The Little Balloonist

Wealthy inventor and dare devil Jean-Pierre Blanchard marries the much younger country bumpkin because he owes her family for saving his life when his latest contraption failed. Jean-Pierre especially enjoys soaring over the city in hot air balloons. To his shock clumsy Sophie takes to the air like a bird and is soon flying solo. After she becomes a widow, France recognizes that a female aviator is flying. Word quickly reaches Emperor Napoleon who is sick of his wife Josephine's extramarital affairs and her waste on expensive clothing that make her look like a peacock. Instead he years for Sophie and begin s courting her at the same time her childhood friend Andre Giroux the psychic healer comes wooing her too. THE LITTLE BALLOONIST is a terrific biographical fiction tale starring a highly admired female balloonist who could count Napoleon as one of her fans. The story line provides a deep look at the pioneer balloonists who bravely flew in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries; Jean Pierre and Sophie were real celebrities soaring above the masses. Readers will enjoy this delightful historical that uses a fascinating romantic triangle starring the emperor, the psychic and the balloonist to bring a lesser known part of Napoleonic France vividly soaring to readers. Harriet Klausner

This is a wonderful story about gifted, brave, and selfless characters juxtaposed with those who struggle with fear, vanity, and self absorption (including Napoleon himself). The reader is given rich historical details of life in Napoleon's France in a writing style that effortlessly combines pictorial vividness and psychological insight. Mrs. Donn is careful to bring forth her characters in all of their complexity while leaving just enough to the reader's imagination. Her loving care of them is remarkable, as are their stories.

The Little Balloonist by Linda Donn is a wonderful story of love, loss and redemption told through the life of Sophie Blanchard, one of the first women balloonists.Sophie is a determined young woman who makes the most of adversity and forges for herself a remarkable life. Ms. Donn is a deft and poetic writer who weaves her tale with great dexterity.

Ms. Donn has given us a great gift, in this her first novel. It is a work that so perfectly captures the fascinating period of Napoleanic France, that one marvels at the detail and the scope of her writing. I will never forget the image Ms. Donn gives us of Napolean riding into battle, tearing out pages of the book he is reading as he proceeds with his army picking up stray pages as they blow past them. Luckily we are on much firmer ground as this novel rises with the beautiful prose of the author, and our imaginations are held by the characters and settings. The coast of Northern France is especially compelling, with the white stretches of salt, underscoring the depth of the longing of the characters for the a life of color and love. I was also intrigued by Ms. Donn's skillful musing on the nature of time, reminding us that our past can never be fully overcome, as it becomes our present. In many ways this novel very much resembles its main character. She is a woman of great beauty and power, but as ephemeral as a novel is long. I loved reading each word of this remarkable book, and eagerly await Ms. Donn's next gift to us all.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading every word of this delightful novel, The Little Balloonist, by Linda Donn. It is a lyrical and touching story of love and loss, war and adventure, invention and history in all the right doses of each. I felt every nuance; I could smell the salt air, feel the ephemeral silk between my fingers, shiver in the dampness of St. Helena all the while sensing the human drama that surrounded the lives of these Frenchmen at the dawn of their new country. Ms. Donn brings revolutionary France alive and expertly draws the reader into the psyche of one of the world's most famous emperors, all done as a backdrop for the story she weaves of a little known French adventuress. Her use of prose is artistic while the tale is captivating. I was sorry when it ended and look forward to Ms. Donn's next book.