A promising young ballet student cannot afford to continue lessons when her Chinese grandmother emigrates from Hong Kong, creating jealousy and conflict among the entire family. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.

Yep fumbles with this strained tale about an 11-year-old girl who yearns to dance. The star of her ballet class, Robin Lee has to give up her lessons at Madame Oblamov's academy when her mother imposes a draconian budget on the household, in order to save enough money to bring Robin's grandmother from China to the Lees' home in San Francisco. Robin gamely practices on her own, stuffing her feet into outgrown toe shoes and dreaming of her return to ballet school, but tuition money isn't available, even after her grandmother finally moves in. To make matters worse, Grandmother blatantly favors Robin's younger brother. In a forced parallel, Robin damages her feet (those too-small toe shoes), and only Grandmother can understand her determination to dance anyway: Grandmother's feet were bound in childhood and, despite immense pain, she unbound them in adulthood as a way of embracing modern values. A lot of the characterizations here verge on stereotypes: the indomitable Chinese matriarch, the unstoppable young artist with a dream, the impoverished but noble-hearted Russian ballet mistress. Combine this with the adults' extremist stances (Mom won't even let Robin keep the $20 her other grandmother sends for Christmas), and the novel reads as a lengthy contrivance. Ages 10-14. Copyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Gr 4-8-Yep once again explores the hazardous terrain that separates a Eurasian girl from her Chinese mother and grandmother. At 11, Robin has found her life's passion: ballet. Then she learns that her high-minded, impecunious parents can no longer afford lessons, now that they are bringing Grandmother over from Hong Kong. Refusing to give up the world she loves, Robin continues to practice in the garage on a cement floor, wearing toe shoes she rapidly outgrows. Meanwhile, Grandmother arrives, limping painfully with the aid of two canes. Though Mother forbids any mention of her disability, Robin's ignorance about bound feet strains credibility. The girl's wary hostility toward the old woman who so disrupts her life turns to active dislike, and then to understanding when she sees her uncovered damaged feet. Andersen's story "The Little Mermaid," awkwardly patched into the narrative, symbolizes the determination to transcend pain shared by Robin and her grandmother. The parents' inattention to their daughter's damaging practice sessions seems contrived to further the plot, and the murkier depths of mutilation in the cause of beauty are never sounded. If Robin's self-knowledge seems unnaturally mature, it is because she is telling about her emotions rather than letting readers feel them. This said, Robin's final epiphany, using the book's symbolic title to great effect, is genuinely felt, and genuinely moving. An appealing story that draws readers into the world of ballet while offering an authentic and sometimes amusing look at the dynamics of Chinese-American family life. Margaret A. Chang, North Adams State College, MACopyright 1996 Cahners Business Information, Inc. From: Reed Elsevier Inc. Copyright Reed Business Information

Gr. 5-7. Robin, 11, is a gifted dancer, and she bitterly resents having to give up her ballet classes to help her parents pay for her lame grandmother to come from Hong Kong to live with them in San Francisco. To make things worse, Grandmother treats Robin with contempt. But when Robin discovers Grandmother's terrible secret--her grotesquely mangled broken feet--their relationship suddenly changes. Chinese foot-binding is dramatic social history, but the contemporary fiction is contrived, with purposive dialogue and coincidences and heavy metaphors. Robin's feet begin to hurt because she practices ballet on concrete floors with too-tight shoes; and, in case we still don't get the parallel, she reads the story of the brave little mermaid who wanted to walk even though it hurt. Yep has written novels with considerable depth and subtlety about the Chinese American experience, but here we get only glimpses of Robin's interracial family and her neighborhood friends; they never quite come together as people in a story. As in Yep's Hiroshima (1995), it's the fact that's compelling. (Reviewed January 1 & 15, 1996)039922906XHazel Rochman From: Syndetics Solutions, Inc. Distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.