Author, teacher, and former principal dancer Gavin Larsen has spent her post-performance life doing something she loves just as much as dancing: drawing stories out of other people. Her new book, Infinite Steps: 33 Dancers and Their Lives in Ballet, grew out of a collaboration with longtime ABT staff photographer Gene Schiavone, who wanted the dancers behind his archive of images to be truly known, not just catalogued.

In this conversation, Gavin sits down with us to talk about what surprised her while interviewing 33 dancers across generations and companies, why she thinks the Plan B conversation puts unfair pressure on students, and what she believes is the real cost of a ballet career that doesn't get talked about nearly enough. Hint: it's not the blisters.

She also shares her take on the job market then versus now, what parents consistently get wrong, and why she finds it genuinely hopeful that kids keep walking into plain rooms, leaving their phones outside, and putting their ballet shoes on.

Infinite Steps is available now wherever books are sold.

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Music from #Uppbeat: https://uppbeat.io/t/ian-aisling/new-future License code: MGAW5PAHYEYDQZCI