After reading the premise of this book I thought it might really be intriguing. I thought the cover was absolutely beautiful and I admire anyone with the strength and stamina (physical and mental) to devote so much time to ballet.

I have to say that I did struggle with the writing in this one. I was getting continually confused between the past and the present because of how it was written. And, thrillers/suspense are one of my all time favorite genres. This was supposed to be that but I didn't get that feel at all.

Just not a strong novel for me, but others might really enjoy it.

The Ballerinas by Rachel Kapelke-Dale is a dramatic view into the world of ballet. If you enjoyed the movie Black Swan (so good!), then you will definitely love reading The Ballerinas.

Delphine, Margaux, and Lindsay are a trio of ballerinas who perform and study at the Paris Opera Ballet School. The story is told from Delphine's point of view, but as readers, we get to see all three girls become women. The book is told in past and present tense, eventually meeting and then told in present tense only. The story unfolds as Delphine comes back to Paris from living in Russia and begins choreographing a ballet for the Paris Opera Ballet.

During the course of this book, I enjoyed reading about ballet, the intensity that girls experience from such a young age, and the friendships that evolve from being together 24/7. The dynamic between the three girls (eventually women) was interesting to me, but I thought it was realistic and not idealized.

Delphine was not a likable character, but she had a lot of redeeming moments in the book, especially toward the end when she has a "come to Jesus" moment with herself. Lindsay and Maragaux were both a bit annoying, but they were "real" which made the narrative better.

Overall, I enjoyed this book immensely because it brought me out of my comfort zone as it isn't a book I'd normally choose.4 stars because I felt there was A LOT of dialogue and it got a bit tedious to read it at times.
**Thank you NetGalley, Rachel Kapelke-Dale, and St Martins Press for an advanced reader copy of this book.**

This book was more drama than thriller and it really let me down. I was hoping for something along the lines of The Dark Swan, instead it was more about the pettiness and lengths ballerinas will go to, to be number one.

A time-jumping, riveting peek into the enchanting but grueling life of ballerinas. This novel also explores the intimate connection between longtime friends supporting each other through life’s joys and trials. Leads up to and finishes with a feminist ideology, underscoring the actions of the characters. Very enjoyable, couldn’t wait to get back to the lives of Dolphin et al.

I love ballet. My mom was a dancer and she wanted me to be one- I wasn’t cut out, but I grew up in that world so I can tell you this book was fantastically researched and accurate. I enjoyed the narrator (Delphine) and her friends Margaux & Lindsey. I loved the setting of Paris as well. The book is described as a thriller, and there were definitely thrilling exciting parts, but I found this to be more literary and character-driven than most thrillers. That’s a very good thing, in my opinion. The book starts a bit slow, but the build up is going somewhere and the second half really takes off! I thought the descriptions of the anxiety and pressure and meltdowns were so realistic and well done. I absolutely LOVED this book and I can’t wait to read more from this author! Thank you so much for the opportunity to review!

I tried to read and this book just didn’t grab me. It reminded of Black Swan. The characters are interesting but I just couldn’t get to the plot fast enough. I prefer thrillers and mysteries more so it may have just been that it wasn’t the right fit for me.

I was so looking forward to reading The Ballerinas. I would like to congratulate the author because it's obvious a lot of research went into this book and it shows. Either that or she was a ballerina at some point, but I don't think that is the case.

The world of ballet is so very cruel to those who wish to succeed from deformed feet, the damage inflicted by en pointe dancing, to eating disorders and very low self-esteem. As beautiful as ballet is to watch, it must be horrendous for the ballerinas.

From The Ballerinas: "Don't they realize, " I'd hissed to Margaux during a curtain call after a particularly grisly performance of Swan Lake fifteen years ago, "That we're all covered in the most disgusting sores under our shoes?" She's plastered her pink grin wide, grabbing my hand as the curtain went up, exposing us once more.
"Of course they know," she said between her teeth. "That's why they like to watch."

This sums up the book. It's filled with pain, drama, each character's cruelty to others, and the never ending fight to get ahead no matter the cost to you or those you profess to love like sisters.

I don't mind dark books and believe me this one turned very, very dark, but the reason I didn't rate this book higher is because it dragged in the middle and there was so much repetition that I grew bored. I also was let down by the "big reveal". When it came it was more of a letdown. Overall none of the main characters were likable. They were surface likable, but were hiding the ugly deep down.

I will say that this book did touch on a pretty timely topic - sexual abuse / mistreatment of others and it was handled in the end, which was good to see.

