Ballet Shoes (Shoe Books) (A Puffin Book)

by Noel Streatfeild

Pauline, was rescued from a shipwreck as a baby. She longs to be an actress. Petrova, is a Russian orphan. She is happiest when playing with cars and engines. Polly was handed over with just a pair of ballet shoes to her name. If she could, she would dance all day! But one thing they DO have in common is, that with money running out at home and Great Uncle Matthew missing, the sisters want to stay together. Whatever it takes. As they prepare for a dazzling life on stage, the dreams and fears of the fossil girls are about to come true...

• ISBN10: 0394908759
• ISBN13: 9780394908755
• Publish Date: 1 November 1954
• Publish Status: Out of Print
• Out of Print: 28 September 2021
• Imprint: Random House Trade
• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English

Reviews

[wyvernfriend]

A long-running favourite of my youth, I was inspired to re-read this when I saw the 2007 BBC version of this I decided to hunt up my copy to re-read. This is the story of three sisters, collected by a fossil hunter (GUM or Great Uncle Matthew) and left with his niece Sylvia (aka Garnie for Guardian) and her Nanny and assorted servants. The three grow up, finding themselves very poor. They take in paying guests to make ends meet and these people help the three girls with their education. One of the things that they do to help is have the girls enrolled in a stage school where at least two of them learn skills useful for their future. They go through trials and tribulations and have to make some very adult decisions through the story.

It's a kids' story so some things are skimmed rather than explored in real depth but there is a lot more depth in this than you find in many stories and it's interesting to see the empowering qualities of this even at it's age. I have to wonder did we progress much since this interwar story.