Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews
After the death of their family patriarch, Cathy, Christopher, Carrie and Corey are forced to return to the home of their estranged grandparents. However, this comes with a caveat. Little do they realise that they’ll be spending the next few years of their lives trapped in an attic, under the thumb of an oppressive, bible-thumping grandmother whilst uncovering strange secrets about their family that threaten to tear their sibling bonds apart at the seams.
This was a book that spent several years living rent free in my head since I read the synopsis in Secondary School, but it was only recently that I actually read it. I got my hands on the audiobook and once I started listening to it, there was no stopping. At the same time, I already knew all of the twists and turns, but still I was taken aback by just how well-written this book was and how cruel fate was to these characters. This is easily one for the most chilling books I’ve ever read. As you’re reading through it, all you can do is pray and hope that all will be alright and you couldn’t ask for a better introduction to the world of V.C Andrews. The slow descent into darkness is at once alarming and comforting, with the characters being put to the test. Whilst not my introduction, this is her best known work for a reason. This is a book that a lot of people picked up when they were far too young but, like me when I read it, you can’t bring yourself to regret it.
The children are the main characters and we see the story through the oldest girl, Catherine ‘Cathy’s, perspective. We see the slow deterioration of her bond with her mother and how, in seeking to replace that connection, she and her brother Chris are bonded together forever through the mutual trauma. Simply put, these four children have no one but each other and Andrews never lets you forget that. Unfortunately, I feel that we don’t get a proper insight into what the mother, Corrine, has going on in her mind. She’s one of the most divisive characters in the story but we have to wait until the ghost written prequel before we get any insight into her. She’s one of the most important characters to the story but we only ever see her through someone else’s eyes which can paint a very biased picture of her. I think that a chapter dedicated to Corrine’s POV, perhaps at the beginning and end would have been illuminating.
Andrews’ prose is detailed and illustrative, unrelenting as each word captures your attention. You won’t be able to put this book down and even though I knew about the twists years before I read it, thank you for nothing and everything Wikipedia, I had let myself forget about a lot of it. The plot is shockingly simple but the characters are what most readers come for and they are intensely interesting. Some of the descriptions of the lengths that the children are forced to resort to are haunting and made me feel viscerally sick. However, this book could be the definition of ‘of it’s time’. Parts were genuinely hard to get through and whilst I can understand why, the more notorious parts of the books do not spring out of nowhere. If you are not prepared for that, do not enter.
This book is one point away from a perfect score, with a point taken off for the dated approach to sexual assault that I can’t be too mad at and the lack of expansion on Corrine’s character. If there was ever a character who could benefit from being expanded on, it’s the mother of the children. Did she ever like her children, or did she see them as simple extensions of herself a la Cersei Lannister? However, you genuinely couldn’t ask for a better introduction to the Southern Gothic genre and one of the best authors of it.
