Release Date: December 7, 2021.
This was riddled with insecurities, fierce competition and critical, unrealistic expectations. Just to be a ballerina and a girl. I kept wondering why we put children through this and is it really worth it? So because of this picture set before me in the landscape of a ballerina life, I found the characters unlikable. It was an uncomfortable feeling as I finished the story. Almost like a itch that couldn’t be scratched.
I thought it good and written well. I learned a lot about the life, the drive to succeed. And it mad me sad. I wanted… I wanted something like, ohhhh I don’t know, romance? Someone to have it? But I wasn’t promised romance and I had to deal with the raw truth.
Maybe that’s why people either love this or hated it. I’m grateful I read it and it’s given me a lot to think about. Me as a women, taking myself back and accepting me as I am.
Thanks St Martin’s Press via Netgalley.

THE BALLERINAS by Rachel Kapelke-Dale is not like the books the blurb compared it to. Not really.

This is a strive to be like those books. In my opinion it simply falls short of what it aspires to be. A little like it’s main character actually. Centimeters short…

2cm is what stands between Delphine and her dreams. And what’s 2cm, a few secrets and several sexual encounters between friends?

Well, that’s where I was hoping I would be while reading it. But I was in fact, perplexed by the authors jarring use of words.

*SPOILER*

It reminded me of NO EXIT where the author ponders (for much too long) (imo) on the personal hygiene of the scary,-yet dually afflicted with alopecia and body odor-serial killer who traps girls in cages and then stops to fart at a rest stops (no dna matching here) to refill his coffee and take a piss during a snowstorm.

Oh sorry, that’s not appealing for me to read about.

There are more than a few other words that I felt were inserted (no pun here) just to surprise readers and seem sexy and provocative like female serial killers.

Like the thought of double jointedness making you special, this book rubbed me the wrong way. And I may never need to hear the word *ipecac* again or visualize it working. Thanks for that!

This is not a case of me being a prude. I like my literature dirty. Filthy and fabulous is fine.

I think what’s lacking is an element of necessity. It’s a shock and awe campaign that if the writing were solid, would be unnecessary.

Remember the saying

YOU’RE USING CURSE WORDS BECAUSE YOU LACK THE VOCABULARY TO EXPRESS YOURSELF.

That’s not me saying that. I promise.

What I am saying is that this book is actually more similar to a book I read last year called THE DIVINES.

Both tried to use verbiage and language to incite strong emotions, but fail to realize that it actually does matter how you use those words. It does matter how words are carried within a sentence. How the sentence is structured.

⭐️⭐️ stars.

I really enjoyed this book. It started of kind of slow, but quickly picked up for me. I was immediately drawn to read the book, because it's set in Paris, France which is one of my absolute favorite places to read about! I want to visit one day!

What I enjoyed the most about the book is the inside look into ballet and what women go through-not just physically, but mentally starting early in childhood and progresses throughout adulthood. Very powerful and intruguing.



Thank you to @Netgalley and @stmartinspress for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

While this books was interesting, I feel like it was slightly mis-advertised. I went in expecting a thriller and ended up with a highly dramatic tale about ballet. It was a good book, but for that reason I didn't enjoy it as much.

A powerful story about friendship, secrets, facing life and the choices we make. The lives of the three friends, Delphine, Margaux and Lindsay will be forever intertwined since they met in Paris Opera Ballet school and will shape them, their relationship and the way they face the world. A tough career choice for women, with the men influence all around them. A cry for women to show their strength together. A really good story.

The Ballerinas by Rachel Kapelke-Dale follows the story of Delphine and her friends. Alternating between adulthood and teenage years it follows the stories of these ballerinas in school and as adults. The characters were flawed and hard to root for, but as a former dancer it was fun to read and be immersed in the world of dance for awhile. However, the ending of the book and solving of the "mystery" was a bit disappointing. I would suggest an interest in dance to be interested in this story.

I received this book free of charge from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

I was excited to be approved for this ARC, but once I started reading it, I found myself having no desire to keep reading. I didn’t like the constant jumping around in timelines (especially mid-chapter) and I didn’t particularly care for the characters. And I wasn’t sure where it was going. It was pretty slow.

I ultimately decided to DNF this at 14%. The biggest reason being I felt like I had to force myself to sit down and read it and reading is supposed to be about enjoyment. This wasn’t doing it for me.

The cover is stunning though.

this book follows 3 girls from their young lives at ballet school thru to their mid 30"s.
Primarily told thru one woman, Delphine and her interaction with Margaux and Lindsay. Their hopes to be prima ballerinas, soloists and the jealousy and actions to undermine the chances of Lindsay, who holds the most promise: twice in her life: .once purposely and once accidentally.
The scandal brought to the ballet school through the actions of a young male dancer and of Delphine's leaving a promising ballet career to become a chorographer of ballet productions.

During a fight, a horrible accident occurs and there is a death and lives are altered.

I wasn't entirely sure what to expect with The Ballerinas. After reading it, I'm also not entirely sure what all happened...maybe in a good way?

