num_pages: 256
description: The extraordinary memoir of Michaela DePrince a young dancer who escaped war-torn Sierra Leone for the rarefied heights of American ballet. Michaela DePrince was known as girl Number 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 is currently a member of the Dutch National Ballets junior company. She has appeared in the ballet documentary First Position as well as on Dancing with the Stars Good Morning America and Nightline. 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.
language: English
title: Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina
publisher: Knopf Books for Young Readers