This was a great book, that really put your in Russia in the ballet world during very tumultuous times. I loved the back and forth stories between the sisters and their connection to each other. This was a really good book.

I truly enjoyed this novel, and am surprised to learn it is the author's debut. The story hooked me from the start, and the dynamic of the sisters' relationship felt true-to-life. I especially appreciated the way the author was able to connect events meaningfully throughout the story. The narrator was good but came across as being a bit detached at times.
Overall, it's a really good book, and I will looking forward to Durham's next.

Thank you NetGalley and HarperAudio Adult for allowing me early access to the ARC audiobook edition of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.

I got completely lost in Maya & Natasha. The world of Cold War Soviet ballet is intense, and this book drops you right in the middle of it. Twin sisters, abandoned at birth by their ballerina mother, are raised to follow in her footsteps at the Vaganova Ballet Academy. Their dream is to dance for the Kirov, but a new law changes everything—only one of them can go. That moment shatters everything between them, setting off a story of ambition, betrayal, and survival as they each take drastically different paths.

I’ve always been fascinated by ballet, and this book captures its beauty and brutality so well. The training, the politics, the sacrifices—it’s all so vivid that I could almost feel the sore muscles and blisters myself. And layering that with Cold War tension made every choice feel even heavier.

This one’s for anyone who loves historical fiction, stories about complicated sisterhood, or just getting completely absorbed in a different world. Absolutely loved it.

Thanks to HarperAudio Adult and NetGalley for the ARC!

4.5

I absolutely LOVED this book! Such a cool and new subject matter - twin sisters who are ballets dancers in Russia. The book shows their lives when they were young and in a Russian state dance academy to how their lives twist and turn during the lead up to the Cold War. I adored the relationship and undeniable love between the sisters - amidst betrayal.

I cannot believe this is a debut book! Elyse Durham has a great, engaging writing style. I will be following her career and can't wait to see what else she releases.

On reread I think it would be a 5 star book. (The only reason it's not this time around is because I was a little confused by all of the characters. I blame postpartum mom brain!)

Thank you NetGalley and Mariner books for this advanced readers copy.

Everyone knows it is difficult enough to become a professional ballerina with a top company, but imagine having your chances dashed simply by being who you were born. In Elyse Durham’s historical fiction debut, twin sisters dancing in Cold War era Soviet Union learn that only one of them can be accepted into the elite Kirov ballet company. The reason why? The Kirov plans to travel abroad to America, and it is feared that family members traveling out of the country together may choose to defect together.

This certainly sets the tone for the dark and serious eponymously titled novel Maya & Natasha. While the Soviet Union may be at war with the United States, sisters Maya and Natasha are at war with each other. Raised at the Vaganova Ballet Academy after their mother, also a dancer, committed suicide soon after they were born, the sisters’ love for ballet comes only second to their love for each other.

But as they enter their last year at the Vaganova, tensions grow between the twins, especially after they learn that only one of them has a chance at making the Kirov. Natasha, the fiery and more compelling dancer, is thought to be a shoo-in, but Maya has spirit and is not giving up the fight yet. However, when she learns a surprising secret about her sister, and discovers that her odds of ever besting her are low, Maya makes a desperate choice that changes the course of their lives forever.

Maya & Natasha is a stark ballet story steeped in the bleak and ominous vibes of the Soviet Union regime. There is no doubting the setting of this story, as it screams “Soviet Union,” and communicates just how oppressed and controlled the people of the country were. While American ballerinas may dance for themselves, their Soviet Union counterparts must dance for their country with little autonomy in their own lives.

While Maya & Natasha is incredibly informative to read, especially as an American, it isn’t the most engaging or compelling story. Author Elyse Durham has said that she loved exploring the omniscience third person style of writing because it allows her to get into the heads of multiple characters, but I personally dislike it for the level of disconnect it puts between the characters and the reader. Furthermore, while ballet is threaded throughout this novel, it is only the first part of the book that really focuses on Maya & Natasha as young dancers, with the rest of the book detailing their lives as adults. While parts two and three of the book provided a lot of information about the state of the Soviet Union, it wasn’t told in the most interesting way.

