DNF 24%

I'm very sorry, but I don't think I'll be finishing this one. The premise sounded really interesting, even though historical fiction is generally not my cup of tea - I do always keep an open mind and like to try new things. So while I adore the premise, I couldn't actually get into the story. It was really dense and there wasn't really a lot going on, so most of the text was information which was hard to get through at times. I think, overall, it's just one of those cases of "it's not you, it's me", because technically I didn't find anything wrong.

I read this a few weeks ago, but it's taken me a while to get around to reviewing it. I've been putting it off, because frankly, it's a really hard book to review. This review is on Goodreads, but will be cross-posted to my blog in the near future. 

The thing that makes this such a difficult book to review is that I know I'm not the target audience for it. That is to say, I was aware multiple times that various phrases and scenes would be extremely significant for those with experience of Jewish faith and culture, but I don't have that. The symbolism, while not incomprehensible because it was explained within the narrative, didn't have the same meaning for me as it would for somebody with that heritage. 

(For the record, I do have Jewish heritage, but there was a bit of a family rift a couple of generations ago and my branch of it ended up 100% cut off from that side of the family, to the point where my grandma wouldn't even tell the bank her mother's maiden name because it was so obviously Jewish. As a result of her refusal to talk about any of this, and because I never knew any Jewish people at school, I grew up knowing absolutely nothing of Jewish culture. This year, my flatmate was Jewish, and I learned quite a lot from her; without that, I think I would have found this book a little difficult to follow in terms of terminology. But I think most people have at least MET some Jewish folks in their life, particularly if they live somewhere that has a stronger Jewish presence than my area, so that probably wouldn't be an issue.) 

I really appreciated these moments in the book because they were part of what made it unique: Katherine Locke has talked on social media about what the book means to her personally, and you could tell. The Jewishness of this book wasn't a veneer slapped on top of a protagonist with a generic set of beliefs and experiences: it was integral. 

But I sometimes felt while I was reading a particular passage, "Oh, I bet this means something more that I'm not getting." There were a few phrases in particular that were repeated and which I gathered from elsewhere in the text were from liturgy (is that the right word?), which would have had powerful cultural echoes for the people whose culture they were. And that's not my culture, so I didn't experience those emotional resonances.

This is not meant as a criticism, because I'm totally okay with not being the target audience of every book, and I think there are so many people for whom this would be a really great and unusual experience, to see their culture reflected back at them like this. It just makes it difficult for me to review this and I feel like I need to explain the certain emotional and cultural detachment I consciously experienced while reading it. I did feel stuff! I definitely had a lot of emotions towards the end, because hey, it was an emotional narrative and I get way too invested in books. But it probably wasn't the same as reading it with that cultural background. 

As for the rest of it, well, now I have to try and remember how I felt about the plot. It was a little bit mixed for me. It took me a while to get invested, because I didn't really understand what was going on with all the balloon magic and, while it was supposed to be somewhat mysterious, I just found it confusing at first. In some ways, the idea of balloons as the only thing magical in a novel that was otherwise primarily historical felt a little bit too whimsical for me, but it grew on me, especially as the narrative became more focused on the idea of hope and these fleeting glimpses of goodness symbolised by balloons. 

I have to admit, I wasn't a huge fan of the romance, but that was less due to any faults with the romance itself and more due to me not being a fan of romance generally. I would definitely have been more on board if Ellie had fallen for Mitzy instead (who is canonically gay so it's not that much of a stretch), simply bacuse almost all romance plotlines interest me more when they're queer. 

I spent quite a lot of the book convinced I'd figured out who was behind everything and frustrated that none of the characters seemed to have thought of this -- and then turned out to be wrong, because plot twist. I mean, I wasn't 100% wrong? Like, I was definitely thinking along the right lines? But I was still wrong, so kudos on surprising me because I'm annoyingly good at ruining books for myself by guessing the plot twists in advance. 

I also enjoyed the historical details and the depiction of East Germany, but I'm wary of giving too many details of what I liked because I've read a lot of books since finishing this three weeks ago and I don't want to accidentally confuse any of them. ;) But it was clearly something that Locke had researched in detail, and while I know basically nothing so wouldn't pick up on inaccuracies if they were there, it felt authentic to me as a reader. 

