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From Kirkus

November 1, 2024
Valby's young readers' adaptation of her 2024 adult title of the same name describes how five trailblazing Black women broke color barriers in the world of ballet. There is no more quintessentially American story than that of the birth of the Dance Theater of Harlem. Mentored by George Balanchine himself, Arthur Mitchell became New York City Ballet's first Black principal dancer. After Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, Mitchell vowed to build a school where Black people could thrive in a predominantly white art form. His extraordinary vision was built on the backs of five ballerinas--Lydia Abarca, Gayle McKinney-Griffith, Sheila Rohan, Marcia Sells, and Karlya Shelton--whose triumphs, tribulations, and journeys toward sisterhood make this story compulsively readable. Valby's chronological account alternates among the women's perspectives, detailing the prejudice that they battled within the company and in the dance world at large. She also doesn't shy away from exploring Mitchell's own internalized racism and misogynistic treatment of his dancers, even as he urged them on to greatness. Prima ballerina Abarca became Mitchell's muse and was feted and celebrated, yet she struggled under the intense pressure to be perfect. This collective biography presents an unflinching portrait of the problematic perfectionism still pervasive in ballet, while joyfully celebrating a sisterhood of dancers who made an indelible mark by demonstrating the beauty of Black bodies to the world. Unfortunately, the work does not contain a source list. A poignant and gripping piece of little-known history. (index)(Nonfiction. 14-18)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Booklist

Starred review from October 15, 2024
Grades 7-12 *Starred Review* During the COVID-19 lockdown of 2020, five former dancers reconnected over Zoom to form the 152nd Street Black Ballet Legacy Council, determined to preserve the groundbreaking work and immense talent of Arthur Mitchell's Dance Theatre of Harlem (DTH). These women--Lydia Abarca, Gayle McKinney-Griffith, Sheila Rohan, Marcia Sells, and Karlya Shelton--were among its founding or early company members, yet history did not remember their names. Valby, a white journalist with two Black daughters involved in ballet, took notice of the Legacy Council and knew it was time for these women to resume their places in the spotlight. Structured in three acts, like a ballet, this powerful account is part cultural history, part biography as it traces the formation, rise, and decline of DTH through the experiences of these five ballerinas, as well as their continued importance to dancers of color today. The book's introduction states, "Black excellence is not a one-off but a spectacular ongoing fact," and the ensuing narrative underscores this truth over and over again through the astonishing accomplishments of these dancers in their own rights as well as in conjunction with the racism and colorism so ingrained in the world of classical ballet. While dancers and Misty Copeland admirers are the obvious audience, this will appeal equally to fans of forgotten histories, such as Hidden Figures (2016), by Margot Lee Shetterly.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Library Journal

September 1, 2024

Journalist Valby (Welcome to Utopia) reveals the little-known story of the Dance Theatre of Harlem, its domineering but brilliant creator, Arthur Mitchell, and five of its most prominent ballerinas. Valby shares the stories of the troupe's three founding members--prima ballerina Lydia Abarca; Sheila Rohan, a mother of three; and Gayle McKinney-Griffith, a Juilliard-trained ballerina--along with Marcia Sells and Karlya Shelton, who moved across the country to join the group. Through their resilience and determination in the face of racism, injustice, and societal pressures, these women left an indelible mark on the world of ballet. Narrator January LaVoy performs the bulk of the narrative, introducing the dancers at the barre and describing their journeys as they took flight. LaVoy's careful, elegant speech captures the dancers' struggles while keeping the interwoven stories clear and concise. The credits include the dancers themselves as they recall their stories after leaving the company. During the COVID shutdowns, the former dancers joined together to become the legacy council of the 152nd Street Black Ballet Legacy, preserving their stories for future generations. VERDICT Valby's groundbreaking narrative is a heartening and heartfelt account of women who strove for and achieved art at the highest level.--Laura Trombley

Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Booklist

April 15, 2024
In spite of their accomplishments, Lydia Abarca-Mitchell, Gayle McKinney-Griffith, Sheila Rohan, Marcia Sells, and Karlya Shelton-Benjamin, founding and first-generation members of the Dance Theatre of Harlem, were hidden figures in the written history of American ballet. At the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, they formed the 152nd Street Black Ballet Legacy Council and began meeting on Zoom to celebrate their shared history and reclaim their roles in dance history. As Shelton-Benjamin told Valby in the New York Times article that became the inspiration for this book, "There's been so much of African American history that's been denied or pushed to the back . . . we have to have a voice." All of their voices are heard in this engaging and insightful collective memoir. Although these ballerinas came from different backgrounds, they were all trailblazers in a dance world devoid of diversity. Their individual stories are woven into a powerful narrative of professional triumphs and personal challenges that celebrates Black excellence in ballet. Anyone who appreciates dance will be enriched and inspired by the stories of these five intrepid dancers.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From Library Journal

February 1, 2024

In this biography already optioned by Netflix through a competitive auction, Valby tells the forgotten story of a pioneering group of five Black ballerinas, detailing their historic, glamorous careers and their enduring friendships, along with a glimpse into the world of professional ballet. With a 100K-copy first printing. Prepub Alert.

