Locke, Katherine The Girl with the Red Balloon, 277 pages.
Albert Whitman and Company, 2017. $10. Language: R (50 swears, 15 f’s); Mature
Content: PG-13/R; Violence: R.
Ellie Baum is on a school trip to Berlin with her class when
she sees a red balloon floating in a park. A red balloon, just like the one her
Saba told her about from when he escaped the Nazis during WWII. Ellie reaches
out to grab the balloon and finds herself transported back to East Berlin in
1988. She is taken in by the Runners and Schopfers who use magic balloons to
help people escape to freedom in West Berlin. Working along-side them, Ellie
learns more of her own family history and of the oppression that has followed
her Jewish ancestors for generations. As the days stretch into weeks and
months, Ellie comes to realize she may never find a way back home.
As a debut novel, author Katherine Locke combines many
elements into one story: WWII, the genocide of Jews and Romanichal gypsies,
LGBTQIA, magic, time travel, teen romance, and the question of the morality of
killing a few to save the many. The beginning of the book is a bit rough with
words sometimes seeming ill-placed on the pages. The roughness quickly falls
away, however, and the story flows effortlessly as the reader becomes wrapped
up in the lives of the characters. The flow continues right up to the end of
the book and then it comes to a screeching halt. The story needs two more
chapters, or at least an epilogue. The reader deserves more than what is given
as a close to the story. Locke’s next Balloonmakers book will come out in 2018
but it is a companion to the current book, not a sequel. Leaving behind my
frustration with the end of the story, I really liked the portion of this book
that was told through the perspective of Ellie’s Saba as he survived the
holocaust. I also give Locke credit for taking such a bold step of using the
history of oppression in Germany and giving it hope through the use of magic.
Despite its drawbacks, I still recommend this book as worthy of being on the
shelves of a high school library.
HS - OPTIONAL (ratings). LMA, future elementary school teacher
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