The one thing that felt a little bit false to me was Ellie, the narrator. She's accidentally time-travelled to the past (though it takes her a really long time to figure this out, but I guess if you were actually in that situation your first thought wouldn't be, "Oh, I must've time travelled," so fair play to her for trying to come up with alternative explanations). She stays there for months. But I rarely got the sense that this was in any way a hardship for her, other than the problems of living in East Berlin. She didn't seem to miss her friends and family particularly, even though she was abruptly and completely cut off from them with no communication. I would have expected her to have more of a reaction to that.

All in all, then, while I found the plot engaging and so on, I didn't feel I really connected with the book on the same level as I might have done had my family not drifted away from its Jewish heritage a couple of generations ago.

Katherine Locke’s The Girl with the Red Balloon is such a gorgeous and moving book that I’m nearly at a loss for words to convey just how good it really is.  I finished reading it a few days ago and just can’t stop thinking about it.   The Girl with the Red Balloon is not a light read by any stretch of the imagination – it deals with weighty subjects like the Holocaust, racism, homophobia, and what it was like to live behind the Iron Curtain before the Berlin Wall fell. For the most part, it’s a dark and gritty dual time period read that shows how horrific it was for Jews during World War II as well as how difficult it was to live under the eye of a totalitarian regime in 1980’s East Germany. It’s not all darkness and horror though. Katherine Locke uses a hint of magic and a bit of romance to offset all of that darkness.  You see, not only is this novel historical fiction that deals with more than one time period.  It’s also a time travel novel.

The Girl with the Red Balloon begins in present day Germany where we meet one of our main characters, sixteen year old Ellie Baum, who has traveled there on a class field trip.  She sees a red balloon floating nearby while hanging out with her classmates and asks her best friend to take a photo of her with it for her grandfather.  It reminds her of a story her grandfather, a Holocaust survivor, always tells her, about how a girl in a purple dress handed him a red balloon when he arrived at a concentration camp during the war, and the balloon floated him out of the camp and to safety. 

When Ellie grabs the balloon, however, the unexpected and unbelievable happens.  She travels back in time to 1988 and finds herself in East Berlin and in imminent danger!  There she is found and led to a safe house by Kai and Mitzi, a Romani gypsy and a German lesbian, who are part of a magical resistance group who uses red balloons to float people over the Berlin Wall and into West Germany.  The catch?  These balloons, while magical, are not supposed to travel through time.  The balloon makers are stumped as to what has happened to bring Ellie to them and are therefore unsure of how to get her back to her own time period.  The resistance group vows to keep Ellie safe from the East German police and to do everything they can to find a way to get her home, but when dead time travelers start turning up with red balloons, it becomes clear that someone is experimenting with forbidden dark magic and time travel.  Why is someone trying to travel back in time and why are they so willing to do it, even at the expense of innocent lives?  If others are dying when they grab these balloons, how was Ellie able to safely travel back in time? It becomes a race against time to stop who is behind this before the bodies start piling up, even if it means Ellie loses out on perhaps her only way back to the future.  

LIKES

This is another one of those books where I could just write pages and pages about what I liked.  I don’t want to give anything away though so I’m just going to list a few highlights.

The friendship between Ellie and her two protectors, Kai and Mitzi, was one of my favorite parts of the book.  These three become fast friends while living in the safe house together, and their chemistry is fantastic.  They’re immediately like The Three Musketeers, all for one and one for all.  I also loved the diversity that these characters represented – Ellie is Jewish, Kai is Romani, and Mitzi is a lesbian. This diversity further forges a bond between them since all three are considered undesirable in East Berlin during this time frame.  The police would love nothing more than to find a reason to arrest them, so they always have each other’s backs.   
As I mentioned, there is also a romance in this book and even though on the surface it might sound like somewhat out of place since we already have time traveling, the Holocaust, magical balloons, etc., the romance actually worked well for me.  First, it’s not instalove, so yay.  No, instead, the relationship develops quite naturally as Kai and Ellie get to know each other better.  Kai is kind of dark and brooding at times and he sees Ellie as this softness and light that he needs in his life.  Ellie becomes attracted to Kai, not just because he is handsome, but because of how he puts himself on the line trying to help as many people as he can get over into West Germany.  Ellie is also touched when she sees how devoted Kai is to his younger sister, Sabina.  He would literally do anything to keep Sabina safe and it’s heartwarming to see. 

