Between Worlds is a series of dance novels or anyone who loves dance and the arts. It’s the story of a 14-year-old girl who uses dance to cope with upheaval in her life.
Between Worlds 1: The Move
Can a sketchbook from the past help Juliana move forward?
Tap dancer Juliana moves across Canada with her parents to care for an ailing grandfather. Cut off from her friends and surrounded by strangers, she becomes overwhelmed by the whirlwind of changes dancing around her. Unable to cope, Juliana escapes to her grandfather’s basement, where she discovers a family treasure: her great-grandmother’s sketchbook.
Europe’s great war has ended, and Tata has gone to America in search of work. His absence leaves Mammi toiling away in the family’s shoemaking workshop and eldest daughter Elisabeth in charge of her siblings and the long list of household duties. With Christmas on its way, siblings who won’t listen, and a list of chores that never seems to end, Elisabeth fears that drawing in her sketchbook and praying to God aren’t enough to help her survive these changes.
When life feels like it’s spiralling out of control, these teen girls from different times must find ways to adapt and create peace in their new normal. But are their lives really that different, even though they live generations apart? Elisabeth’s sketchbook in hand, Juliana embarks on a life-changing journey to find out.
The Move is the first book in Lori Wolf-Heffner’s contemporary/historical series, Between Worlds. If you love history, the arts, and family ties, pick up a copy of The Move today and enjoy a story that crosses generations.
What Dance Means in These Dance Books
Growing up, any dance movie I watched revolved around “making it,” but part of me knew that wouldn’t be my future, despite a few attempts at professional auditions. Dance novels I read had the same theme. I wanted to write the series of dance novels I was missing in my youth, one where the protagonist loved dance but infused her life with it.
Dance is woven into Juliana’s everyday life in this series of dance books, from dance class to practice at home to competition.
Although she sometimes debates a professional career as a dancer, that goal is not the reason Juliana dances. Dance is her outlet and sometimes even her way of understanding the world. So even when she’s not dancing, she’s seeing how she can live dance. That’s what makes this a series of dance novels.
Dance has filled my life with so much meaning and beauty, but aside from a few years of teaching dance in my 20s, I never turned professional. You can dedicate your youth to dance without planning to have a professional career, and that’s the philosophy of dance in Between Worlds, my series of dance novels.
