New series of children's books about ballet

[JaneL]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this (not sure it really counts as ballet news! And I thought that most of the members with young children are probably posting in this section). Anyway please move it if this is the wrong place (or if showing off isn't permitted!).

 

Having said that, I am pretty much posting this just to show off:

 

I'm writing a series of children's fiction set in a ballet school! The three books will be published next year by Usborne. More info here, plus a cringey/cute photo of me as a six year old in a tutu!

 

http://usbornepublishing.tumblr.com/post/98878063205/ballet-stars-on-worldballetday

 

Maybe some of your little dancers will like them when they're out next year. For now, I'm having the BEST time writing them

[Pups_mum]

Best of luck with that Jane. My DD is older than your target audience but I am sure she would have enjoyed your books when younger.

As a matter of interest, are there going to be any male characters? Just been reading the thread on difficulties faced by boys and it occurred to me that boys seldom feature in children's literature about dance. Maybe there is a hole in the market that you could fill?

[Dance*is*life]

Yes there was one book about a boy dancer I loved - A Proper Little Nooreyev.  There is definitely a gap there to fill.  Good luck Jane - I loved your photo in the tutu - it was so calm and regal for a little one!!!  I shall look forward to buying your books for my Great Nieces!

[JaneL]

Thank you Pups_mum and Danceislife!

 

The main character and her two best friends are girls but there are boys in the class that they're friends with too and I hope that I'm portraying it as normal for boys to be doing ballet, even if they are mostly in the background as the main parts of the stories will focus on the three girls.

 

Danceislife - Proper Little Nooryeff is by Jean Ure, who wrote a lot of ballet stories. I LOVED that one (and also Hi There, Supermouse and especially Star Turn - the first in the series about Karen and Jessamy). 

[alison]

First gymnastics, now ballet!  Congratulations, Jane - looks as though your writing career is really taking off!  (I shall have to go back and reread some of your earlier creations - always assuming I can ever get back on That Site )

[JaneL]

Thanks Alison   Hahaha, I read some old writing recently and CRINGED. All very cliched and I was shockingly bad at dialogue. But I was only about 16. Some of it still exists on the internet but most of it's lost because it was saved on a floppy disk (!!!) and I don't think there's any way back to That Site... it must be nearly 10 years since I was there.

 

I have to say I am in total heaven getting to write about ballet AND boarding school - those were my favourite types of books when I was a child. 

[alison]

Thanks Alison   Hahaha, I read some old writing recently and CRINGED. All very cliched and I was shockingly bad at dialogue. But I was only about 16. Some of it still exists on the internet but most of it's lost because it was saved on a floppy disk (!!!) and I don't think there's any way back to That Site... it must be nearly 10 years since I was there.

 

I have to say I am in total heaven getting to write about ballet AND boarding school - those were my favourite types of books when I was a child. 

 

That Site is still there: I've just gone and looked - I was thinking about it only the other day, actually, since it was the beginning of October.  If I'm feeling particularly masochistic one day, I might try and battle to get logged back in there, but certainly not at the moment, when it's taking me about 5 minutes to download any page!

 

Your second bit reminds me of a book I once read, about a girl who was at some sort of ballet boarding school (but definitely not White Lodge).  I know I bought it at a school fair one year, and I'd guess it dated from the 50s.  I can't remember much about it now, except that one of the heroines(ish), due to injury or something, ended up being given Prayer in the final act of Coppelia.  Amazing what you can recall at times, isn't it?  (Wish I could actually recall what I was supposed to be doing on the Internet tonight apart from posting on here, of course!)

[JaneL]

 Amazing what you can recall at times, isn't it? 

 

And what you manage to forget: it took me a good while to figure out the significance of October 1st!

 

That book doesn't ring a bell so I think it must be one I haven't read - it wasn't one of Lorna Hill's Wells series was it?

[Fiz]

Or Drina Dances?

[Loulabelle]

Drina Dances was one of my favourites!

Not that I can remember the story at all, must have read it 35 years ago, but I can remember the picture on the cover was a photo of girl in a white tutu. I think she was kneeling, my mm then went on to copy her tutu for me. ????

Edited October 3, 2014 by Loulabelle

[Fiz]

Does anyone else remember A Circling Star by Mara Kay? She was an American writer who wrote a very good novel called Masha about a group of young girls at the Smolni Institute for impoverished Russian noble girls. Star was about a young girl at the Marinsky at the end of the last century. I loved it but it is now out of print and any copies go for hundreds of pounds secondhand!

[JaneL]

Ooh that sounds good, Fiz. I haven't heard of that before!

 

Not written quite so long ago, although undoubtedly very dated now as they were pre-internet, but I loved Mal Lewis Jones' Dance Club series. She had another lovely series set in a vocational ballet school but I can't remember what it was called. All I remember is there was a character called Odette. There was also an American series called Scrambled Legs about a group of girls who were forced to take ballet lessons and hated it but became great friends so they carried on dancing so they could hang out together.

[Fiz]

Our eldest loved Scrambled Legs.

[Lisa O`Brien]

The very best of luck with the books,Jane.

[JaneL]

Thank you, thequays!

[scoobydoo]

I am scoobydoo's DD, and I have read your first book, I think you are an amazing author and I can't wait to read your next book. ????????????

[JaneL]

Hi

 

Thanks so much for reading my books! I'm so pleased you enjoyed the first one and I hope you like the second one just as much. I've just finished working on the third book and I'm excited for you to read that one too when it comes out in August!

 

Jane x

[Petalviolet]

Just to let you know my DD is getting Perfect Piroutte for her birthday on Friday :-)

[JaneL]

Hi Petalviolet,

 

Oh wow, thank you! I hope she enjoys it! And happy birthday to your daughter

 

Jane

[Dance*is*life]

Just wanted to say that I ordered Perfect Pirouette (ostensibly for my Great Nieces) but of course I had to read it myself first and I loved it!  Well done - really good book - very true to life........

[JaneL]

Thank you so much, that's really lovely to hear! I'm glad you enjoyed it and I hope your great nieces will too!

[pas de chat]

Does anyone else remember A Circling Star by Mara Kay? She was an American writer who wrote a very good novel called Masha about a group of young girls at the Smolni Institute for impoverished Russian noble girls. Star was about a young girl at the Marinsky at the end of the last century. I loved it but it is now out of print and any copies go for hundreds of pounds secondhand!

I know I wanted to buy it for my DD as it was my fav book as a child but it is so expensive to get a secondhand copy!

[alison]

On 02/10/2014 at 22:06, JaneL said:

Some of it still exists on the internet but most of it's lost because it was saved on a floppy disk (!!!) and I don't think there's any way back to That Site... it must be nearly 10 years since I was there.

 

Let's see if this works on this site:

 

@JaneL

To judge by the number of recent notifications I've had from usernames I don't recognise, I suspect That Site may have been opened up to the public again

[Fiz]

A Circling Star has been reprinted in paperback and I actually own a copy now.