Pointe, Claw

by Amber J. Keyser

Overview

Jessie Vale dances in an elite ballet program. She has to be perfect to land a spot with the professional company. When Jessie is cast in an animalistic avant-garde production, her careful composure cracks wide open.

Meanwhile, her friend Dawn McCormick's world is full of holes. She wakes in strange places, bruised, battered, and unable to speak. The doctors are out of ideas.

These childhood friends are both running out of time. At every turn, they crash into the many ways girls are watched, judged, used, and discarded. Should they play it safe or go feral?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781467775915
Publisher:	Lerner Publishing Group
Publication date:	04/01/2017
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.30(h) x 1.20(d)
Lexile:	620L (what's this?)
Age Range:	13 - 17 Years

About the Author

Evolutionary biologist-turned-author Amber J. Keyser has a MS in zoology and a PhD in genetics. She writes both fiction and non-fiction for tweens and teens.

Her young adult novels include Pointe, Claw (Carolrhoda Lab, 2017), an explosive story about two girls claiming the territory of their own bodies, and The Way Back from Broken (Carolrhoda Lab, 2015), a heart-wrenching novel of loss and survival (and a finalist for the Oregon Book Award). She is the co-author with Kiersi Burkhart of the middle grade series Quartz Creek Ranch (Darby Creek, 2017).

Her nonfiction titles include The V-Word (Beyond Words/SimonTeen, 2016), an anthology of personal essays by women about first-time sexual experiences (Rainbow List, Amelia Bloomer list, New York Public Library Best Book for Teens and Chicago Public Library Best Nonfiction for Teens) and Sneaker Century: A History of Athletic Shoes (Twenty-First Century Books, 2015), among numerous other titles.

Her forthcoming books include Tying the Knot: A World History of Marriage (Twenty-First Century Books, 2018) and Underneath It All: The History of Women's Underwear (Twenty-First Century Books, 2018). More information at www.amberjkeyser.com. Connect with Amber on Twitter @amberjkeyser.

Editorial Reviews

★ 02/20/2017
Jessie Vale studies ballet at a prestigious preprofessional program at the Ballet des Arts in Portland, Ore., and the 17-year-old has the blisters and bloody feet to show for it. Vadim Ivanov, the company’s principal male dancer, announces that he’s putting together his own piece, and Jessie has been chosen to be a part of it. Jessie initially chafes at the animalistic, avant-garde piece but soon begins to thrill to the adult Vadim’s attention and touch. Meanwhile, Jessie’s childhood friend Dawn struggles with increasingly severe blackouts and the strange pull of a captive bear. Jessie and Dawn’s separation at age nine was traumatic, and their reunion, initiated by Dawn’s mother, ushers in a metamorphosis for both young women. A former dancer, Keyser (The Way Back from Broken) deftly explores the bonds of love and friendship, and the grueling world of ballet. It’s easy to picture Jessie exploding in a riot of frenzied grace, and Dawn’s war with her own body and mind is heart wrenching. Alternating between Dawn and Jessie’s perspectives, Keyser’s writing shimmers with raw emotion and empathy, and her finale, much like in dance, is poetic, bittersweet, and life affirming. Ages 13–up. Agent: Fiona Kenshole, Transatlantic Literary. (Apr.)

Publishers Weekly

"It is a book of contrast and counterpoint . . . . Lines blur as the story develops, save for the knife-sharp ferocity of two young women locked in an empowering duet."—starred, Booklist

From the Publisher

2017-01-17
Two teenage girls fight for their dreams and their sanity in this intense novel about the pressures society places on women to be perfect.Dawn, a 17-year-old white girl, copes with mysterious fugue states while enrolled in a prestigious online school program that guarantees her a spot in next year's Stanford freshman class; her former best friend Jessie, also white, dances in an elite Portland, Oregon, ballet school from which only two students will be selected to join the company. Unraveling the mystery behind the girls' broken friendship is part of the novel's driving force. Keyser uses animal imagery in both protagonists' alternating narratives to focus attention on the ways that society simultaneously exalts and denigrates women's bodies. The girls' hypervisibility and physical vulnerability are omnipresent, from the street-level windows through which male passers-by lasciviously watch the ballerinas perform to the impersonal manner in which doctors discuss Dawn's body in an effort to diagnose her. The narrative is appropriately dark, but the intensity of the physical imagery that juxtaposes human desire for control and animal primitiveness occasionally feels forced rather than the organic product of teenage thought and situations. The short, clipped sentence structure occasionally makes the girls sound too similar despite their differing personalities. A novel that despite its flaws viscerally evokes struggles of modern teenagers in a brutally authentic manner. (Fiction. 14-18)

Kirkus Reviews