Chris and Cathy come from a long line of poor decision makers, and they continue that tradition when they return to the new Foxworth Hall to celebrate Bart's graduation from Harvard and his twenty-fifth birthday. What they think is a one night stay before moving to Hawaii turns into a three year long run in hell.
Cathy and Chris are still the same bores they always were.
Jory (ugh, that name) is still mister perfect.
Bart is still an oozing walking herp sore that's consistently on its period.
Cindy turned into quite the little slut.
The newest addition to the family is Uncle Joel, one of Corrine's brothers thought to be long dead. He's old, he's creepy, he's been living in an Italian monastery so he's developed some hardcore religious beliefs and he's Bart's mentor. Nice.
A bunch of bad things happen such as:
Jory becomes paralyzed and then his pregnant wife cheats on him with Bart then leaves him after giving birth.
Cindy is a slut who keeps getting caught having sex.
Cathy constantly whines to Chris and Chris gets pissy with her about it.
Bart has wild mood swings and Uncle Joel is just evil. How evil? Well, we never get to know for certain because Andrews leads us down a poorly plotted path then says "awww fuck it" and takes the easy way out. Characters personalities instantly change and petty nuisances are conveniently taken care of as though as they never existed.
How I wish I would have saved my time and just used Wikipedia to satisfy my curiosity.
Petals on the Wind is terrible, and I mean just out and out terrible. How terrible you might ask? Petals on the Wind is a slap dash put together hot mess with no real thought or effort put into it. It struck me as quite odd in the plotting and dialogue.
We meet up once again with the Dresden Dolls right where we left them, heading south. Lil' sis Carrie gets sick on the bus and the other passengers are pissed at the kids because of the stink her vomit is producing. Never fear though, a nice older black lady takes sympathy on them and takes them home to her "doctor son" who helps the children and because they are just so damn charming (more like the moment he lays eyes on a 15 yr old Cathy he wants to hit that thing) he legally takes full custody of all 3 Dolls. He saves Carrie's life, mentors Chris on his way to doctordom, buys Cathy slutty see through nighties which she gladly parades around the house in now that Chris is in college and Carrie is in a boarding school.
Despite 3 years 4 months and 16 days locked in a room and forced to play in the attic Chris is ready for college and ready for med school. Despite the interruption in her studies, Cathy is a self taught ballerina and good enough for an international stage. Carrie is still the same obnoxious whiney unlikeable brat who's stunted growth is a constant source of torment. Now that Cathy is a woman every man she sees instantly falls in love her and wants her.
She devises a master plan of revenge, a very stupid master plan, against her mother and grandmother. Since Cathy is probably one of the most stupid female characters in history, she decides that becoming a rich and famous prima ballerina is the best revenge, how that's revenge I don't know, seems more like moving along with her life and pursuing her dreams. So after things don't work out the way she had hoped and her career as a dancer is finished she has a newer even more stupid plan. This brilliant plan is to sleep with her stepfather and have his baby and make him divorce her mother.
This story is beyond stupid. If it weren't for one outrageously stupid plot point I would be done with this series. Cathy has a 7 yr old son by her first husband, her second husband is dying and pleads with her to engage in the incestuous relationship that Chris has been begging her for for years so her two sons will have a father, gross I know, he reasons that the 7 year old will forget that his true relation to Chris is as his nephew and not his son. Um.... 7 years old is pretty damn old to forget something like that. So ewwww.
Andrews uses the words sensational and sensuous so much that they loose all meaning. Her characters are one dimensional and too cardboard to care about and too stupid to be believed. So why am I going to read the next book in this series of fuckery? Damned if I know, but I will.
