1.5 stars

Sinister, seductive, thrilling – a few of the adjectives used to market this debut novel, and all of them disappointingly inaccurate. Dance of Shadows, unfortunately, is not the best defender of company-packaged books.

The start of this new trilogy focuses on Vanessa Alder, a ballerina and student at the New York Ballet Academy. It focuses on the mystery surrounding this elite ballet school, one that involves missing students and their enigmatic choreographer, Joseph Zhalkovsky. It tries More...

"...from the creators of Lauren Kate’s Fallen."

What the fuck did I just read? No really. What was that? It started out great, then the pacing went awry, the writing got terrible, and I started rolling my eyes. A lot. I read books with stupid characters all the time. I read books with ridiculous metaphors and amateurish writing. But I haven't read anything this bad in a long time. It's weird because this book didn't start out all this bad for me. But, like a snowball rolling downhill, it gained speed, and eventually bowled me over with its More...

See more of my reviews sooner on The YA Kitten! I received my ARC from the publisher via NetGalley.

Books about dance are awesome. Books about demons are even more awesome. How could Dance of Shadows, a book about ballet and demons (the literal ones; ballet comes with plenty of figurative demons) and how the two intersect, go wrong? A lot of ways, actually.

Dancing comes with a lot of pressure. Eating right, mastering dances that can often be complicated, not making a fool out of yourself during r More...

»Wir sind eine Schule der Träume. Hier werdet ihr euch in Feen, in Prinzen, in Schwäne verwandeln – in weiße und schwarze –, in böse Königinnen und in Dämonen.«

INHALT
Die New Yorker Ballettakademie verheißt die Erfüllung aller Träume. Für die tanzbegeisterte Vanessa ist sie allerdings noch mehr als das: Sie tritt in die Fußstapfen ihrer begabten Schwester Margaret, die spurlos verschwunden ist. Vanessa hat das unbestimmte Gefühl, niemals an Margarets Talent heranreichen zu können. Dabei hat sie e More...

That cover is fucking gorgeous.

But um..

"From the creators of Lauren Kate's Fallen."

I don't understand. o_o

See more reviews at YA Midnight Reads
That cover O__O I simply fell in love with this amazing cover that captured my heart the second I saw it. Not really pleased with what I got in the end as I had high hopes in liking the book despite the low average rating.

A book of a sinister ballet school and mysterious disappearances of dancers, Vanessa is accepted into the school of Ballet, not only for dancing purposes, but also in search for her missing sister, Margaret. Then Vanessa meets Zep, dark and More...

What an amazing idea( even though it wasn't the author's own idea -_- ), but the romance and stereotype characters ruined the book for me. Hopefully the next book focuses more on Vanessa finding her sister and the demon than the romance. Highly doubt it though.

"The right steps with the right dancer can wreck havoc."

Vanessa’s sister disappeared from the New York Dance Academy, but she’s not the first one. 11 girls have gone before her, and all in the same way. They were told to master an odd dance– La Dance du Feu– before they went missing. Something is wrong, terribly wrong within the 4 ashen walls of the dance theatre and Vanessa must find out, or the world will spin away into the hands of a sinister force as she dances. Mark my words, the disappeari More...

Full review can be found here

Thank you to Bloomsbury Publishing Plc (UK & ANZ) for sending me an advance copy of Dance of Shadows through NetGalley. In no way did this affect my opinion of the book.

When I first read the blurb of Dance of Shadows, my first thought was:
Zep. Justin. Josef. WTF. A LOVE SQUARE. YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. (Also, what kind of name is Zep?)
Now having read the book, all I can say is 1. Thank God it wasn't a love square (although it was still a love triangle -_-) More...

This was one of the largest amounts of time I have ever wasted in my life...not that it took me very long to read. The characters were boring and under developed apart from one, who was not even a protagonist, merely a foreshadowed character who was not given the chance to develop but squashed like a fly. Dance of Shadows was like reading a messed up fanfic of Twilight-I know what you're thinking; Can Twilight get even more twisted and messed up than it is already? Well, as it turn out-yes it ca More...

Originally posted at: Girls on YA Books

~Review:
First...is this book really 447 pages?? Well, I guess that's one way to start off a positive review...This book flew by so fast I had no clue!! I completely submerged in this book not paying attention to the pages (or i this case, percentage finished). I just kept reading until I was done or needed to fangirl or vent on goodreads through status. Second...look at that fantabulous cover!! I don't care what anyone says or thinks...this cover has blown More...

