SELECTED AS A BOOK OF THE YEAR BY:
JIM CRACE, GUARDIAN ? ¡®A whole wide world of significance¡¯
SARAH SANDS, NEW STATESMAN ? ¡®Sheer delight¡¯
MICHAEL PRODGER, EVENING STANDARD ? ¡®Picaresque history¡¯
DAN JONES, DAILY TELEGRAPH ? ¡®Tremendously inventive¡¯
LEV GROSSMAN, TIME MAGAZINE ? ¡®Thrilling history¡¯
CHLOE SCHAMA, NEW REPUBLIC ? ¡®Unadulterated delight¡¯
KIRKUS ? ¡®Gripping¡¯
MAIL ON SUNDAY ? ¡®Tragic¡¯
¡®A book as delightful as it is unexpected ¡¦ [an] extraordinary cabinet of drifting aerial wonderment, a book that will linger and last, as it floats ever upward in the mind¡¯ Simon Winchester, Wall Street Journal
¡®Holmes presents a full-blown, lyrical history of the same subject, investigating the strangeness, detachment and powerful romance of ¡®falling upwards¡¯ into a seemingly alien and uninhabitable element. He lovingly charts ¡¦ a history full of awe and inefficiency ¡¦ A truly masterly storyteller¡¯ Evening Standard
¡®Endlessly exhilarating ¡¦ packed full of swashbuckling stories, as well as fascinating historical accounts of the use of balloons. It is also a singularly beautiful book, wonderfully designed and illustrated and quite clearly a product of love¡¯ Mail on Sunday
¡®What Holmes teases out ¡¦ is that ballooning gave us, quite literally, a different point of view ¡¦ This exhilarating book, wonderfully written, generously illustrated and beautifully published, captures all that and more¡¯ Spectator
¡®Holmes conjures an extraordinarily vivid, violent, thrilling history, full of bizarre personalities, narrow escapes and fatal plunges. A peerless prose artist, infectiously curious¡¯ Time Magazine