I do think there are many readers that will enjoy this book. It just wasn't working for me. I would recommend it to those who enjoy ballet and like reading about it from the inside, those who enjoy darker friend sagas, and women's fiction fans.

Thank you to Netgalley, the author, and publisher for providing an ARC at my request. All thoughts are my own.

An interesting book centered on the pressure ballerinas endure to remain perfect and the competition among them. It was also interesting the way the author wrote three diverse characters with different pressures from their private lives. Although she portrayed them as friends, they may have been as young girls, but I didn't believe they were as they grew older and became more competitive for prime spots. I thought the ending of the novel was well done and I found it surprising, so even if at times you feel like skimming the book, be sure to stay through until the end, it is well worth it to see how these women show how powerful they become and not just physically powerful ballerinas.

Ballet has always been one of my favorite things and I love reading about it. Ballet is so beautiful and so ugly. From foot deformities to eating disorders, the world of ballet is fascinating.
This book follows three dancers (Delphine and her best friends Lindsay and Margaux) as we alternate between their teenage years and their present day lives. (This gets confusing at times, as the gap between then and now begins to close.) Now in their late thirties they are close to aging out of dancing. They are all unlikeable, but reading about them was still enjoyable.
This books biggest flaw is that it can’t decide what it wants its big moment to be. There’s way too much going on. There’s a “mystery” around what happened to Lindsay years before and when it’s revealed, it’s anticlimactic and honestly a little silly. There’s the situation with Jacques, a male dancer and sexual predator. And finally, there’s the terrible ending, which really seems to come out of nowhere.
If the story connected a little better and had a better ending, I would have rated it higher.

DNF at 88%

I tried. I really tried to finish this book. But I just couldn't keep subjecting myself to this torture.

I was drawn to the cover and the promise of a ballet story. And I did get some ballet out of it. But it was overshadowed by all the drama in the life of the characters. The novel was slow-paced and drawn-out, the three friends were not likeable and I didn't manage to make myself root for any of them or even care, to tell the truth.

I was also promised some dark mystery which actually disappointed and felt very anticlimatic.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an eARC of this book.
It depicts the insular world of the ballet and the lives of 3 best friends, what they do to get ahead and the men with whom they get involved. Captivating novel.

Big thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for providing me with a digital copy of The Ballerinas in exchange for my honest opinion.

I've always been fascinated by ballerinas. I had a short-lived attempt at being one when I was 5 or 6, but quickly learned I wasn't coordinated enough. I've had friends who were ballerinas growing up and still dabble from time to time. One of my favorite movies growing up was Center Stage, a movie entirely centered around New York Ballet. There's just something about it.

All I can say about The Ballerinas is wow. What a book. Even though it is a fictional story, I felt like I was reading the real-life account of three ballerinas. It was filled with emotions, description, and was so raw at times. It highlights both the glamorous and the negative. It was certainly a look into the world of ballet.

I would say this leans more Women's Fiction than Mystery/Thriller. There really isn't a mystery to it, but it does have a hell of a twist at the end!

Either way, a fantastic story about the three ballerinas and the Paris ballet.

While I did ballet for 12 years, I wasn't at this level. I do remember some of my classmates going through great lengths to lose and maintain weight. I do remember bandaging my toes, all the lambs' wool, and breaking in a new pair of shoes.

Delphine and her two best friends had been in the same company for years. Delphine had left, after being given a prestigious spot all the dancers covet, and follows a choreographer to St. Petersburg. She finally leaves him and returns home to find that things have changed. In the thirteen years she has been gone her friends have different lives. The are all aging out of the dance program, but Delphine has convinced her boss to let her offer Lindsey the starring role in the ballet she is choreographing. She owes her. Margaux is still there as protective as ever. While Delphine has stayed single, Lindsey is married to a man who adores her and hopes to a father some day to their child. Margaux is married to a woman she loves and desperately wants to have children with, but they are having difficulties.

So many different stories woven into the same narrative, Delphine's story is told in the present and in the past alternating chapters. I love getting to know these women and remembering some of my past as a dancer. I liked getting to know other characters and the effects they had on the lives of Delphine, Margaux and Lindsey.

I was given the opportunity to read this book by NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.

An inside look of the life of a ballerina and the process it takes to make it to become a star. Three young friends who meet along the way and the different lives that they all lead as they all try to make a name for themselves. Learning just how far others will go to succeed and if they have it in them or not!

As a former dancer, I loved this book! I was expecting more of a thriller based on the description but I think this is better characterized as a literary fiction piece. The author does an excellent job depicting the discipline and sacrifice required of professional ballerinas as she weaves through the careers and life choices of the three main characters in the book.

