When sixteen-year-old Ellie Baum accidentally time-travels via red balloon to 1988 East Berlin, she’s caught up in a conspiracy of history and magic. She meets members of an underground guild in East Berlin who use balloons and magic to help people escape over the Wall—but even to the balloon makers, Ellie’s time travel is a mystery. When it becomes clear that someone is using dark magic to … change history, Ellie must risk everything—including her only way home—to stop the process.
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Historical fiction and fantasy aren’t usually my favorite genres, but Locke makes it work in this delightful, thought-provoking book.
I enjoyed every page of it and this dark era of history was balanced with charming, witty characters and sparkling magic.
I’ve read several reviews complaining that the ending “needed closure.” If you prefer things wrapped in a perfect neat little package, you may not like the ending- but it’s still an incredible read (I personally did not object to the ending because life is messy and uncertain).
One of my favorite books of the year !!!!
This YA novel has a time-travel motif – one of my favorite genres – and the magic-balloon set up is an interesting one. Frankly, the element of moving through time is not a major thread in the story; Ellie basically is transported back to 1988 East Berlin and stays there for the duration of the book. But the author does a great job capturing the flavor of that wall-divided city.
Surprisingly for a story offered by a renowned publisher of children’s literature, this book has a number of harsh expletives. But they do fit the context of the tale, and most of the writing is extremely well done and not offensive.
Easily the strongest element of this story is the emotional ties between Ellie and Kai, and also the other characters like Mitzi. The goodbye at the conclusion is stirring and tinged with memorable pathos as the protagonist says goodbye to the guy she has fallen in love with, and returns to her own modern world.
Every so often a gem of a story falls my way and keeps me glued to my seat (or my iPad). The Girl with the Red Balloon is such a book. Written by the highly imaginative and creative Katherine Locke, the story tethered me with tension, adventure, romance, and magic. All of the main characters – Ellie, Kai, and Benno showed a wonderful depth of emotion, caring, insight, and conflict. The weary, gloomy, war-torn Berlin provided a wonderful backdrop for the saga of these people. I loved the blend of practicality, hope, and desperation you feel as the story progresses, the sweetness of falling in love, the defeat of failure. When the end came, I cried. A beautiful, beautiful story.
I really enjoyed this book. A very original approach to a Holocaust survivor story.
It’s been a few months so I don’t remember names, but I loved this book. The heroine touches a red balloon while on vacation in Germany and is transported back in time before the Wall fell in 1989. She makes friends with 2 balloon runners whose jobs are to help transport people out of East Germany using the balloons. But this time something happened. What went wrong? How can she get home? It was great and kept me on my toes. I loved the ending and look forward to more from this author.
The Girl with the Red Balloon was a really interesting and enjoyable book. It spanned three time periods: present day, 1988 Berlin and Nazi Germany. The genre is difficult to define – fantasy, magic, historical, romance, science fiction – time travel. The themes are powerful and relevant to today. The only thing I thought didn’t work was how little Ellie thought about her parents and family when she was trapped in 1988 Berlin. I would really like to read the sequel as I’d like to find out more about this secret society, the Schopfers, who rescue people using balloons.