Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeild

I'm not sure how it is that I never read this book as a child. I can't possibly have not read it, but I don't recall reading it. I don't even recall hearing about it until Meg Ryan was sitting in the children's section of a bookstore and told a customer about it, in You've Got Mail. I remember coming home, and getting online to see if I could find this Shoe book. It was out of print.

Then yesterday, I was looking on my bookshelf, and guess what I found? I am not sure when I bought it. It has a Novel Idea price sticker, which means I bought it here in Dar, but who knows when.

Ballet Shoes was originally written in the 1930s. It doesn't have the magic, vampires, suspense of a lot of today's books.  It's a sweet, simple story of 3 girls, who are adopted by GUM (Great Uncle Matthew). He leaves on a voyage, for 5 years, and promised to leave enough money for his niece to raise the girls.

Five years is approaching, and there is no word from GUM. The girls now enrol in dance school, where at the age of 12, they can audition for paid shows and help with the household.  


It's not as utterly girly as you may think. Petrova has no interest in ballet, but prefers fast cars and airplanes. There are 2 professor boarders. Women. Who live together. Not too bad for a book written in the 1930s!

1 comment:

Nicole said...

I totally forgot about this book! I t was one of my "big" books when I was 8. Ahh.. great memories!