I was incredibly invested in this relationship not just because I liked that it developed naturally and that their two personalities really complimented each other, but also because it just tugged at my heart strings.  What happens to their relationship if the balloon makers are able to figure out how to send Ellie back to her own time period?  Would she go or would she stay with the man she is falling in love with?   

Other highlights for me were the completely unique premise and the major themes of the novel.  Seriously, it doesn’t get much more creative than the idea of using magical red balloons to save people.  In addition to the unique premise, there were also so many themes that resonated me with as I was reading.  With respect to those balloons, I loved the beautiful message that there were heroes everywhere, both during World War II and during the time of the Iron Curtain – people who risked their own safety trying to save as many people as they could.  Another darker message that resonated with me as I got further into the story was more of a question of ethics – if a person’s overall intention is good, does that excuse any unethical behavior he or she may engage along the way accomplishing that goal?  This was definitely food for thought for me as I was reading. 

A final highlight for me was the way the story was presented.  It’s presented in alternating chapters from the perspective of Kai and Ellie in 1988 East Berlin and from Ellie’s grandfather, Benno, as a young boy during World War II.  I loved how presenting the story this way effectively moves Ellie’s time traveling story forward as well as her relationship with Kai, while at the same time, circling back and showing the origin of the red balloons.  Seeing Benno’s horrific experiences in the Jewish ghettos, surrounded by disease and death, served as a poignant reminder that without that red balloon, neither Ellie nor any of her other family members would exist in present day.  Ellie literally owes her life to that magical balloon.

DISLIKES/ISSUES

The only real issue I had with this book was that it took me a few chapters to acclimate to the three alternating points of view.  I’m not going to call that a dislike because once I got used to it and remembered, I thought it was a beautiful way to tie together what happened with Benno and a red balloon during the war and what happened to his granddaughter when she touches a red balloon over 40 years later.

FINAL THOUGHTS

The Girl with the Red Balloon is a book that I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend to anyone who enjoys historical fiction, magic, time travel, romance, and even mysteries.  Not only does it have a little something for everyone, but it’s also just a beautifully written story that will be on your mind long after you read the final pages.  

RATING:  5 STARS

Thanks so much to Katherine Locke, Netgalley, and the Albert Whitman Company for allowing me the opportunity to preview an advanced copy of this book. It in no way shapes my opinion of the book.

How do you describe this book ? I'll have a go but may not do it justice.its  a time travel book that takes us the reader back in time to a very important time in fairly recent history .I think Ellie the girl with the red balloon is an ok character but maybe I found her a little on the young side for me to fully engage with , having said that I was young once so maybe should have found it easier to  go with the flow, I guess I found her obsession with another character Kai a little boring, but the setting and descriptions were wonderful so I am probably being churlish and too picky.I thought the feel of the place and time that the book took us to was very well captured and that is the main thing.I also liked Benno and was fascinated by his story.Overall I think this is well worth a read and is quite a clever book it makes you think and pulls the heartstrings .I would like to thank Netgalley and the publishers for an ARC in return for an honest review.

5/5 Stars

Mixing magic and the harsh realities of history, Katherine Locke has written a consuming story of both darkness and light with her YA debut The Girl with the Red Balloon. It follows Ellie Baum as she's sucked into the past by a simple decision, and I was completely enthralled from start to finish.

