If you are an elementary school aged girl, or otherwise that age and in ballet, Letters to Misty is your jam. From its soft pink and purple cover to the lovely ballet dancer on the cover this book knows its target audience. This is self-help for those young people (mainly girls) who are navigating soft social skills and personal interactions that have the potential to vex people of any age. It might be helpful if you know that Letters to Misty is written by Misty Copeland with Nikki Shannon Smith, but it’s not mandatory.
Letters to Misty is easy to read. It’s a kid’s ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’ if you have a base interest in ballet. It’s not a ballet-centered book. It’s that Misty Copeland is a well-known ballerina. She’s the first African American female principal dancer at the American Ballet Theatre. In addition to that she’s written a handful of books and has earned many awards like Leonore Annenberg Fellowship in the Arts. As a Black woman navigating the already niche area of ballet since the age of 13, she’s received lots of fan mail, as well as, questions from young people.
It’s these questions that make up the backbone for Letters to Misty. The letters are brief and presented in-between snippets of advice where she (or Shannon Smith) spends a couple of paragraphs relating to the youth’s problem and sharing a similar parable. The letters are loosely connected via five chapters, but as this is a ballet-centered author, they’re referred to as dance positions and positively affirming thoughts.
The third position is ‘releve’. It’s the rising of the body onto the balls of their feet. The imagery that we can dig into here is rising above life’s challenges. Copeland writes a letter to the reader here where she shares what rising above difficult tasks means to her. She then segues to imposter syndrome and how she dealt with it in working with new jobs like fashion or writing. There are letters from youth who have come up short in competition, are dealing with burn out, wrangling with social media and grappling with things that every upper-elementary and middle school kid deal with.
It’s easy for your mom or dad to tell you (as a kid) what’s up. However, you probably won’t listen to them. You’ll hear the words that are coming out of their mouths, but you won’t heed the advice, that’s probably correct and certainly well-intended. Our son’s older cousin will say the exact same thing that we advised him about and he’ll look up at him like he’s Gandhi who just came down from the mountain. Parents: it’s frustrating but we were probably the exact same way.
Letters to Misty is exactly what some kids in that younger demographic need to hear and read. If you’re reluctant to read anything with a ballerina on the cover this book won’t be your jam. If you don’t like to read, see: most boys, this won’t be your jam either. For older readers, say those in high school, the letters and helpful tips that Copeland puts forth will be too simple. Those same people might question how many of the letters are real or what percentage of the book Copeland actually wrote, but do not trouble yourself with those thoughts.
This is a book that knows its target audience and sticks the landing. Letters to Misty deals with the soft emotions who are navigating ages eight through twelve and figuring out where they fit in the puzzle. If your child knows Misty Copeland, they’ll know they need this book. It features the letters that they want to write to her, but just haven’t gotten around to it yet.
Letters to Misty: How to Move Through Life with Confidence and Grace is by Misty Copeland with Nikki Shannon Smith and is available on Aladdin, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.
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