Cloud Hopper ia definitely more of a teen book. There are some heavier topics than one might expect from the title. The writing style may also not be accessible to all teens.

Honestly, I adored this book. Not much happens at all, it didn't lead up to the excitement is expected but it some way it's nice that it didn't. It was exhilarating at times but mostly chilled, and peaceful. They had the problem with the girls, and the lost hopper, and Sophie’s Grandma but it all progressed slowly. The book characters appreciate life in all aspects and it's so calm and wholesome. I love the concept, type of writing, and also the setting. I think there could be more description as it can be limited but I love the town they live in. I love the relationships between the characters and how they all come together. However a few things are confusing for me. Firstly, the muni? I don't know what this is at all. Also, hoping? I understand the concept but at times in the novel, I can't tell whether they're hopping or in a plane lol. And lastly, the characters can be confusing. I don't understand Joseph, Sam etc in who they are and how they come into the storyline. Some parts felt rushed e.g when the girls left. I think they should be spent more time together. I love the raw scenes with Sophie and her grandma as they tell stories, and the final scene. It is beautiful.

Certainly a more literary read than we typically get in teen fiction. Ostensibly, it's a story about a trio of teens trying to find out where a mystery girl came from. In truth, it's a story about how trauma colors our view of life, how it informs our decision making and thus our future. The writing is a bit meandering and lacking in focus. IT also uses a lot of specific terminology related to airfields without ever defining it.

This is definitely more of a TEEN/YA book than a middle grades book. I would not give this to my 5th graders to read. The story just did not feel realistic in anyway.


I received an advance copy. All thoughts are my own.

**Thank you to Netgalley and Penny Candy Books for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. This in no way affected my rating**

I'm a little at a loss with this book. It kind of feels like that "expectations vs. reality" meme. The synopsis made it sound like a very interesting and intriguing Middle Grade novel. The reality is one of the blandest books I've read with no plot and nothing to say.

Cloud Hopper professes to be about a girl who falls from the sky during a ballooning accident and three kids who are learning her story and want to help her. Technically, those things do happen, but it is not nearly as interesting as the synopsis is. The story is really about three bored white kids living in rural Oklahoma who see an accident happen to the child of a migrant worker and spend the rest of the book poking their noses into other people's business and possibly putting them in more danger.

To begin with, the characters are between 14-15, but they read like they have the logic and reasoning skills of a child around 8 years old. They bribe their way into hospital wards with baked goods. They attempt to bribe a cashier for credit card records using baked goods. They find an origami bird with a name on it at the crash site which inexplicably ends up being a clue. The last one especially was hard for me. I looked into the mechanics of "cloud hoppers" to see how they operate and the idea that this girl would have had time to fold an origami bird with information on it while operating the balloon is unrealistic at best. The idea that she folded it like that ahead of time, given the reason she cites at the end of the book, would likewise be unrealistic. It made no sense. One of the characters has a job, as well. They would be old enough to know that these tactics should not work.

Towards the beginning of the book, after no one claims the Hopper after the accident, the town puts out a $10k reward for information. This is a VERY rural area. There is no way they have that kind of money. That aside, however, the kids go into this thinking they're somehow going to get information, get the money and give it to the Hopper and her family without getting ICE involved (They are illegal immigrants). This plot is dropped without ceremony and never comes up again. There was no reason for it to be in the story. They also tell hospital staff and a social worker where the girls had been living, which would have outed any family members who returned there.

The way migrant workers are portrayed in this book was appalling. EVERY time they pass a farm, the main character mentioned Spanish music playing. They can't speak to the Hopper or her family because they don't speak Spanish. The store they go to says they remember the Hopper coming in to purchase shoes because the man with her paid with "crumpled, dirty dollar bills." They mention the threats of ICE and "kids in cages" and how horrible this is, but then give information away that could potentially be incriminating. And once the plot no longer needs the poor, sad, immigrant girl for the white children to learn a lesson about "compassion', she, too, is thrown away. There was ZERO reason for this to be a story about immigration. There is no plot purpose to it. There was no growth for the characters nor lesson for a reader outside of how sad immigration can be. All mentions of Hispanic characters are seen through the eyes of children who only know them as a stereotype, but are under the false notion that they are moved by "compassion" to help this girl instead of the real reason: they are bored and nosy. As I mentioned earlier, the book is set in Oklahoma. This means the family would have to get through Texas first to even be there in the first place. For a state that's not on the border, these kids spend a LOT of time thinking about the border.