The audiobook of this novel comes highly recommended as an alternative to reading Maya & Natasha, as narrator Yelena Shmulenson provides the correct pronunciation of the multitude of Russian words used in the story.

In all, Maya & Natasha is a mixed bag of a novel. The book has a gripping first third, which describes the rivalry between warring sisters, who despite the competitiveness between them, desperately love each other; yet the latter parts of the book falter. 3.5 stars.

This was a well written historical family story. Really enjoyed learning about a different place and time period- and lifestyle. The complex characters and their relationship was intriguing. Narration was very well done.

Maya and Natasha isn’t a book I’d typically pick up, but I’m glad I did. It’s a well-crafted historical fiction that had me looking up historical facts as I listened. The story follows the lives of Maya and Natasha, twin sisters whose lives and that of those around them are affected by historical events, secrets and connections across continents. The narration was well-suited to the content, An interesting view of twin sisters during this time in history. As the emotion builds in the story I think the narrator could have a bit more emotion for certain portions but overall I think this is worth the listen.

*** BOOK REVIEW ***

Book available now!

Maya & Natasha are twins who follow in their late mother’s footsteps living in the world of ballet in Russia during the Cold War. There is drama, intrigue, scandal, everything you’d expect in the world of ballet. This story is a karmic representation of how far one will go to acquire their dreams no matter the consequences and definitely puts a unique “spin” on historical fiction. It was certainly an interesting perspective on the Cold War and a very entertaining storyline. The audio was done very well! Overall this one got a strong four stars from me and definitely recommend for historical fiction lovers!

Thank you #netgalley, the publisher and the author for gifting me this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley for an ALC. This book was absolutely fantastic. It was everything I wanted it to be. Dramatic, heartbreaking, redeeming. There was a super fascinating author’s note at the end explaining all the research she did and how she included real people as characters as well as characters based on real people. I was truly sad when it ended.

"Once, she'd thought that being bound to others was a kind of slavery. But a life lived in the sole pursuit of your own happiness was a life without love, and being free from love wasn't freedom at all--it was slavery to yourself.... Now she understood that love could be an anchor."

Orphaned twins Maya and Natasha have trained all their lives to be ballerinas with the goal of dancing side by side and traveling the world with the famed Kirov Ballet. But during their last year of school, the government decides that only one member of a family may travel at a time to ensure that the other member will not defect. This means that one of the twins will not be accepted into the Kirov. That announcement pits the twins against each other. As a dancer, Maya has always felt herself inferior to Natasha. Maya is quiet and mousey, whereas Natasha is outgoing and vibrant. Natasha dreams of defecting to experience true freedom, whereas Maya is content with success as defined and rewarded by the Soviet state. No one would anticipate the lengths to which the twins will go to thwart the success of the other.

The author weaves real life events and figures into the novel with atmospheric writing that captures the grey and gloom of Cold War era Russia. I enjoyed the peek into the world and competition of ballet. One twin is caught up in the making of a state sponsored movie of War and Peace, which felt like a metaphor for the twin's relationship. I was astonished that this was a debut novel, because the writing seemed that of a sage author. In my opinion, the writing style was reminiscent of Amor Towles and I enjoyed the fact that one scene takes place in the Metropol Hotel, immediately reminding me of A Gentleman in Moscow. I'll definitely be looking forward to what this author writes next.

First I'd just like to give a quick shoutout to NetGalley and HarperAudio Adult for giving me a copy of the audiobook. I enjoyed alternating between listening and reading the e-book.

I've spent the last week going over this story in my head, struggling to figure out what to rate this. Let me preface this by saying that I don't usually read historical fiction and I don't remember a lot of what I learned in history class. I went into this pretty blind on the setting and the time period, leaving me slightly detached from the story. Despite this though, the setting was rich and descriptive; especially so with the audiobook. I found myself curious about this time period and wanting to know more about the history that went into this book. When I looked into this, I discovered just how much of Russia’s history was put into this book.