Copyright 2023 Library Journal

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

From Publisher's Weekly

Starred review from January 15, 2024
Vanity Fair contributor Valby (Welcome to Utopia) paints a vibrant portrait of the "first permanent Black professional ballet company" in the U.S and the five trailblazing dancers who put it on the map. Originated in 1968 by George Balanchine protégé Arthur Mitchell, the Dance Theatre of Harlem featured "founding" ballerinas Lydia Abarca, Mitchell's "prized" dancer who later landed on the covers of Essence and Dance magazines; Sheila Rohan, who performed while running a household and raising three children; Juillard-trained Gayle McKinney-Grffith, who served as the company's "ballet mistress" and later taught choreography for the 1978 film The Wiz; Marcia Sells, who joined the company at just 16; and Karlya Shelton, who stepped in with little notice to star in the 1978 production of Serenade. The company shattered artistic boundaries even as it strained under financial pressures, the whims of the brilliant yet tyrannical Mitchell, and an old guard media that favored more renowned-and more white-troupes. Valby meticulously untangles the prejudices woven into the dance world and analyzes the politics of establishing a Black ballet company amid a period of backlash to the civil rights movement ("Let the gorgeous lines of his dancers' bodies serve as fists in the air," she writes of Mitchell's mission). In the process, Valby successfully counters the perception that Misty Copeland was the "first" Black American ballerina. The result is a captivating corrective to an often-whitewashed history. Agent: Barbara Jones, Stuart Krichevsky Literary.

From Kirkus

January 1, 2024
A journalist uncovers the forgotten legacy of a group of pioneering Black ballerinas. In 1969, Arthur Mitchell--"the first Black principal dancer" of George Balanchine's famed City Ballet--"formally incorporated" the Dance Theatre of Harlem, writes Valby, an Austin-based journalist and former EW writer. Begun in the shadow of Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination, the theater's purpose was to "once and for all prove that a person's skin color was irrelevant to their right or relationship to classical dance." To this end, Mitchell recruited and trained a collection of talented Black ballerinas, including Lydia Abarca, the company's prima ballerina, who dreamed of one day buying her parents a house; Sheila Rohan, whose widowed mother had raised her on Staten Island; and Gayle McKinney-Griffith, Marcia Sells, and Karlya Shelton, who left their Connecticut, Ohio, and Colorado families (respectively) to try to make it in the world of New York dance. In its early years, the theater grew thanks to the talent, strength, grit, and ingenuity of these remarkable women, who, in a time of intense racial inequality, earned standing ovations on European tours and solicited donations that would keep the company afloat for decades to come. Together, they weathered Mitchell's tyrannical training techniques, colorism, and sexual harassment, all of which complicated their idolization of the man they credited with the success of their careers. Valby, "a white woman with two Black daughters who are dancers themselves," is a skilled storyteller with an eye for significant details and thematic complexity. While her decision to begin and end the book with Misty Copeland's widespread misidentification as the first Black prima ballerina detracts from the dynamic, tumultuous, and inspiring journey of the five central ballerinas, the book is deeply researched and full of heart. A rich, detailed, and complex history of Harlem's first prima ballerinas.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

From AudioFile Magazine

January LaVoy's smooth and expressive voice is a perfect match for Karen Valby's history of America's first Black professional ballerinas and the Dance Theatre of Harlem, founded in the late 1960s. These five women cracked open the door that Misty Copeland would dance through decades later. LaVoy is a master at conveying the emotions wrought by the exacting standards of their sometimes dictatorial teacher, as well as the racism they faced in ballet and everywhere else. The women formed a tight unit that survives to this day. It's the many small details of their lives, along with LaVoy's performance, that paint a vivid picture of each dancer. A nice touch is the occasional voices of the ballerinas themselves (one of whom recently died and is voiced by her daughter). A.B. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine