Ten Cents a Dance
Ten Cents a Dance
Author: Christine Fletcher
Desc: With her mother ill it's up to fifteen-year-old Ruby Jacinski to support her family. But in the 1940s the only opportunities open to a Polish-American girl from Chicago's poor Yards is a job in one of the meat packing plants. Through a chance meeting with a local tough Ruby lands a job as a taxi dancer and soon becomes an expert in the art of "fishing": working her patrons for meals cash clothes even jewelry. Drawn ever deeper into the world of dance halls jazz and the mob Ruby gradually realizes that the only one who can save her is herself. A mesmerizing look into a little known world and era.