I was a dancer for many years of my life, so I loved that Rachel Kapelke-Dale brought me back to that world. These ladies were more advanced than I ever was, but jealousy and competition with your fellow dancers is universal.

I did give The Ballerinas four stars overall. It was probably closer to 3.5, but I'll round up. I think that there was just a bit too much happening. You have present day and then flashbacks. You have relationship trouble, alcoholism, aggression, and more. It was just a lot happening, and it made all of those pieces feel a bit lukewarm, rather than punch you in the face.

I was excited to get this book. I wanted to delve in the world of the ballet and the drama it contains. For me, it fell flat. There was some interesting information about this lifestyle, but I thought it could have been more. I also didn't feel that the story moved along well. It was very slow and there was not much drama or happenings. The big secret was not that big and I felt let down. I read waiting for something to happen, but until the very end little was going on. Not a book I would recommend.

It was okay, I felt like the synopsis had me more interested than the book. But mainly because this isn't typically what I gravitate towards.

4.5*

When I picked up this book, I was expecting something set in the 1800s or earlier. This is not. The time period moves back and forth from 2018 ("current" day in the novel) to the narrator, Delphine's past starting at 1998. This was a lovely surprise. I immediately connected to Delphine and her friends. It seems so glamorous to be a ballerina in Paris. It’s like looking through the window at a toy store when you’re a child. A Christmas display. It amazes you. You want to fall into its potential. But the glass starts frosting over. Just at the corners at first so it’s almost charming. Slowly it starts creeping in so you can’t see those bright, shining toys as easily. You assume it’s still the same beautiful, intriguing display of potential but if the frost is cleared you don’t really know what will be there. Life is like that for Delphine. It's nice looking, always pretty and polished, but everything is complicated.

We see snippets of her past; clear as day. But always the story is fogged. The damage. The decay. It’s there; you can smell it but you don’t know it in any true way just yet. There's no big reveal, per se. Delphine admits to part of the deep dark secret early on, but I still wanted the details. I wanted to see the fall out. I wanted to see why she ran away to Russia and how that really played out. I've seen other reviews say this is slow paced, but I didn't find that at all. This felt just right for me. I was really engaged in this look at Delphine's life and history and how much time was given to her friends. The author didn't shy away from how complicated friendships can get and there was a satisfying grittiness to how Delphine tries to reinsert herself into her old life while knowing that it's not that easy, but still wanting that so much.

This is truly character driven. There isn't much of an overarching plot here. There is an obvious and well drawn story arc, it just depends on the characters. The girls change and grow and I loved seeing not only how they change and grow and Delphine is too wrapped up in herself to see it, but also when Delphine does finally see it and finally stops being so selfish herself.

I also didn't have an issue with the time skipping around. It didn't feel jarring or confusing. It was only slightly confusing when the past part caught up to the present. The issue that finally compels Delphine and turns her story was not a favourite of mine. I see why the author used it. It worked really well. It wasn't obvious in that I knew where the plot was going, but it was sort of expected, not a huge surprise, given Delphine's history. The ending was pretty great too, not amazing, but definitely satisfying. It's nicely wrapped up and there is no reason to write a sequel.

There is a bit of adult content in this book.

I really enjoyed it and will definitely be recommending it to friends,

The Ballerinas, by Rachel Kapelke-Dale

Short Take: Q: “Where have all the good men gone, and where are all the gods?” (A: Not Paris.)

(*I voluntarily read and reviewed an advance copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.*)

Greetings, duckies! I have just learned that apparently I am hosting Thanksgiving this year, and Jonesy the dog is getting his big snip this week, so needless to say, stuff just got real busy. Although I am grateful that my friends and family want to be in my home to celebrate, I have a whole lot of desserts to make and probably a chicken or something too, so let’s jump right in.

The titular ballerinas are Delphine, Lyndsay, and Margaux. All of them are dancers in the prestigious Paris Opera Ballet, and in their mid-thirties, all are approaching the end of their careers with varying levels of distress. Delphine has lived in St. Petersburg for the last few years, carving out a niche as a choreographer and is returning to Paris to put together a new show.

But Delphine’s best friends aren’t the same people they were a decade ago, and their friendship, rivalry, and secrets from both the past and the present might just be too much for any of them to bear.

My sweet nerdlings, I’ve read and/or reviewed other books with a ballet backdrop, but this one was on a different level. Most of the others deal with young dancers, clawing through their rivals for the spotlight, but these dancers aren’t dewy-eyed ingenues anymore. They are scarred and exhausted and still desperately in love with the thing that is destroying their bodies and hearts.

Of course, there’s a bit of mystery in there, as to what exactly happened when they were teenagers (and of course, the timeline bounces back and forth between Then and Now), but the real meat of the story is in unravelling who these women have become. And therein are the more problematic aspects.

Delphine is our narrator, and she is kind of the worst. Completely self-absorbed, not caring about her “best friends” so much as she just wants for her show to be successful and for everyone to shut up and be besties like they were so many years ago. Not that she wants to be bothered with their problems or anything, she just wants the trappings of friendship without having to BE a friend. She eventually turns it around after something awful that affects her personally, but for real, just once, can’t a book allow a character to just walk away from toxic people? The big forgiveness scene in real life is usually just an opening for the narcissist to return to their preferred hunting ground.

