Disaster strikes the recital for Nancy and her ballet class when the special-order glass slippers from Paris go missing a day before the show. Could it be the work of the jealous classmate who didn't get the starring role of Cinderella? Or perhaps the jokester who likes to pull pranks on the whole class? Or the aspiring photographer looking for the perfect shot of the glamorous footwear? Most importantly, can Nancy and her friends find the culprit and retrieve the stolen shoes before it's too late?

This is another title in the series featuring a very young Nancy Drew solving simple mysteries. What's funny is that an earlier Nancy Drew spin-off had a very similar title with the cassette tape of special music going missing right before the dance recital; this book was, however, better than that one. For one thing, I did appreciate that the ballet class included boys (and tomboys) and was led by a male teacher. This more accurately reflects the real world, but oftentimes children's books have all-female ballet classes.

Unfortunately, I found the conclusion of the mystery a little bit anti-climactic. I actually didn't fully predict it because I had other more elaborate theories of what happened. It was nice to see that there was not actually thievery involved but instead a prank gone wrong and, as always with this series, all's well that ends well.

The audiobook narrator was extremely good at sounding like an actual young child, as well as providing the other voices and accents. She also inflected some life into the rather bland writing style, so that you could better hear the emotions of the characters. However, it also made aspects of the less-than-stellar writing style more obvious, such as how awkward the split infinitives sounded. The book ends with instructions for a craft of ballerina finger puppets, which probably is better in text, but I'm glad they didn't neglect it in the audio version. ( )

Juvenile mystery series featuring an introduction to the Nancy Drew character as a pre-Teen.

In my opinion, this was a decent book. "Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew: The Cinderella Ballet Mystery" is about Nancy Drew and her friends George and Bess trying to solve the mystery of who stole the glass ballet slippers for their ballet school's upcoming production of Cinderella. A girl named Autumn was supposed to play Cinderella but she sprained her ankle so Andrea steps in to fill the part. Nadine, a girl in the ballet class feels that she should have been given the part and makes it known. Right after it is announced that Andrea will play Cinderella, the glass slipper ballet slippers from Paris go missing and Nancy Drew and her Clue Crew. I only gave this book three stars because I felt that it was very repetitive. The book is only 83 pages long and Nadine made comments like, "That's not fair!" and "A terrible mistake has been made." at least two times during each chapter. I also only gave this book only three stars because I didn't find it very engaging. There was never a time when I was very intrigued or really wanted to keep reading. Also, the few pictures in this book didn't seem very realistic. I thought that Nancy Drew and her friends were in elementary school, based off of the way they act. For example, in the beginning of the book, George offers his classmate a cookie and it turns out to be a plastic toy cookie. The way the illustrations are drawn, it looks like Nancy and her friends are teenagers. ( )