and, upon finishing it, cried for another half hour. The ending wasn’t even sad, just incredibly bittersweet and beautiful.

If you haven’t gathered it from my review, The Girl with the Red Balloon is one of the most powerful, emotionally impactful books I’ve read in my life. I cannot recommend this story highly enough to everyone.

Have you read The Girl with the Red Balloon? If so, let’s pleeeeaaase discuss because I have SO MANY FEELINGS ABOUT IT. If not, please tell me you plan to pick it up this fall?

Oh dear. I hate writing this kind of review because whatever I think about a book, I recognise that a lot of hard work has gone into its creation.

The best aspect of this novel was its premise. Even though I gave up on it (something I rarely do), I was compelled to fast forward and read the last chapter because I wanted to know how the plot ended.

Beyond that, however, I found it a trudge to read. I didn't bond with any of the characters or find the language magical. In fact, I found it laborious and shallow in equal measures. It's July and I've been trying to read this book since May. I've taken it on the train, in waiting rooms and to coffee shops. Each reading has felt like a chore.

It's quite possibly me not the book. I'm the wrong reader. It's for this reason, I've given it an average rating. I can easily imagine there are readers out there who will love it. Just because it's not my cup of tea doesn't mean you should avoid it.

While this book isn't without its flaws, I really enjoyed the bones of the story. The magic system was unique and (for the most part) well explained. The characters felt real, they had distinct voices and personalities, and I enjoyed the three different perspectives. I do wish Mitzi had been more involved though, because she was the most interesting character to me.

My major issue with this book though was the time-travel aspect. The author provides a lot of info on how it works, but it didn't make a lot of sense to me. Especially with regards to the balloons not being able to travel back in time, but then having to find a loophole because clearly they can, Ellie traveled back in time! It just felt a little messy and given how central the balloons were to the plot, I wish it had been cleaner.

I also didn't really care much about Kai and Ellie's romance, but that's more of a personal thing. I don't think every YA novels needs a romance plot just for the sake of having one, and I think in this case it felt a little forced to me.

All that said, I really did like this book. The history and scenery of East Berlin before the fall of the Berlin Wall are captured fantastically, and I enjoyed the friendships between Mitzi and Kai, and Mitzi and Ellie. Benno's chapters set in WWII are also excellent, and I liked that the characters, even the villains, are well fleshed out with flaws but also good traits. I would read the next book in this series.

The Girl with the Red Balloon is a welcome addition to YA literature, and it worthy of being in the same category as "The Book Thief" and "Shades of Grey." However, unlike the former, the Girl with the Red Balloon blends history and fantasy in order to tell a story that is indeed well-needed.

The book has three main characters, Ellie, Kai and Benno. I found most of the characters, with the exception of Benno, very well-developed. I can't say that I have a favourite but I do believe that readers will see aspects on themselves reflected on the page. I only wish we had seem more of Mitzi. With respect to Benno, I wish there were more of his story given how central he is to the plot.

The writer uses a triple narrative storyline in order to develop the plot and it definitely worked in a non-distracting way. The triple narrative is engaging and looking back, I do believe the story would have been less interesting if only told from the perspective of the main character. It is worth mentioning that there is a bit of romance. It is, however, extremely mild and does not detract from the plot in anyway. Again, it seems like a tool used for advancing the story as it difficult to conceptualise the story developing along purely platonic lines.

Locke's writing style is very engaging. The writing felt very personal and it was easy to be fully immersed in the story. Although I found the plot engaging, The Girl with the Red Balloon falls into the same trap that that other time-trail books often do, that is readers have no idea what's going on on the other side. Although it is addressed on page I wish that readers would have been privy to developments in the original timeline. The pacing of the story was also very strong, while there was a bit of a lull towards the middle of the book, the latter half was very engaging and I found myself skipping ahead to find out what was happening. Locke does a great job of building anticipation in that regard. One minor point to note was that the resolution of the plot does come way into the latter half and could be considered a bit rushed.

Setting is a huge part of this book and it's very difficult to imagine this story in a setting other than Berlin. Locke manages to weave together a tale that relies as much on setting, politics and history as it does on characters and plot. This is truly a commendable feat.

In summary, The Girl with the Red Balloon was an enjoyable read. I would recommend to teens who are interested in history, specifically European history.

I admit I started reading this story without knowing exactly what to expect. I'm finding that I do like historical fiction more and more and knew this wasn't quite like most I'd find but the description intrigued me and so I read. The more I read, the more I found I loved the story and what may have seemed fairly simple ended up being much more intricate than I expected in such a wonderful way. I do hope the author continues the series, although it's also left in a wonderful spot as well. Although if the series continues, I'll definitely be following it!

In 1942, a boy escapes from Chelmno concentration camp holding onto a red balloon.

In 2017, the granddaughter of that boy grabs the string of a red ballon and is transported back to Berlin, Germany, 1988.