I loved watching these women take ownership over their bodies and their lives over the course of this book.

Delphine’s mother was a prima ballerina. And that’s hard to live up to. Still, she tried. And she was mostly successful except for that may 5% more she needed to be her mom. She needed 5% more grace, 5% more beauty, 5% more talent. She seems to just fall short. Still, she’s one of the top ballerinas in school growing up. And she has two friends, Lindsay and Margaux who she shares everything with.

Fast forward to present day and she’s been hired to choreograph the newest show at her former opera house. And all her friends are there. Should be a good time, right? Except there are a lot of things that we, the reader, find out as we flip back and forth from present day to the past. And while there are good times, there are also times when best friends are secretly enemy rivals, boyfriends are deceitful and intentions are anything but pure.

The Ballerinas is a satisfying tale of female friendship, competition and sometimes revenge. It’s also a cautionary tale to always be careful who you trust, especially when all your friends and lovers, are out for what they want.

Special thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin’s Press for an advanced e-galley in exchange for my honest review. This one is out December 7, 2021.

I requested this book from NetGalley based on the cover. I also loved the description of long simmering rage in women. I was on vacation when I started this book and I read it over the course of a day because it was so engrossing.

Delphine, Lindsay, and Margaux were students in the Paris Opera school from the time they were young. When they graduate they have about a 10% chance of being selected to join the ballet’s corps – if they are lucky. Each year as more advanced spots open up they can audition to move up out of the corps until they face mandatory retirement at age 42.

They story is told in two time frames. The first is their time in school until they move into the ballet company and their first few years there. The second is 15 years later. Now Delphine is a choreographer and not a dancer. She’s been hired to come back to Paris from Russia to choreograph a ballet based on the life of the last Tsarina of Russia. She wants Lindsay for the lead. She feels like she owes her. Why does she owe her? That’s the mystery that is explored in the past timeline of the book.

For a lot of books that would be the plot. This book keeps the surprises coming. The present timeline doesn’t exist just to explain the past. There are some major conflicts here too. How to you come back to a place where you grew up when you’ve been gone for 15 years but most of your friends never left? Can you go home again? And then, just when you think everything is resolved there is a final twist that you didn’t see coming. There is a whole lot going on here but I loved it. I like books that keep me from guessing exactly where it is going to end up.

I learned a lot about the day to day life of elite ballerinas, especially those in training. These characters felt like real women and not stereotypes. In fact the author seemed to actively set up stereotypical situations and then maneuver around them in unexpected ways. For example, there is a young, ambitious ballerina who wants to move up and many authors would have had her be spiteful and mean. In this book she turns out to be sympathetic and supportive of other characters.

There are a lot of dark themes here – rape, domestic abuse, infertility, abortion, injuries, etc. It isn’t a light and fluffy read. But it does draw you in and keep you reading.

I’m not gonna lie, when I first saw what this book was about I wasn’t too excited. This isn’t my usual read but after diving into the book I couldn’t stop reading! I really enjoyed the plot, and the book is very well written.

The Ballerinas is a perfect example of don’t judge a book by its cover. I honestly didn’t think I would enjoy this book as much as I did. I would definitely recommend this to other people. It is a great read.

THIS BOOK WAS AMAZING! SUCH AN AMAZING READ!!! I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN! THE WRITING THE PLOT THE PACE EVERYTHING WAS SO GOOD! WOULD LOVE TO SEE THIS AS A MOVIE OR A SHOW!

Somebody was suffering right in front of me-my friend- and the only thing thing I felt was curious interest." - from The Ballerinas

2.5 stars

So, I feel a little bit in love with this book looking at the cover, and reading the description. The book has an odd sort of split perspective going from present time to the past; but the past is in a sort of present day narration. I don't typically like dueling timelines, but this was I think the worst way to do it, because you never really get transported to the past. I wanted to hear about this friendship between these three women so badly. Most of the characeters are horrible, however. The MC, Delphine, is probably the worst- but Margaux tried to tie for it in the end. (How DARE you!) Delphine wouldn't know how to be a good friend if her life depended on it- see my quoted example. I wanted to cry at what she did to Stella. All the men are worse. Are they friends? No one really acts like it. The only redeeming character is poor Lindsay. As a thriller, it worked even less; the big reveal was such a fizzle gone flat, and the extra twist was almost comical. Was there parts I still enjoyed? Yes. I wished we could have learned more about her Medusa piece, and the newest one. I found the rehearsals the most interesting. and some of her relationship with the MC's mother, which was only breifly touched on.

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher, and the author for a copy in exchange for an honest review.