I had incredibly, incredibly high expectations for this, which may have something to do with the absolutely gorgeous cover, so I wasn't very surprised when it just fell flat of them, but I was a bit disappointed.

What disappointed me was how completely...shallow Vanessa was. And not in that personality sense. We never got to learn much about Vanessa really, and what we did learn irritated me. From what we see, she misses her sister, she thinks she knows it all, she's naive, and she's stubborn, an More...

4.5 stars

Dark and intriguing, Dance of Shadows weaves together mystery and suspense with the beauty and danger of this story's elegant ballet. Graced with an appealing storyline, and the mystery behind this story's main character Vanessa, sister's disappearance, this was a book I was hooked with from the moment I started reading it. Yelena Black's third person writing was well crafted, and flowed well never once making it confusing on who was talking and what was going on. I enjoyed being comple More...

The cover.Lets just take a moment to admire it.Done?
Good.
Now it's time for what's inside the book which is less pretty.

The idea of this book is pretty awesome.It really is.But...then came those stereotypes and that annoying thing called lack of plot.And then insistence Barbie people(White of course) are all shallow and self-absorbed and even worse like to make out with their boyfriends.In public.I know sooo bad especially since the MC has a crush on said boyfriend.
But we'll deal with that later. More...

Well. This one was, um... something. Let's just say it took a loooong time to not go very far. If it weren't for the prolouge, you'd have absolutely no idea what direction the book was going in. Missing ballerinas... sold into slavery? Complicated murder plot? Something paranormal?

Nope. Just your average (view spoiler)[demon raising and possession (hide spoiler)].

Seriously. It took over 300 pages to start EXPLAINING THINGS. I mean, if you're going to do a book about (view spoiler)[demonolgy and all that (hide spoiler)], cool. Fine. It could actually be rea More...

Ein bleiches Mädchen, mit roten Haaren, Ballettschuhen und einem Rosenblütenkleid - dies ist das Cover des Buches “Dance of Shadows - Tanz der Dämonen”.
Heute, am 5. Februar 2013, erscheint es mit 380 Seiten im Bloomoon-Verlag.
Geschrieben hat es die amerikanische Autorin Yelena Black, welche nicht nur das Schreiben, sondern auch den Tanz liebt.
Ich danke, von Herzen, dem Verlag, für dieses besondere Rezensionsexemplar.

Die New Yorker Ballettakademie - eine der Eliteschulen!

Nur die besten Tänzerinn More...

A new student at New York Ballet Academy, Vanessa Adler is following in the footsteps of her older sister who disappeared over three years ago and hasn't been seen since. All of Vanessa's new friends are excited to be starting at the school and although Vanessa tries to feel the same way, her thoughts are overshadowed by worry over what may have happened to her sister.

During her investigations, Vanessa and her friends discover that there have been a spate of disappearances from the school dating More...

Ever read a book that was so amazing that you found that you couldn't put it down and you just had to keep reading it to discover what happens and what is going on ? For me Dance of Shadows was one of those stories as it held not only the elements of reality with the main character and her friends being at a ballet school - the NYBRS ( The New York Royal Ballet Society) which we see feature in movies like Centre Stage 1 and 2 and Save the Last Dance 2, but it also mixed the aspect of mythology a More...

Zeppelin like the band Led Zeppelin? Gray like Christian from 50 Shades of Gray? Zep is a nosebleed. Justin is drool. What's with all this sweat?! It's Black Swan gone wrong. It's a case of copy and paste. What is her name (looks at book) Vanessa is like Nick from The Great Gatsby (only because she doesn't belong or move the plot) and Bella Swan from Twilight and Nora Grey from Hush, Hush and every female lead gone wrong. Vanessa is like congestion and constipation. Wait, oh no Yelena didn't! I More...

Read my full review: http://www.iheartreading.net/book/boo...


I rated this book a 2-star total, and I think that’s being mild. I have no idea why anyone even decided to publish this crap. There are tons and tons of potential manuscripts out there that are ten times as well-written as this book, that have characters with actual depth and a storyline that makes sense. Dance of Shadows has neither of those, and yet it was picked up. The book doesn’t even look edited. It has major flaws screaming fro More...

