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In the all-encompassing darkness the cicadas grumbled, the leaves rustled and whispered, a hen suddenly broke into a series of raucous squawks. It was indeed a bright, talkative night, gabbing away, twenty four to the dozen. It talked and she listened. Not to them, but to her own sounds. The stars hobnobbed with the clouds, the pine trees confabulated with each other, the snoozing birds, once again burst into a string of chirps woken from their forty winks. One fidgety owl flew down from the tree and perched on her window sill, tapping at it. "Talktometalktome toohootoohoo", it said, and she continued to listen.To her own sounds.

In a sudden flash of clarity, she realized that the person moving around the house morosely, was not her, the person plodding through life in a somnambulistic trance was not her. The ear-callousing silence at home wasn't her either.The trouble was, she herself did not know what she was anymore.The girl who once babbled on with a bright-eyed-exuberance, suddenly turned extremely quiet; she had her hallucinations for company, and a nightmare which clung to her resiliently, making her scream every night.Wordlessly.

Why did the garrulous girl suddenly turn absolutely quiet? What devastating twist, what tragedy engulfed her, throwing her life into turmoil? Read on to find out.

A Skyful of Balloons will make you laugh and cry with the characters, the vicissitudes in their lives will tug at your heartstrings; you will savour the beams of the rising sun, and the romance of the setting sun will tickle you into a beautiful morn.

Full of beauty and marked by lyricism, A Skyful of Balloons is a heart-rending and deeply poignant novella. With finely drawn characters, Santosh Bakaya tells the story of one girl's struggle for life, love and hope.

About the Author: [Critically acclaimed for her poetic biography of Mahatma Gandhi, Ballad of Bapu [Vitasta; 2015], academician-essayist-poet-novelist, Dr. Santosh Bakaya is the recipient of the Reuel International Award [2014] for her long poem, Oh Hark!.

The Universal Inspirational Poet Award was conferred on her by Pentasi B Friendship Group and Ghana Government in 2016. The Poetry Society of India, awarded her the Poet Laureate Award for Ballad of Bapu, Oh Hark! andWhere are the Lilacs?for the year 2017.

Her poems have been commended world-wide, and feature in many international anthologies.

Flights from my Terrace [2017], Under the Apple Boughs [2017], her other books, have also been very well-received.