Review: Dancing Through It
Jenifer Ringer is a Principal Dancer at the New York City Ballet, and DANCING THROUGH IT is her memoir. It is not, however, strictly a memoir or autobiography of a dancer, it is also a Christian inspirational story. Unfortunately, there are times throughout the story that dancing plays second fiddle to her constant mentions of God and Faith. Religion is not bad in and of itself... but using a book about ballet to preach is a little frustrating to the reader, especially since this book is not labeled as Christian or under Spirituality. There amount of religious references in this book are overwhelming at times, especially in the first half of the book where you can barely read a page without a mention of God.
The blurb for this book also leads you to believe that it will go through Jenifer's struggles through the competitive world of ballet... And yet the book lacks any competition, instead glossing over the stories of her relationship with the other dancers, making it seem as if everyone is one happy family. In fact, Jenifer's rise as a ballerina almost seems too easy: She quickly becomes a top student at her ballet class growing up, is accepted at more than one ballet school in the Washington area, later joins another school in NYC, and then quickly becomes at an apprentice at the New York City Ballet. She becomes a soloist early in her career, and then - after a year's absence from the ballet due to weight issues - she is accepted back with open arms and shortly after becomes a Principal Dancer. It's almost too easy to be believable, and part of that is because Jenifer rarely if ever mentions the actual physical and emotional hardships of being a ballerina.
In the end, I was disappointed with this book. While it has some good sections and the author has some great points regarding the dance world and eating disorders, the overall thread of the book skips over what would actually be interesting to most readers and instead sugar-coats any difficulties the author had during her career.
Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
-------------------
If you enjoyed my review, please help me share it by marking it as being helpful on Amazon. I have included the link to the Amazon review in the Source section at the bottom of this review.
3
5
