Beyond My Dreams

Book excerpt: Mel Tomlinson's fascinating true story starts before his birth at his family's home in the Chavis Heights Housing Project in Raleigh, NC. It starts with the struggles of his parents and grandparents in Jim Crow-era North Carolina and continues with his unexpected and meteoric rise through the ranks of the professional ballet world with almost no prior dance training. After years spent as a soloist and principal dancer in some of America's top professional ballet companies, Mel fi nds himself placed in the House of Mercy AIDS Hospice in Belmont, NC, where his friends and family expect him to soon die a hideously painful death. But it seems that powers beyond his dreams had other plans for Mel Tomlinson, the once captivating, charismatic dancer.