Top 10 Reasons to Read The Girl with the Red Balloon

"If you give a girl a red balloon she'll believe in magic and memory."
Ellie Baum is a Jewish-American girl who's grandfather survived the Holocaust. She's passionate and intense even when thrust into dire circumstances.
Kai, my love, is a Romani boy who willingly chooses to move from England to East Berlin to protect his sister. He's reserved and focused on his mission, caring deeply about what he's doing.
This ship sails itself! Seriously these two together was so beautiful. It's slow burn and exquisitely heart warming and heart wrenching at the same time.
The team MVP though is Mitzi.  She's a fierce lesbian lighting up the world even when she's not accepted by her country. Plus she's an amazingly supportive friend.
Multiple POV's and settings! The story is told through the eyes of Ellie, Kai, and Benno and while most of the narrative takes place in 1988 East Berlin, it's also set in the Lodz ghetto.
The exploration of collective memory, how people are shaped by things they never experienced. It also reflects on being influenced by the generations that came before us and how it informs our identity and our place in a community.
Marvelous writing! Honestly Locke wields writing with such force, crafting such excellent scenes that hit right at the soul. Her words are powerful and empowering, invoking intense emotion.
Obviously I adored the use of magic. How the simplest object, a red balloon, could inspire such hope and make a difference.
"If you give a girl a magic balloon she will burn down the world."
Overall Katherine Locke's The Girl with the Red Balloon is a gripping adventure playing out in the past. It's emotional and endearing with characters that wiggle their way into your heart. The narrative is heavy and poignant especially with ongoing current events but was tempered by the whimsy and magic being used. I honestly think everyone should pick this book up!

Katherine Locke’s Girl with the Red Balloon a compelling look at time travel 

GIRL WITH THE RED BALLOON, by Katherine Locke, Albert Whitman & Company, Sept. 1, 2017, Hardcover, $16.99 (young adult)


We all know balloons float. We use them to celebrate special occasions, track weather and even transport people to other locations. But what if balloons could do much more? What if they could save people from impending doom? What if they could even transport people through time? Those are the questions behind Katherine Locke’s Girl with the Red Balloon.

Girl with the Red Balloon follows 16-year-old Ellie Baum, who is on a school trip in Germany. When Ellie sees a red balloon bobbing along unattended, she realizes it makes for the perfect photo-op. When Ellie grabs the string, she gets way more than she bargained for. Instead of the perfect shot, she’s transported to 1988 East Berlin.

Alone and afraid, Ellie accepts the help of Kai, the first person she meets there. Luckily for Ellie, Kai knows how she got there — well sort of. Kai is part of an underground group that uses balloons and magic to help people escape over the Berlin Wall. So Kai understands the balloon, but not the time travel. Even the balloon makers aren’t sure how Ellie made the jump.

As Ellie works with Kai and his underground group, two things become clear: everyone wants to help get Ellie home and someone is using dark magic in attempt to change history. Ellie’s not willing to let the past be changed, even if that means sacrificing her future in the process.

Girl with the Red Balloon is an intense and, at times, very dark, book. What makes it work is compelling material — both real and imagined. Not only does Locke take readers to 1988 East Berlin, she also immerses them in 1940s Berlin and Poland. The source material for both these settings is rich and well researched. Then Locke adds in magical elements that create a new reality without obscuring the old.

I found Locke’s choice of a red balloon, rather than black or white for example, to be another strong editorial element. The boldness of color echoes the boldness of the balloons’ travelers and handlers as they fight against regimes. The red stands out in stark contrast to the suffering of Jews in ghettos and concentration camps as well as the oppression suffered by those trapped on the east side of the Berlin Wall.

Girl with the Red Balloon does have a few pacing problems. Early on, I devoured it, but as I came to the second half, I found myself dragging. I still cared about the characters and wanted to know the outcome, but it wasn’t the page-turner I started out with. Luckily, things turned around for me a few chapters later, and I once again found myself racing toward the end.

Girl with the Red Balloon is the first book in a planned series. Locke is currently working on the second novel, which takes place 45 years before the first. The author has said it’s set in the same world with different characters. I’m interested to see where she goes with it. This sort of treatment certainly opens up a lot more possibilities in the future.

This was really good! The premise of the book is really intriguing and I've never heard or read any book like it before which I liked. Time-travel and historical fiction were nicely weaved together too!

Ellie grabs a red balloon in Berlin, Germany in the present and is transported to East Berlin in 1988 before the fall of the Berlin Wall. While there, she discovers magic, mysteries, and people she never thought she'd love. 