I’m not a big fan of time travel books in general, and I wasn’t really impressed by The Girl With the Red Balloon’s take on it in particular. I found the plot a little aimless and the twist a little obvious. That’s not to say the plot was bad — it wasn’t, and there were exciting parts — I just wasn’t reading it for the plot, not really. I found myself reading it for the writing and the representation.

So on that note, let’s talk about writing and Jewishness.

I didn’t find the style to be absolutely perfect, but it was beautiful and it ended up growing on me a lot. I have so many gorgeous quotes highlighted in my reading app, and the style definitely made what would have been a tedious plot (to me) enjoyable. I really love Kai and Ellie and Mitzi, and their friendships and romances and personalities. (The romance plot actually deserves a bigger mention — Kai is my new book boyfriend)

But the thing that got the most emotional reaction from me was Ellie and her grandfather, who has his own subplot, being Jewish. It’s not extremely common to find Jewish representation in books, and it’s decidedly uncommon for it to be Jewish representation I actually relate to. But I loved that Ellie was determined to celebrate Shabbat, even stuck in 1988, and how her stubborn commitment was echoed in the story of her grandfather illegally taking part in religious ceremonies (like Passover, specifically) in the ghetto. Despite being mostly a story about the perseverance of ordinary people during dangerous times of history, The Girl With the Red Balloon was also a story of Jewish perseverance at all times, no matter what.

And that’s why this book gets five stars. So maybe it wasn’t an absolute favorite and I shouldn’t rate it quite so high, but I’m indulging myself. It was beautifully written and personally important to me, and anyone who actually likes time travel will undoubtedly enjoy it even more. Five stars. Fight me.

THis book was very well written and I enjoyed it! At some points I heard "99 Red Balloons" in my head because of the red balloon used as time travel devices instead of Tardus. I do like the characters especially Mitsy since she did went from being fearful to brave after being around ELlie the entire book. Awesome work!

This was pretty good! The Jewish presentation was great and the themes explored were thoughtful and well-done. This is such an engaging premise and Locke handled the time-travel component gracefully. For me, it took a little while to get into it and the writing style was just a bit bland, but the overall concept and story made up for that for me. I will definitely look for the sequel!

Although my favorite subject in school was never social studies, historical fiction is one of my favorite genres to read. As an avid reader, I consume stories, and history is just that: stories. I love delving into the personal lives of those in a certain part of history. I have never been a "general overview" person. Give me the details; it makes things so much more intimate and fascinating. Now, coupled with fantasy, which tends to emphasize a story's themes? That was exactly what made the synopsis of The Girl With the Red Balloon by Katherine Locke so appealing to me.

Basically, on a school field trip in Germany, Ellie Baum accidentally time-travels to the year 1988, the time of the Berlin Wall. She runs into Kai and Mitzi, who are a part of the underground dealings of the red balloons that bring passengers over the Wall, and learns that time travel—although her grandfather's stories about magic are true—is an anomaly. They offer her shelter until the magic-wielding Schöpfers find a way to send her back, but soon, more time-travelers from modern times turn up... dead.

The story is an interesting mix of Ruta Sepetys's historical fiction and William Ritter's historical fantasy series Jackaby. While the story has a solemn background like that which is present in Sepetys's novels, it also has a unworldly feel with the intervention of fantasy in a setting other than that of our time. But it's not just the idea of the story that's beautiful. The execution is stellar as well.

Some stories hardly benefit from the inclusion of more than one narrator, but The Girl With the Red Balloon's three narrators, being from different time periods, all contribute perspective and emotional depth. In addition, I absolutely adore the sense of connection and friendship among the Ellie, Mitzi, and Kai trio. They're each out-of-place in a different way, and it's difficult not to root for them when they're trying so hard to make do with what they've got. Ellie has to adapt to being in another country and another time, Kai is a Romani separated from other Romanis with only a sister he dearly loves and protects, and Mitzi is a lesbian who can't return to her own family. Kai and Mitzi may have their own problems, but they are such characters. Kai is hilarious and witty, and Mitzi, after warming up to Ellie, is like the outgoing best friend everyone wants.

Unfortunately, the romance doesn't do too much for me personally. It moves quickly, considering the circumstances. Ellie is quick to trust and rarely thinks about her family and friends back home. That is not to say that I don't like Ellie and Kai together. Their banter is great, and the writing had me shipping them at especially the end. Here's an example of one of the many spectacular bits in this work:

I wanted to tell him that people would write books about boys like him one day, boys who lived in fairy tales and changed the course of human history and human imagination.
That line grabbed me right by the heart and clenched it. I seriously cannot stress enough how, if I had to describe this book in one word, it would be "beautiful." The writing immerses you in this grim world with vivid imagery and similes, and reading about it is anything but painful.

"You're never given anything more than you can handle, Benno," she told me as we took our bags to the trains.
In conclusion, I am not only suggesting this book; I hope for readers to become as hyped about the debut of the novel as I am anticipating The Balloonmakers #2. The story has a plot that is almost fairy-tale like while touching on issues of both the past and present, something truly unique. I rate it 4.5 out of 5 stars.

