Customer Reviews

Dancer

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Danielle Ferris
English Per. 5A
Dancer

The book Dancer , written by Lorri Hewett, in my opinion was a great book! I think one of the main reasons why I liked it so much is because I am and dancer myself. That's not the only reason I thought it was so good though. It was also the author wrote the book and how it was about a girl who felt like an outcast and what it was like to do something different from everyone else and be completely different from most people.
The book Dancer is about the main character Stephanie Haynes. Stephanie takes ballet classes everyday of the week. She takes it very seriously. She's also very good at it. Stephanie basically devotes her life to ballet. This book takes place in a small rich town called Cherry Hill in Colorado, in present times. The reason I know it was present times is because Stephanie and her friends do most of the same pastimes as teenagers now a days do.
Stephanie goes to a private school on a scholarship. Her father is a janitor at the school. She doesn't have very many friends at school only one girl who she knows from dance class. She's sort of an outcast because she's really quiet and doesn't hang out with anyone at school and when she's not at school she's at ballet class. Stephanie likes ballet because it gives her something special that she does different from anyone and she's good at it too. Also at Stephanie's school there is the popular girls: Gillian, Lisa and Kelly. Gillian used to be like Stephanie. Her and Stephanie are probably the only black girls in the school but when Gillian moved there she hung out with the popular girls and ignores Stephanie. Stephanie kind of feels embarrassed when she's around the popular girls.
Then one day she meets him, Vance. He starts taking classes at the dance academy. At first Stephanie doesn't really like him but when she gets to know him things sort of spark up. She starts hanging out with Vance more often. She also meets his Aunt Winnie. His Aunt Winnie used to be a dancer in Germany. Her dream was to be in the NYC ballet but at that time blacks weren't allowed to dance in NYC. Stephanie starts taking classes with Ms. Winnie on Sundays. Vance usually joins them. Ms. Winnie starts creating a dance between Vance and Stephanie. Ms. Winnie is sort of Stephanie's role model and inspiration.
Stephanie and Vance start spending more time together and Stephanie gets aggravated because Vance won't open up to her and she's nearly in tears because of her parents. That's another thing Stephanie's parents don't understand how important dance is to her and her dad keeps pushing her to look at colleges and she gets in a lot of arguments with her parents.
One day Stephanie is at school and she goes into the bathroom and hears some one coughing under the stall. She peeks under and sees that it's one of the popular girls. It turns out that she took a lot of her mom's pills the night before and was really sick. Stephanie helps her get help and get to a hospital.
Then Stephanie finds out that Vance wants to quit ballet because he really likes club dancing, but he doesn't know how to tell Ms. Winnie and he wants to drop out of the summer recital. But he can't because he's the prince in Sleeping Beauty and he's the only boy for the part so Stephanie convinces him to wait until the end of the recital to talk to Ms. Winnie.
I liked this book a lot and I would recommend it to teen girls who enjoy reading about the ways of a girls like and what some girls go through. I also liked how you could relate to Stephanie's problems. They weren't like un- real problems. I also like the ending it was a real shocker. Read this book and find out if Stephanie gets to live her dream of becoming a dancer in the American Ballet Company!

Set in Denver in the early 90's, Lori Hewitt's novel The Dancer is a touching love story, in which two African-American ballet dancers meet at a ballet class and fall in love. The main chararter, Stephanie, dances six days a week and loves every minute of it, but her parents think that it's just a hobby and that she should stop dancing so much and go to Stanford. They say this because they know that there aren't many black ballet dancers. Stephanie soon learns that there will always be someone better then you and that you should shoot for the stars no matter what. Stephanie has always been the best dancer in here studio and has been there a long time but is tossed to the side when a skinny white girl comes in and takes the dancer instructors eye. Stephanie is notice by a black dance instructor during class and is taken under her wing. Throughout the book she often goes to her house without her perants permission. Her parents aren't very supportive of this either and think she is spending too much time with her too. "Stephanie people just don't give dances lessons and not expect to be paid," Stephanie's mom often say this and Stphanie would reply, "Miss Winnie (her ballet teachers name) believes in me and thinks I'm talented, why can't you try to understand that?!" This book shows tells you that you should live your dreams and that there mayt be obsticles in the way but you should overcome them and love your dreams. I wouls defineately reccomend this book and I give it 5 stars.

I loved this book! I seriously couldn't put it down! The story was superb, the characters were great and the way the author writes lets you picture everything going on!

