When money gets tight, three adopted sisters (Pauline, Petrova, and Posy Fossil) take to the stage to earn their keep. Pauline soon shows talent as an actress, and Posy as a dancer, while Petrova holds on to her dream of flying planes. The story follows their successes and struggles as they strive to uphold a vow to put their names in history books. In Anne Raverat's debut novel " Lover", the main character mentions how she first fell in love with reading at age "seven with Ballet Shoes" and that she "didn't know" who she wanted to be more out of the three sisters (p.267, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017).

Gum Great-Uncle Matthew Brown, an elderly geologist and professor, who finds the three sisters during his travels. Gum is Sylvia's great uncle and later guardian after her parents die. The girls and Sylvia go camping. Mr. Simpson comes to tell them that Pauline will be auditioning for a movie, Charles In Exile. She gets the part, but finds film acting difficult and initially dislikes it. After the filming, Pauline and Petrova act in a pantomime of Cinderella. Even with the money from the film and play, Sylvia cannot afford to keep their house, and decides to sell it. Dr Jakes and Dr Smith. Note Dr Jakes’ tie and short hair which indicates that she is a forward-thinking New Woman Recently I found quite a lot of books I should have read while a teenager or younger. I now have a good collection of "missed" books. The other thing which is very much of its period is that poor Sylvia has been left on the shelf. She’s quite a young woman, probably in her mid-twenties when the book opens but, towards the end of the book, Nana notes sadly that her hair is going grey and that her face is lined with worry. We realize that Sylvia is one of the generation of young women whose possible future husbands were killed in World War I.

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a b "Ballet Shoes dances onto BBC One". BBC Press Office. BBC. 20 July 2007 . Retrieved 30 November 2009. Noel Streatfeild doesn’t go into the bathroom facilities but the lodgers would have had a common bathroom, comprising bath, wash basin and lavatory, together with a separate lavatory and wash basin. Times when they could have a bath would have to be negotiated between them. Remember the scene in "You've Got Mail" where Colleen Kelly (Meg Ryan) is sitting in the children's section of the newly-opened Foxx Books, and a customer comes in looking for the "Shoes" books by Noel Streatfield? The clerk has clearly never heard of them, but Colleen has, and she tells the customer that "The Ballet Shoes" is definitely the one she should start with... The story is that of three young girls, a few years apart, who have been taken in by Mr. Matthew Brown (Uncle GUM). Pauline is the oldest and was lost at sea after her and Uncle Gum's ship sank. Nobody knows what's happened to her parents. Petrova, the second-oldest, is the daughter of Russian high-borns that fell on hard times after the Revolution and died. Posy, the youngest, is the daughter of a dancer who couldn't take care of her. Ballet Shoes: A Story of Three Children on the Stage (first edition). Library of Congress Catalog Record. Retrieved 22 August 2012.

It was just a right book in every way. Right message, right characters, right plot. Everything was perfect. Some books just create the Christmas mood, even if they are not entirely about Christmas. Winifred A fellow student at the Children's Academy. Though considered the best all-round pupil at the academy, she often loses major roles on account of her plain looks and inadequate clothing, the latter a result of her large family's poverty. Winifred is both a particular friend and rival of Pauline.The Shoes books are mentioned in the film You've Got Mail by Meg Ryan's character, a bookstore owner.