This has a clever and interesting setup, but the prose in between tended to meander, and so did my mind. The magic system was not as tightly constructed as I would have liked, but the flashbacks were very well rendered.

I will review this book on release date but I can say that if you are a teen that loves History just like I do, totally give this a read.

The Girl with the Red Balloon blew me out of the water with its twist on West Berlin in 1988, where magic red balloons help people escape over the wall. I was captivated with the vivid aspects of time travel and the way it was explained in this novel. Everything in the novel was connected in a loop and was tied together with a nice red bow at the end.

Unfortunately, this book wasn't for me. I couldn't get invested in the characters or plot, but would still recommend it to anyone into time travel based novels with a bit of history thrown in!

This was so unique, and an absolute blast. I love time travel, and the red balloons were a fascinating piece of worldbuilding! The three POVs were solid and mostly well-meshed, the Benno chapters did pull me out of the main story a bit. However, but I thought they were extremely poignant on their own. Kai's POV was my favorite, but I enjoyed Ellie's chapters too. I loved that Ellie was brought back to the 80's, and the tension regarding the East Berlin conflict was really interesting to explore with these characters. I did struggle a bit with Ellie's motivations at the end, but overall I found this very emotional and compelling.

(And can we have a sequel about Mitzi, pretty please?!?)

The Girl with the Red Balloon is a YA urban fantasy time travelling novel set in Berlin. Well, I don't know about you, but I'm sold based on that concept alone.

Ellie Baum, an American Jewish teenager, visits 21st century Berlin on a school trip, excited but slightly apprehensive as she recalls her grandfather's Holocaust-formed apprehensions about the German people. She spots a floating red balloon, and, recalling grandpa's description of beautiful days as "balloon days", asks her friend to take a photo of her as she grabs it... and, touching it, is pulled into night-time 1980s East Berlin. There, she meets a gypsy boy, a lesbian counterculture girl, and a conspiracy to smuggle persecuted people out of East Germany by means of magical balloons. Time-travel, it turns out, had not been a part of the plan.

The book is rich in atmosphere and detail - clearly, Katherine Locke has visited Berlin, and read up about history. It's also obvious that she knows a little German (but isn't at native-speaker-level), as she sprinkles German words and phrases into the book. The latter works up to a point: for any non-German-speakers, it undoubtedly adds to the richness of the details. To native speakers, her choice of words jars a bit, especially the repeated use of "Schöpfers", meaning "makers". Unfortunately, "Schöpfer" is used almost exclusively to refer to God as the creator. Similarly, her attempt at a compound noun is a bit befuddled.

When it comes to describing East Germany (and, in flashbacks to history, Jewish ghettos and concentration camps), the story feels grim and very claustrophobic. There's no way around the grimness for the scenes set in the Holocaust, but my impression is that the grimness of the DDR may well be overplayed in the novel. Germany is an odd case - because it reunited the communist, dictatorship East with the liberal democratic West, the transition was different from other countries. Because of the WW2 history, (West) Germany has a very self-conscious approach to looking at its history - so there are museums and memorials and movies about the horrors of the DDR. Other 'East European' countries also transitioned from Communist dictatorships to democracies, but didn't necessarily put the same amount of money, effort and cultural navel-gazing into looking at their past regimes. The result is perhaps a distortion of perception: Life in East Germany was no walk in the park, but it wasn't more terrible than life in any other country behind the Iron Curtain.

In terms of freedoms, living in the DDR probably wasn't worse than life today in Egypt or Cuba. In some areas of life, I suspect the likes of Egypt and Cuba today are less accommodating than the DDR had been. For example, I was a bit surprised that Mitzi, the lesbian, feared persecution, or that a pregnant woman out of wedlock would have been in terrible trouble: the DDR had a reputation for being ahead of West Germany in women's equality & sexual promiscuity / sex-positiveness. For example, the DDR 'legalised' homosexuality in 1957, 12 years before West Germany did. (In West Germany, the supreme court re-iterated in 1957 that homosexuality was obscene, and 50,000 men were arrested before it was legalised in 1975). As for racism, while it's never gone, the prejudice against Jews and gypsies that appear in the book strike me as unlikely in 1980s Germany (West or East). At times, Katherine Locke's DDR feels like it hasn't changed much from Nazi Germany, and that is, in my opinion, an exaggeration,

That said, Ellie being an English-speaker behind the Iron Curtain, she has to spend much of her time in hiding, forcing a claustrophobic tension into the story that feels warranted and authentic. Perhaps East Germany feels extra grim partially because of the culture shock and contrast she experiences.

While much of this review details the aspects of the novel that made me bristle a little, I would nonetheless recommend it. It's a good, exciting story, with shedloads of atmosphere and enough authenticity for most readers. If you were alive during the Cold War, or if you're a German native, you might find some things to quibble over, but if neither of those statements applies I suspect you'll enjoy the setting, atmosphere, detail and tension of the book.