Part one follows the sisters during their last year at the Vaganova Dance Academy. On the first day of classes, they recieve news that due to a new law, only one of them would be allowed into the elite dance company the Kirov. This is where a wedge starts to be driven between the sisters. After years of going after their dream together, it has now become one twin versus the other. As their relationship dissolves, we see how each twin changes as they begin to develop a sense of themselves outside of being the others twin.

Part two follows the sisters after they've left Vaganova. This part of the novel, you can't truly appreciate unless you know the history behind Russia’s adaptation of war and peace that was produced between 1961 and 1967. Inspired by watching this film herself, the author Elyse Durham incorporated the production of the film into her book. She made this section as true to real life as she could, even including little details and events that the actors and production crew experienced. I'm amazed by the amount of research and details that went into it. She wanted to immerse the reader in Russia during the Cold War and she definitely succeeded. I could fully imagine these scenes and found myself looking into information I didn't know, just so I could fully appreciate this book.

Where I struggle to give a rating is with Part three of the book. I will say that Elyse Durham perfectly tied up this novel during this section of the book, but I found myself at times bored and rushing to get to the end. It felt like less time was spent with this section of the book compared to parts one and two.

Overall though, this was a stunning read and has really piqued my interest in historical fiction. This was Elyse Durham’s debut novel, but I will be checking out any books she releases in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley and HarperAudio Adult for providing this book, with my honest review below.

I am not usually a fan of audio books (the pacing usually doesn’t keep up with me and I am best with visuals to engage, or a combination of audio and visuals). That said, I was committed to reading Maya & Natasha after reading its premise and hearing some great early reviews of the Audiobook. While I can’t change how I’m wired, I can vouch that the story here is so interesting and the narrator so excellent that I was able to largely follow along.

I love a good book involving the ballet and this one is a strong addition. Maya and Natasha are twin daughters of a ballet dancer who passed after their birth in Soviet Russia. As the two follow in their mother’s footsteps in dance, their close relationship is shaken by jealousy and betrayal and war within themselves. The things these twins did to one another were heartbreaking to read about knowing that they are the closest people that will ever be in the other’s lives. The best I can describe this was as both a history lesson or history based and a ‘can you believe Elizabeth Taylor in her youth’ type of scandal that I could not get enough of.

As mentioned, the narrator is amazing, her tonal changes for voices but the consistency and lack of abrupt switches kept this reading smoothly, and that’s in addition to that gorgeous voice I could use as both ASMR and still not losing the story. Highly recommend this beautiful audiobook and novel that is somewhat a play on history (bonus points for the author’s note outlining fact vs fiction and what’s in between at the end).

As a lover of ballet, I enjoyed the background in this book. I thought this was well written and believable and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an audio copy of this book! I really enjoyed this historical fiction depicting a pair of orphaned twin sisters in the 60’s-80’s Russia and not only what it was like to grow up there, but also to be a dancer that represents their country. It was definitely eye opening to learn about the conditions over there. I don’t know what it’s like to live there today, but would be curious to see how it compares. The sisters’ relationship was contentious for most of their lives, despite living with invisible strings tying them together while they were apart physically. They always wished they had better relationships with each other which was sad but also beautiful to read about, and although i felt it dragged on a bit at the end i did almost cry at the conclusion!!

Maya & Natasha is the story of twin daughters of an up and coming ballerina who dies by suicide immediately after their births. They grow up raised in ballet culture. This is historical fiction novel that would be enjoyed by those who enjoy Russia and communist societies, the ballet culture, or the relationship between twins.

This is one of those books that will stay with me for a long time. I listened to the audio version and was captivated from the start. The narrator did such a great job of bringing the story to life. The characters are rich and well developed and imperfect in a way that makes them human. I feel like it was a great example of how trauma is ongoing, and impacts people differently. The ending wasn’t neat, which worked because life isn’t neat, and I have been thinking about it ever since. If you love historical fiction, especially Soviet stories set in the Cold War era, this book is spectacular.

