Petals on the Wind - Virginia Andrews > Reviews > A Thrilling Sequel

Author's product rating:   

Would you listen to it again?	Absolutely
Story	Outstanding
Characters	Outstanding
Listenability	Once you start it, you won't be able to switch it off!
How does it compare to similar audio books?	Not applicable
How does it compare to audio works by the same author?	Not applicable

Advantages:	too many to count
Disadvantages:	none

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

== Buying The Book ==

This book, and the rest of the series (bar flowers in the attic) were bought for me as an easter present. I wanted them because i'd read flowers in the attic and fallen in love with the family I suppose. Petals on The Wind became my favourite of the series, aswell as Flowers in The Attic that is. As much as I love the other three in the series these two stand out as the best of the series.

The Book

Petals on The Wind carries on where Flowers In The Attic left off. After finally escaping the captivity of the attic the three remaining children are on a bus heading for Florida. They don't make it very far however before Carrie takes a turn for the worse and gets sick. The older two are scared and don't know what to do. Then a guardian angel in the form of a big, mute, black woman named Henrietta Beech comes to their aid. She helps them off the bus and takes them to a house where she is the housekeeper. The master of the house is a Dr Paul Sheffield. He helps young Carrie and eventually adopts all three of them.

He spends alot of money on them and pays for Cathy to do ballet lessons, her dream is to be a prima ballerina. It is at these lessions that she meets Julian Marquet, he is a bit older than her and tries his best to seduce her. This enrages her brother as he has certain feelings for her, which although wring can't be stifled. Cathy on the other hands only has eyes for their new father Paul. It takes a while but she seduces him and they begin their secret affair.

Cathy is in turmoil over her feelings for Paul, and her brother, also there is Julian, a dancer close to her age who professes to be in love with her. She must make a choice, but she doesn't want to hurt anybody. She eventually marries Julian in a quick ceremony before their dance company goes on a tour. Although Julian loves her he also loves young school girls and wants to control Cathys life. It causes huge rows and she runs away to attend her brothers graduation from medical school, after being forbidden to. When she returns Julian has gone and has replaced her as his dance partner with Yolanda Lange.

Not long after Julian and Yolanda are in a car accident, she dies and Julian is paralised. At the same time Cathy finds out she is pregnant with Julians baby, she realises then that she does truly love him and wants to make it all up to him, but is it too late?

Cathy, Carrie and her baby move into a little cottage near the house of their imprisonment. Cathy wants revenge and has set her eyes on her mothers new husband Bartholomew Winslow. She falls pregnant with his baby and he falls in love with her, but as usual the family "curse" strikes those they love the most.

The Author

Virginia Andrews died in 1986, leaving alot of unpublished work. The Flowers In The Attic series is by far the best she ever wrote. A ghost writer now carries on her work.

What I Thought Of It

I thought this book was marvelous. I cannot decide which I prefer, this or Flowers In The Attic. I love them both so much for different reasons. This one is great as Cathy begins to grow up and becomes a mother. Which opens up the challenge to her of not following in her mothers footsteps. I was moved by her relationship with her first husband Julian and the tradegy which befelled him. Also the ways in which their imprisonment effected each of them in different ways. Cathys inability to trust, Christophers urges towards his sister and poor Carries self conciousness about her size and looks.

It really gave me something to think about for days and weeks after reading it. How a mothers greed changed the course of her childrens lives forever, not just theirs either, everyone they came into contact with found tragedy and heartache, only a small amount of happiness was found by any of them.

My reccomendations

I reccomend that anyone who is thinking of buying this book does so. It is very very good. It will open up a whole new world for you. bear in mind though it is not for the feint hearted, there are some strong religious and political issues in the book and it has the ability to make the reader extremely emotional. It is definitly not a book suitable for children for example.

These are just my personal opinions on the book and series as a whole. I would say buy it and make up your own minds. Different people will take different things from the book and will each have their own experiences. All in all it is a wonderful book by an extemely talented author.

I have not come across another author that I feel has this kind of creative spark that she did, either before her time or since her passing. It is a waste that she did not live longer to be able to write more series' like this one.

As good as the ghost writer is, nothing is a good as the real thing and I have no doubts that had she lived longer she would have come up with some even better work that we would treasure for years to come. One things for sure no one that has read her work will ever forget her name. She will go down in history and her books will still be read in hundreds of years time. They are timeless, I don't believe they will ever be considered totally out of date and not worth reading.

I have almost every book she ever wrote including the ones the ghost writer wrote. I will keep collecting until I have them all and I know I will read and re-read them until they are worn and tattered and need replacing with new copies!!

Even though all her books have a similar theme none of them are boring or repetitive like some books I have read by other authors. I believe that she had a real gift.