My Goodreads review:
| Daphne Kalotay has written a beautiful novel about life in Stalinist Russia. Through the lens of a Bolshoi ballerina, the reader is taken on a journey of hardship, starvation, tragedy, love, and hope. Nina rises to the top to become a principal of the Bolshoi but just as her career peaks, Stalin's harsh grip on Russia finally becomes inescapable for Nina. As she witnesses tragedies all around her, her world collapses. Told from the perspective of an older Nina, now bound to a wheelchair, who is selling off her gorgeous Russian jewels, we learn of the many secrets of her past. Included in those secrets is Grigori, a Russian poetry professor who assures older Nina that their lives are intertwined. I really enjoyed this novel but my one complaint is the abrupt ending. You come to love these characters and to have the story stop so suddenly feels wrong. |
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