The main character, Sophie, also has a plot about her grandmother (and caretaker) dying from MS. This, too, has a plot that goes nowhere other than "this is sad". Sophie doesn't learn anything. She doesn't grow from any of the experiences she has. Her two friends have similarly tragic backstories without reason. They also pull her away from her dying grandmother every chance they can, which is kind of terrible. I truly can't explain what a child reader is supposed to get from having read this book other than "sad things happen to people sometimes."

While I have spent time harping on the lack of plot, the writing is also bland and strange. Sentences like "the higher we climb we keep climbing" and "the clouds cloud" were not uncommon. They are grammatically correct in most cases, but they don't mean anything.

I gave this book 1.5 stars, but rounded up to 2 for Goodreads. There is no reason I can see for giving a child this book about white children being sad for immigrants when there are excellent Middle Grade books that set that experience center stage instead of treating it like a side plot (For example, Esperanza Rising). Like a cloud, Cloud Hopper lacks substance.

Cloud Hopper
by Beth Kephart


Penny Candy Books
Penelope Editions
Middle Grade | Teens & YA
Pub Date 08 Sep 2020




I am reviewing a copy of Cloud Hopper through Penny Candy Books/Penelope Editions and Netgalley:



After a girl in a homemade hot air balloon falls out of the sky in rural Gilbertine there are understandably questions, like why won’t she talk, and why has she risked her life to live somewhere that does not seem to want her.





Is there anything Sophie, Wyatt and K, three friends who are misfits and each have stories of their own that are rather complex. What should they do to help her.




Told in the perspective of fourteen year old Sophie who lives with her Grandmother who is s loosing her battle with Multiple Sclerosis.



Cloud Hopper is an adventure that is set amongst old plane, Vietnam veterans and majestic hot air balloons.



Cloud Hopper is part adventure, but more than that it is a story of family, it’s a story of loss, and learning to let go. It’s a story of pain and heartbreak, but that of adventure and joy as well.


Cloud Hopper reminds us that it is okay to be unique, to be your own person!



Five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

Written in a fantastical manner similar to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory or Stargirl. For fans of magical realism.

Cloud Hopper is shelved as both YA and Middle Grade and though I don't frequently read a lot of middle grade, I was so intrigued by the plot that I decided to give it a try, after all, most of my favourite books are shelved in that same in-between.

For whatever reason, I just couldn't get into the writing here and that meant I also couldn't get into the story. It's not a bad book. It's story is incredibly unique and it has a lot of heart and great messages, but it ended up being a fairly 'meh' experience for me.

Who or what makes a family? Sophie has moved with her Grandmother Aubrey, dying of MS, a year ago to Gilbertine, NC. Has never known her parents. She become friends with Wyatt who's only guardian is Joseph, a vet running the MUNI and hot air balloons with other vets. K is another friend who lives in an old plane after his mother left him a while back. They all work together when a girl falls from the sky because a storm has caught her "cloud hopping" with a personal hot air balloon to find out who she is. Her family we find is an uncle who has gone missing and a cousin, all of them illegal aliens, Two girls never trust anyone and end up leaving during a snowstorm never to be found. Sophie spends the story dealing with the future death of grandmother and where/how she will live when she dies. Very unique characters and how they relate to one another.

This book was good, the stories it told were compelling. If felt real to me as the story grew and expanded. The style was very hard for me to follow. It was a fast read and I wanted to know what happened next. I enjoyed the experience even though it was difficult to follow.