The strength of the book lies in the interwoven stories--Ellie and Kai's story in East Germany--and the store of Ellie's grandfather during the Holocaust. I really loved the back and forth between the time lines, especially as it was Ellie's grandfather who told her stories about a girl with a red balloon saving him from Chelmno. I loved the history in it and the diversity. Kai and his sister, Sabina, are Romani (Kai refers to himself as Romnichel since they lived in England for so long), and you almost never see any Roma characters in fiction, especially not in a story that deals with the Holocaust. Or see fiction books acknowledging that Roma were murdered in the camps too, along with other groups Hitler saw fit to exterminate. It's clearly well-researched and thought out. I also loved that Kai and Mitzi were touchy best friends--hugs and odd little non-lip kisses--and they were just friends as Mitzi is a lesbian, which was treated as no big deal by the characters in the book. Her family, who she's estranged from, thought it was (since this is 1988 East Berlin), and I really liked that inclusion. 

It did take me a little bit to get into the book and the prose itself was lacking a little something for me. I didn't fully feel invested in the characters (except for Mitzi and Ellie's grandfather's chapters), but I think part of that is because Ellie was soon romantically interested in Kai, and I was no shipping it, and I wasn't in the mood for a book with a romance. The explanations for the magic were kinda not there at all, which I pretty much fine with since I can suspend my disbelief well. Also, the ending. I am not a fan of the ending. I do like not knowing. I don't like open endings like this one is. 

An intriguing and well-executed premise, but the pacing and prose were a little off for me.

THIS BOOK. just. THIS BOOK!! I'm sorry, but W O W, I am blown away, I am emotional, and I am in desperate need of the next book asap! The writing, the messages, AND THE SWOONY ROMANCE, oh it makes for the PERFECT book.

Overall, I did like this one. Time travel, WWII-themed (though to my surprise, not actually set during WWII), magical red balloons, all of this just screams me. Though to be completely honest, me and this book did not get off on the right start. 

1% into my eARC and already I was seriously judging the simple writing style. Meeting our main character, Ellie, felt a bit lackluster, all tell and no show. I was afraid that this writing style, and therefore this book, wouldn’t work for me at all. Fortunately, that didn’t end up being the case as after 2%, the writing changed and started to appeal to me. 

I also must admit that my expectations were set really high, even though I have never read any of the author’s older works before. If you don’t know by now, but I try to read anything and everything related to WWII. Even though this didn’t necessarily take place during that setting, it is still set during the time of the Berlin Wall. This came as a shock, as 1989 wasn’t so long ago, and I had thought the Berlin Wall was brought down earlier. 

The Girl with the Red Balloon had a solid plot and solid characters. And time travel of course! I was impressed and surprised with Ellie’s actions, despite the fact that she so badly wanted to go back home. Kai and Mitzi were also wonderful additions to the book, though to be honest I’m not sure whether I cared about the romance between Ellie and Kai. 

More could have been developed, especially in regards to world-building. I’m a bit fuzzy on the details of the balloon makers. I’m assuming that there will be more in the sequel, or companion book, as this one is only 256 pages. There were also times where I was confused on who was on who’s side. Though perhaps this was due to my lack of knowledge in history or just the terms used. 

Either way, I did enjoy this! Not sure if I will pick up the “sequel”, but I’ll think about it!

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 //

Overall, I liked this one! I'm looking forward to Locke's future works. 

I thought the time traveling aspect was incredibly fun, especially because I'm not a huge time-traveling person despite loving science-fiction. I liked the idea of the red balloon, serving as a way to save lives and as a huge symbol during this time period. I also enjoyed the shifting POVs between Benno, Kai, and Ellie, as I felt as if it gave me more development as to the impact of the red balloons and the time-traveling aspect. 

The romance was also super cute and developed, and I liked the incorporation of information about the Berlin Wall and the personal perspectives as to how it affected daily lives. Overall, if you enjoy Jewish characters (as well as a swell of other characters from different backgrounds), time traveling, and German history, be sure to check out this one!

[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.

The girl with the Red balloon certainly surprised me. It is beautifully written, with the right amount of fiction and fantasy in a book with plenty of historical content and good descriptions. Furthermore, the characters develop in such a smooth way that one only realises at the very end of it. On the other hand, minorities from this century are finally given the importance they derserve, not only Yiddish, but especially the Roma people, although a bit deeper insight about Kai and Sabina´s people would have been more than welcome. 
In a nutshell, the book reads itself well and means an enjoyable experience for the reader. I will recommend it and write a positive comment in Good Reads as soon as it gets published. 

Congratulations to the author for this unique piece of work.

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.