STEP LIGHTLY

This debut collection of short fiction by Klym, a former professional ballet dancer, explores the lives of expert and novice dancers to reveal how the art form channels the power of self-expression.

In a brief introduction, the author describes his background as a dancer (he studied at New York City’s School of American Ballet) and tries to articulate how dancing and composing stories intersect for him: “When I write, I dance,” he states. He describes the relationship between writer and reader as a partnership—one that’s aided by growing familiarity. In “The Ballet Class,” an amateur ballerina in her 40s observes that her classmates are a motley but lovable crew. In “The Belly Dance,” Karla, a woman faced with a stalled marriage, turns to a belly dancing class, which teaches her the moves that she needs to spark a new sexual rapport with her husband. As a writer, Klym is clearly drawn to formal variance; as a result, these stories feature braided narratives, bulleted lists, step-by-step guides, a faux product disclaimer, and a dessert recipe. The author also freely uses section titles, which provide crisp packaging for vignettes that, read quickly, create a sense of swift movement through time and theme. The story “Pavlova,” for instance, unfolds in newspaper clippings, diary entries, and a mysterious, aforementioned recipe to tell the story of a dessert dish so potent that it summons the ghost of its namesake—legendary Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova—and physically transforms any dancer who eats it. Klym has an accomplished command of narrative voice. In “A Professional Male Ballet Dancer in Twelve Steps,” he succinctly captures the tone and diction of a child: “your parents took the leaves you collected and ironed them between pieces of waxed paper. You said you loved the smell.” The book runs into trouble with its dialogue, however, which is often too wooden and prosaic to seem believable: “You put body, mind, and soul into the entire process,” Karla’s husband in “The Belly Dance” says, “but cooking and eating are not the same thing as loving.” The author’s clear passion for dance enlivens the 15 tales, but he sometimes bends over backward to coin a new phrase that expresses its importance, as in the story “Origin”: “A state of eloquence encased in a spark of spontaneity, Dance set the world in motion.” Klym frequently mentions the difficulties that dancers face, such as stereotypes regarding sexuality, problems of body image, and the physical and mental tolls of performance and training. Despite this, some of the stories here lack any tension at all. In “The Ballet Class,” for instance, the climax occurs when a character’s ex-girlfriend unexpectedly shows up, but the end still fizzles. In “The Belly Dance,” Karla lies in order to join a class for pregnant women, but this complication never transforms into something interesting. And “Origin,” a creation myth of cartoonish grandiosity, never allows readers to access the emotion at its core. 

An uneven set of tales but one with plenty of bright spots.