Maya and Natasha are twins, born in incredibly harsh circumstances, and raised their whole lives to be top ballerinas who represent Russia. When they reach the point in their training where performing around the world in Russia’s top ballet school is in sight, they receive the news that, due to a new law, only one family member may join and go abroad. This leads to hard choices, deception, and betrayal.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the alc.

Unfortunately, this book did not hold my interest. I am dissappointed because the premise sounded really good.

Every reader of historical fiction has places and times that they gravitate towards, and one of mine is Russia. I have always been fascinated by ballet, and combined with a view of what went on behind the Iron Curtain and the complex family dynamics that these twins shared, I couldn’t hit the request button fast enough.

To start with, I’m so glad that I read this as an audiobook. The narrator, Yelena Shmulenson, read this beautifully. She has the kind of pleasant voice that makes it easy to listen for long periods, and she pronounced the Russian words and names in the story perfectly, yet still had no detectable accent in English, not even using any type of regional terms. You know, like how they say “y’all” down south and “yous guys” in Jersey? She sounded like a native speaker for both languages, which isn’t always easy to do. However, her wonderful narration couldn’t outweigh some of the other things that I didn’t love as much about the book.

It follows the tale of a set of twins girls who was born on the eve of the siege of Leningrad to a ballerina mother who orphans them just after birth. The two girls are raised by a close friend of their mother, but there’s a weird thread of the friend having a crush on the girls’ mother, but aside from giving her the impetus to take care of her friend’s newborn babies, it was mentioned multiple times and didn’t really create any movement or further the plot.

Despite being twins, there are some significant differences between them and the trajectory of their lives. They’re both brought up in the shadow of the great Kirov Ballet, and dream of becoming ballerinas. Growing up in the Vaganova Ballet Academy, the sisters practice and learn together, but it isn’t long before one outshines the other. And while they’re dreaming of being accepted to a ballet tour in America, the Soviet law dictates that only one family member can go abroad at a time for fear of defection.

For two girls who share everything except an equal amount of talent, it becomes clear which sister is going to be heading to America, and the other sister isn’t satisfied to stay in her sister’s shadow anymore. I was shocked at the lengths one of the sisters went to in order to sabotage her own twin. And I wasn’t surprised at all by the reaction of the sister who was sabotaged.

The girls grow from infants to young women, and readers get to see them change over the years. And while they’re completely different women, the voices of Maya and Natasha blended together for me. I kept having to remind myself which sister was which, because they didn’t really have anything else to differentiate their chapters. I was more invested in one sister than the other, but both of them wound up being morally gray. However, it isn’t their fault necessarily, the government pitted them against each other, and under a totalitarian dictatorship, individuals didn’t get a say in their own fates a lot of the time.

Overall, this had so much potential to be an outstanding book, yet it never quite reached that. I had a really hard time with how similar the thoughts of both sisters were, and hoped that it would get better as I got further in the book. It didn’t. This was a fantastic expedition into Soviet Russia, and the way the state controlled every aspect of people’s lives, and how the people resisted when they were able to get away with it. You might enjoy this if you gravitate towards: fiction involving Soviet Russia, ballet, dance, and the complex bonds of family when they come up against the rules of the state.

What a well done debut novel! The research and history woven through the book was incredibly well done. The story of twin sisters, caught in the complicated world of Cold War Soviet ballet. The sisters become competitors, both vying for the chance to go to America and to leave Russia. The story is about betrayal, love and life during a challenging time. Told in alternating points of view, this book flowed seamlessly. The character growth was done wonderfully. The descriptions in this book were truly incredible - I truly felt as if I were watching a movie unfold. The historical aspect of this book was woven into the story in a way that only added to the book. This is an emotional story that will be with you long after you finish reading it. I look forward to future books by this author!

Thank you netgalley for my advanced reader copy.