Original review posted on The Book Smugglers

WARNING: this review contains spoilers as well as the occasional CAPS LOCK OF FURY AND FRUSTRATION. You have been warned!

Here, let me start by spoiling this review for you by cutting to the chase: Dance of Shadows is spectacularly bad.

It does actually have a promising premise that mixes the strenuous world of Ballet and a supernatural mystery involving disappearing prima ballerinas as well as demons. Oh premise, you could have been so much fun had you More...

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON HTTP://WWW.TEENBOOKALOVER.BLOGSPOT.COM
Yelena Black
dance of shadows
Dancing with someone is an act of trust. Elegant and intimate; you're close enough to kiss, close enough to feel your partner's heartbeat. But for Vanessa, dance is deadly – and she must be very careful who she trusts . . .
Vanessa Adler attends an elite ballet school – the same one her older sister, Margaret, attended before she disappeared. Vanessa feels she can never live up to her sister's shining reputatio More...

Review courtesy of Dark Faerie Tales

Quick & Dirty: Hauntingly beautiful story with a mystery that will keep you guessing through the whole book.

Opening Sentence: In the harsh glare of the lights, Chloe’s shadow stretched across the stage.

The Review:

Vanessa Adler is a freshman starting at the most elite ballet school in the country, The New York Ballet Academy. Her sister Margret attended the same school but she disappeared 3 years ago and was never heard from again. Vanessa enjoys dancing b More...

This was a book that seemed really scattered for the first 80% (sorry...read on Kindle) of this read.

The elements of which I speak are:

1. The mystery surrounding Vanessa's older sister Margaret. You have to wonder why her mother let her go to the school that her sister disappeared from? There are some serious plausibility questions surrounding this plot line choice.

2. The mystery surrounding the disappearance several other girls at the school. There is just the "they dropped out" excuse. A litt More...

Dance of Shadows by Yelena Black is a YA novel featuring the (imaginary) New York Ballet Academy and a demon.

Vanessa's sister Margaret, three years older than her, went to aforementioned dance academy and, shortly before she was supposed to play the lead in the school's production of The Firebird, she disappeared. The school told her parents she had run away or that she might be dead. Vanessa doesn't believe Margaret would have run away, though, nor does she believe she's dead. A ballerina like More...

Mystery, romance, danger and a taste of the supernatural behind the scenes at the world’s most elite ballet academy…

I was attracted to this book by two things. First, the fact that the central theme is the ballet – having spent my early years up to the age of 18 in leotards and ballet slippers it’s a world I was eager to revisit. Second was the cover, which promised mystery and drama.
On both counts, I wasn’t disappointed. Yelena Black does an excellent job of drawing you into the world of the b More...

Maybe 1.5, at times. Okay, yes, the cover is GORGEOUS, but . . . .

I kept thinking that the inspiration for this novel had to be the movie BLACK SWAN, maybe with a dash of ROSEMARY’S BABY? Just didn’t work. Maybe people mad for ballet PNR will squeal with delight, but that doesn’t seem like a big demographic.

Vanessa is a freshman, but she is going to be on her own at the New York Ballet Academy to study and perform. Luckily, some of her dorm-mates are straight out of GLEE, instant best friends of More...

Overall, I quite enjoyed this book. I think it's got a great premise, and most of the time the author did a really good job of making everything fit together. There were a couple of things that annoyed me, such as amateurish writing, and a couple of things that could have been altered to produce a slightly more polished story. Fortunately, these things did not generally ruin my enjoyment of Dance of Shadows, although I did feel a teensy bit unsatisfied at the end of the novel.

The ending felt qui More...

Die New Yorker Ballettakademie bedeutet für Tanzbegeisterte die Erfüllung aller Träume - für die junge Vanessa ist sie allerdings noch mehr als das: Dort tritt sie als Schülerin in die riesigen Fußstapfen ihrer älteren Schwester Margaret, einer Ausnahmetänzerin, die vor drei Jahren spurlos verschwand.

Vanessa ahnt nicht, dass er begonnen hat, der Tanz auf dem Vulkan...

Das traumhafte Cover hat mich verzaubert, noch bevor ich wusste worum es eigentlich geht. Doch leider konnte der Inhalt nicht so g More...