Audiobook5 hours
Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina
Written by Elaine Deprince and Michaela DePrince
Narrated by Allyson Johnson
Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
Michaela DePrince was known as girl no. 27 at the orphanage, where she was abandoned at a young age and tormented as a "devil child" for a skin condition that makes her skin appear spotted. But it was at the orphanage that Michaela would find a picture of a beautiful ballerina en pointe that would help change the course of her life.
At the age of four, Michaela was adopted by an American family, who encouraged her love of dancing and enrolled her in classes. She went on to study at the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School at the American Ballet Theatre and now dances for the Dutch National Ballet.
In this engaging, moving, and unforgettable memoir, Michaela shares her dramatic journey from an orphan in West Africa to becoming one of ballet's most exciting rising stars.
At the age of four, Michaela was adopted by an American family, who encouraged her love of dancing and enrolled her in classes. She went on to study at the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis School at the American Ballet Theatre and now dances for the Dutch National Ballet.
In this engaging, moving, and unforgettable memoir, Michaela shares her dramatic journey from an orphan in West Africa to becoming one of ballet's most exciting rising stars.
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Reviews for Taking Flight
Rating: 4.534482862068965 out of 5 stars
4.5/5
58 ratings5 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Her story is very inspiring. I really enjoyed listening to it! She’s a testament to the power of strength, love, sharing, and dedication to your chosen field.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is a beautiful and inspirational story. Michaela Deprince’s passion is astounding.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I was really moved by Michaela DePrince's story as shown in the documentary, First Position. It's been wonderful watching her career take off with her move to HET National Ballet Company. I kept my eye on the American release date for this book and bought it the day it was released. I had a few hours yesterday so I sat down and read it cover to cover. It's heart wrenching and victorious. Her struggle in Sierra Leone as little more than a baby to discovering what it is to be a minority in a mixed family in the United States and finally what it means to break barriers of color in the professional ballet world. Miss DePrince is much to be admired and this book reveals a young lady still figuring it out. I hope all the best for her and I continue to watch her wonderful career as a dancer unfold.
Read the book and then pass it on. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The memoir is easily my favorite genre - I find the lives of other people endlessly fascinating. Some stories seem to stay with me long after I’ve turned the last page. “Taking Flight” is one of those stories. To say that Michaela DePrince is an extraordinary young woman feels somehow inadequate, there don’t seem to be adjectives strong enough to capture the strength, courage, and determination that is revealed in her story.Michaela, born in war-torn Sierra Leone, was an only child. She lost her father in a rebel attack where he worked in a diamond mine, and her mother died only months later due to an untreated illness. At only three years old she found herself alone in the world and living in an orphanage after her only relative, an uncle, rejected her. At the orphanage she wasn’t called by name but by number. There was very little food and no medical care. She quickly learned to adapt to this situation. For a small child to be able to maintain her sense of self and any level of personal value is truly remarkable.Michaela was one of the fortunate orphans to be adopted. Upon arrival in the United States she was diagnosed with a severe case of tonsillitis, “The doctor told my mother that if I had remained in Africa another day or two, the infection would have spread through my body, causing sepsis. I surely would have died.” Michaela’s parents saw not only to her basic needs but also supported and encouraged her intellectual, athletic and artistic growth - especially her love of ballet. Michaela’s passion for dance and her talent promise a bright future. Although, she is faced with seemingly insurmountable obstacles. She rises above the limitations others try to place on her again and again. To read this compelling story of her journey through the world of professional ballet is to be inspired.Note: Michaela DePrince is one of six dancers featured in the documentary “First Position”
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is a remarkable story - not only rags to riches, but starving to fed, abused to loved, endangered to safe. Michaela DePrince, born in Sierra Leone, war orphan and refugee, finds a ballet magazine at her orphanage and that treasure changes the entire trajectory of her life. She is adopted and adored by a white American family that has lost three hemophiliac sons to HIV. Her parents adopt four more West African daughters. They do everything in their power to make the girls feel secure, and yet all five are haunted by "debils", the child soldiers who raped and killed. Every loud male voice sends them fleeing. And yet they become swimming champions, ballerinas, and musicians.Michaela also has vitiglio, a skin condition that causes loss of skin color in blotches. Happily, this does not prevent her from dancing with the ART, Dance Theatre of Harlem, and currently in the Dutch National Company. In a world where appearance is everything, where parents of white ballet students claim that her body is too "athletic" for ballet, she triumphs. Michaela and Misty Copeland, another black ballerina, have recently shared their inspiring stories. Hopefully, classical ballet will seek out and promote black female dancers (black males are more plentiful in these companies) to be their swans, Dew Drop fairies, and firebirds!