But sure, Delphine, congrats on achieving a basic level of humanity, I guess. Hope it lasts.

I also think that Ms. Kapelke-Dale had a lot of ideas that she was passionate about regarding feminism, women’s bodily autonomy, #MeToo, and all of the battles that women are still fighting - the ones that should have been long settled, truthfully. It’s a noble set of issues to take on, but the result is messy. There are a whole lot of crammed-in soapboxing passages, too many “bad man hurts woman” scenes, and not one single good male character. Seriously, every single man is bad in this book. Not to mention how the author goes all-in on the “men are just uniformly terrible” in a book that revolves around women undermining and backstabbing each other. Irony, or hypocrisy? No idea.

But there is one truly admirable character, and that’s the city of Paris. She’s old and new, gritty and glamorous, full of the world’s best art and food and music. She’s also the only character I could see myself spending any time with.

The Nerd’s Rating: THREE HAPPY NEURONS (and ALL the french pastries. Seriously. All of them.)

This book first appealed to me because of the title and the cover. I thought I would really enjoy a story about the world of ballet. I was right. This is a great story about ballet, the relationships between women, and the role men play in both that professional world as well as in the personal lives of the women. I did not always like the choices made by these women, but the author makes you want to root for and care about them. She also gives you a behind the scene look at what a ballerina’s professional life is like. Totally different than the glamorous way it may seem to those of us on the outside.

First of all, anyone who picks this up thinking they’re getting a thriller because of how this is being marketed is going to be extremely disappointed. Hardcore thriller readers are not going to see this as a thriller.

What this book really is: a character driven story of three ambitious ballerinas competing for recognition and prestige while yearning for the autonomy and respect that seems to be kept out of their reach generally by men but also by other women. The setting of the elite ballet world is so vivid. The picture of their grueling daily routines, the physical pain, the inachievable expectation of perfection is intense.

I had a difficult time liking or rooting for any of the characters although I think all the women were fairly realistically drawn. The friendship itself is kind of hard to understand when they really don’t treat each other well at all and in fact, spend a good bit of time bickering and betraying each other in small and large ways. The message about the struggle women face with having bodily autonomy came across a little too suddenly and heavy handed. This book is well-written but dark and heavy and probably needs a few trigger warnings.

Before we begin I want to say Thank you Netgalley and the publisher for this Arc.

The Ballerinas
The Ballerinas is a mystery thriller novel it is set in Paris, France. It is about a girl named Delphine and her love for ballet and her friends.

Basically Delphine has been in the Paris Opera Ballet since she was 8 years old and her lifelong dream is to become a professional ballerina.

This book is a thriller about friendships and the price you pay to get to what you want.

Overall this book was ok and it was nice quick read,

2.5⭐

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

The Ballarinas is another one of those books that didn't catch my attention until around halfway through. Once it did catch my attention it didn't keep it for long. It seemed to drag on and on creating one conflict after another instead of just having a main conflict with twists and turns. None of the problems were given enough time and focus to make them interesting. They were all solved pretty easily with a way too much filler thrown everywhere. There were a bunch of different elements all thrown into the story without any real structure or purpose. Everything was skimmed over, there was no real focus on anything and there was way too much of nothing.

I'm not sure why this is considered a thriller. I didn't find anything thrilling and nothing grabbed my attention. I found it to drag on and on and ended up pushing through it as fast as possible just get it done.

Delphine is coming home. She fled the Paris Opera Ballet years ago, leaving her two best friends, Margaux, and Lindsay behind. Her life and her relationship with her partner Dimitri have been an illusion, one that once she looked behind the curtain, she realized it was time to go. She had abandoned her dream of being a famous ballet dancer, but her work as a choreographer means she has a chance to begin again, back home.
Told in two timelines, we see these women as young ballet dancers, and in the present see where they are now. I remember the first time I saw The Nutcracker in NYC, having no idea that behind the magic, there was so much pain. Having the right size body, not eating, and the competition between the ballet dancers was eye-opening. I will never see the ballet in quite the same way again.
Why exactly did Delphine leave? The story was a brutal look at how women are shamed for their bodies, and how a slight criticism can fuel a descent into an unhealthy place. I did not race read this book but took my time and carefully considered what the author was saying. I was honestly surprised at a pivotal scene towards the end, though having made it this far and experienced all the things that had happened, in hindsight, I should have seen it coming. A heartbreaking story, but one also filled with female friendship and hope.

The Ballerinas by Rachel Kapeleke-Dale is an interesting look into the world of ballet and friendships. I enjoyed seeing how these characters dealt with their passions and desires. What stood out in this book is the ambition, feminism and raw look at how deadly serious ballet can be. The two timelines of past and present really allowed us to get to know our characters and wove seamlessly together. This was a fast and engaging read.

I gave up on this book about 25% in. I couldn’t get into it, I’m sure it will be a favorite for others but it just wasn’t the book for me.