A Circling Star by Mara Kay

Aniuta is the pert and pretty child of Madame Sheremetyeva servants, at loose ends in a proper Russian househeld until Madame helps her to get admitted to the Imperial Theatrical School in St. Petersburg that trained the dancers for the Bolshoi Theatre. There was an acting division too but it was ballet where the students ate, slept and worked.

Grave Agnia, sly Marussia, earnest Zina, talented Tania, Victorine whose sister was a circus bareback rider, Liev with his musical gifts and his passion to compose a ballet with Aniuta as its star - their lives and fortunes intermingle with Aniuta's to give a detailed picture of a time when classical ballet as we know it was emerging from earlier conversations.