When Linda Stone, a wallflower living an average life in Boston, receives a mysterious package, her life suddenly changes. So far she has led the normal, even uneventful life of a teenager about to graduate from high school practically unnoticed. She lives with her father, Jack, and her dog (also named Jack); her mother died right after she was born. When her father is not conducting his trains along the Boston lines, he spends his days in a ratty robe watching television. Far from enjoying a meaningful father-daughter relationship, Linda has practically raised herself. Too tall, lanky, and sporting size 11 feet, Linda is awkward and shunned by her peers.
In One Dance in Paris, Julia Holden writes an enchanting tale of a young woman who discovers herself through her mother. The package she receives contains a few unusual items which set her on a journey to Las Vegas and eventually the City of Lights, Paris, France. One of her mother’s old friends finds her through the Internet and introduces her to exciting world of Folies Bergere. Linda’s mother was a dancer in Folies, a beautiful woman who mesmerized thousands every night on stage. She had become legendary, and after first performance, she was known as La Gazelle.
After finding Dixie, her mother’s best friend, she travels to Paris to find more details about her mother’s life in Folies. Through some mishaps, happenstance and searching, she finds her way to the Folies theatre. She met Madame Renaud, her mother’s loyal confidante and matronly figure. In Paris, her “ugly duckling” disposition slowly falls to the wayside as she begins to blossom as an identical replica of her mother. Working with the past manager of Folies, she learns the same solo dance and is being groomed to become the next La Gazelle.
Holden’s writing is quick, witty and lovely to read. She has a style that entices readers to keep moving forward, and her short chapters are a refreshing change of pace from the usual long chapters. Her novel is a story of one young woman’s search for excitement, romance, and self identity. Holden is also the author of A Dangerous Dress.