Cindy was too young to care about (I will say that I love Cindy in the final book of the series, though) and both Cathy and Chris felt like watered down versions of who they are.
Bart felt almost comically the bad seed, whereas Jory lacked much personality beyond his golden boy archetypes. So much of me was unable to buy anything in I f There Be Thorns. (Save the little glimmers of Corrine's attempt at redemption and John Amos general villainy.)Įverything felt unnecessary and tiring. The bad news is that I cared very little for Bart and Jory's childhood or any of the plotlines that were featured in If There Be Thorns.
In truth, it seemed to me that If There Be Thorns was meant to be something bigger than what it actually was, which leaves me feeling highly underwhelmed. It had a lot going on for it that should have felt as indulgent as it was creepy, but it never quite caught up with itself. Yet, If There Be Thorns feels jilted by its own lack of a spark.
Perhaps this is due entirely to the shift in narration from Cathy, over to her young sons, Bart and Jory. While Flowers in the Attic was purely a page turner, that had you gripped and internally yelling in unease, and Petals on the Wind held the similar pace and tone to a classic soap opera, If There Be Thorns develops so slowly I could barely stand it. It holds a different feeling of terror than the previous two novels in the Dollanganger Saga. If There Be Thorns is very much in the same Gothic horror vein. If I thought that Petals on the Wind felt as if it were penned by another author entirely, If There Be Thorns feels even more as such. There is not a lot to be enthralled by, really. It lacks the same haunting feeling that Flowers in the Attic and even Petals on the Wind possessed. Looking back, I'm pretty sure it was fate that I would dislike If There Be Thorns. Feel lucky if you have even one to trust all of the time.” “You can trust a few some of the time, and most none of the time.
0 kommentar(er)
