BookBrowse Reviews The Dance of the Dolls by Lucy Ashe

BookBrowse:

The Dance of the Dolls features the world of early British ballet, brilliant description, and multiple fascinating characters.

Twins Clara and Olivia Marionetta (née Smith; they chose far more glamorous stage names) are at the forefront of a groundbreaking artistic movement. As dancers with the Vic-Wells Ballet — which will become the modern-day Royal Ballet — in the 1930s, the sisters are part of one of the first established ballet companies in Britain. Though the setting they are in is one that will become iconic, and though the novel takes place against a backdrop of pre-World War II fears, Clara and Olivia's story, with its thrilling twists and creeping character development, focuses primarily on the personal anxieties, victories, and threats they encounter. Lovingly researched by former ballerina and current English literature teacher Lucy Ashe, The Dance of the Dolls is full of brilliant description and the deep inner thoughts of multiple fascinating characters.

Particularly because Clara and Olivia's chapters are in first person, Ashe is able to show the stark differences between the girls, whose physical similarity as identical twins is remarked upon time and time again. Clara wants excitement and adventure beyond the confines of a ballet barre, whereas Olivia's focus on en pointe perfectionism masks her hunger for proving that she can shine on her own, instead of just as one of a set of two. When a Russian choreographer attends their company rehearsal armed with a ballet he smuggled out of his former country — the dark comedy Coppélia, about a scientist who tries to steal the life force of men to fuel a doll he has created as the perfect daughter — the twins are suddenly in competition with each other for a role.

Although Clara and Olivia are primarily focused on their artistic careers, both are forced to contend with male attention they would rather avoid. Clara feels constricted with her beau, who has become more and more controlling since they met. Olivia, meanwhile, is faced with a mysterious admirer who always seems to be lurking around the corner when she least expects it. These men only know Clara and Olivia the ballerinas, without showing much interest in getting to know them as people.

Two other characters whose points of view are elaborated upon through their own chapters are Samuel Steward, apprentice to a shoemaker whose craft includes the pointe shoes for the Vic-Wells Ballet, and Nathan Howell, the company pianist whose adolescence as a child prodigy mars his current existence, which he considers mediocre at best. Both men's chapters are in third person rather than first, though Ashe maintains a narrative voice that allows readers access to their inner thoughts. Samuel is drawn to the beauty of the ballet, and to one of the dancers in particular, as he searches for excuses to hand-deliver his creations in order to sneak a look at the company. Nathan is more concerned with the glitz and glamor of the London arts scene and becomes obsessed with having the perfect ballerina on his arm. Ashe expertly subverts readers' expectations about these men's roles in the twins' lives, culminating in the final thrilling twists. From the prologue, the author implies one male character's role in a kidnapping attempt, but whether it's the character that readers may have guessed is only revealed in the last third of the novel.

The one downside of the multiple points of view throughout The Dance of the Dolls is that much of the story occurs in a tight space of time — though the book itself stretches through several months, the action on the page concentrates on the same performances, the same parties, and even the same conversations between characters' chapters. This makes it somewhat confusing to follow the plot, as the thread becomes tangled and readers see the same situations playing out repeatedly. If the chapter headings included dates, times, and locations, this may have been allayed; as it stands, the narrative thread is usually easy enough to pick up again, though the format does somewhat disrupt the page-turning urgency warranted by Ashe's thriller.

Regardless of any confusion brought on by multiple narrators, each point-of-view character is more than strong enough to hold their own. In fact, there are other characters whose points of view are not explicitly written — including some borrowed from history to outfit the novel — but whose presences are so compelling that Ashe could certainly write more from their perspectives. Yet this book's beating heart is the experience of Clara and Olivia. Their impenetrable bond has clearly been cemented even beyond the usual closeness shared by twins, and each moment of contact between the two feels lived-in and real — perfectly broken-in, like a pointe shoe should be.

This review was originally published in The BookBrowse Review in September 2023, and has been updated for the September 2024 edition. Click here to go to this issue.