Stephanie is a black ballet dancer in training. Her parents are "plain, boring, ordinary" people. Her dad is the school janitor, and her mom sits at home.
She then meets a woman named Miss Winnie, who has a nephew named Vance. Miss Winnie was a black professional ballet dancer, and Vance is very arrogant and un-motivated but is an amazing dancer. Miss Winnie believes in Stephanie even though her parents are pleading for her to quit ballet. She shows Stephanie that even though she doesn't fit the "peeled apple skin tone" of a "perfect dancer" she can be great.
"I can't believe for you, but I can believe with you" Miss Winnie said.
Meanwhile, Vance gets the lead role in the dance acadamey they both attend's ballet, Sleeping Beauty. Stephanie is falling apart over how he doesn't seem to care, how he hates Miss Winnie, how he loves her (she loves him too) and how her parents want her to quit. A popular girl at her school wants to be her friend, but stephanie catches her intoxicated in the school restroom. A new girl, Anna, enters the ballet acadamey. She is the image of a perfect dancer, and Madam Caroline chooses her for Sleeping Beauty over Stephanie.

Stephanie's life is falling apart when she needs hope the most.
"There will always be dancers better than you," Madam Caroline said. But is that really true?

This book was especially touching because I am black and I do ballet a lot just like Stephanie. My parents don't like it, but I am the only person who believes in myself right now.

Please read this book. It will show you into a whole other world of hope and need and love and feeling.

When I first picked up this book, I was a little skeptical. I was not a dancer, had never been a dancer, nor had conjured up the plans to become one in the near future. I sat down to read the novel and more than once wondered what I was doing with such a book. It was not the typical writing genre I enjoyed, but with personally knowing the author, I stuck with it nonetheless.

As the pages flew by, I found myself becoming exceedingly engrossed in Stephanie's world. I felt her pain when she continued to face setbacks from both her parents and herself as she pursued her dancing, but I also felt her jubilation when she excelled.

Dancer is wonderfully written and very true to life. Being a teenager myself, I sat in awe as I realized that I had no trouble accepting the typical teenage lifestyle Hewett painted as fact.

The connection between Stephanie and Vance I thought was a powerful one, and perhaps a little unconventional. Most of the books I've read have had a different chemistry than the one Stephanie and Vance shared, and I was relieved to find a change of pace. They both possessed the talent to dance, but Vance felt more pushed into it than Stephanie did.

I thought that the relationship between Winnie and Stephanie was engrossing, especially when the reader is hit with the realization that maybe Winnie has been planning to turn Stephanie into her all along.

This book portrays the idea that being an African-American dancer is no small feat, and Hewett backs this core theme up several times throughout the novel. For this reason I found the book far more impacting, especially when Stephanie makes it as a dancer when even she begins to have doubts.

By the end of the story, I still wondered what I was doing with ballet book in my hand; however, my skepticism was gone and I was left with no regrets. Dancer is an amazing book that pushes people to strive for their goals, even when they might have to defy everyone who stands in their way. It conveyed a powerful message and left me grinning when I finally closed the cover.

This novel is so easy to relate to if you are a teenage ballerina. Stephanie, a sixteen year old loves ballet to bits. She chases her dream through struggle. Her dad is anti ballet as he thinks its better to have a better career and her mother is the same. The lady who really captures her admiration is Ms. Winnie, a retired dancer. Her nephew, Vance also knows how to do ballet and the pair make a great pas de deux couple. Read this fabulous book to feel part of the world of ballet.

This book is about a 16 year old girl who has a dream like most teenagers. She is a black ballerina who wants to find her place in a world which she thinks is really different from her world. I recommend this book especially for those people who have dreams and also have a hard time believing in themselves. It is a good book for 11 to 14 year olds about a teenager's world divided between school, dance classes and home.

I really loved this book not just because I am a dancer but its a really good story line. The author paints a picture in ever scene so it's almost like your right there with the main characters. It was so real it had the same impact to me as a movie. After I read it I could remember scenes and relate it to my personal experience and it felt like a real movie!

I love this book! Every ballet lover will too! The author portrays a very realistic look at the life of a teenager, the peer pressure, trying to be "cool" etc. Definitely a must-read!

I'm 11 years old and I love dancing. I really liked this book, it is filled with love, ballet, and you might be able to relate with it. It is about a teenage girl who loves dancing, but her parents don't want her to become a dancer. She meets Ms.Whinnie who is encouriging her and then she meets Ms. Whinnie's nephew Vance. He is a dancer too, but he doesn't like ballet as much as he does freestyle. Vance and Stephanie start dancing together and Stephanie loves it. She loves Vance. She starts spending alot of time with Ms.Whinnie and her parents don't like it. Stephanie is a very good student, but she doesn't have any friends, she meets one of the only other black girls in her school who is really popular and she becomes friends with her. In the end Stephanie gets what she wants........