Flores en el ático

Where do I even begin with this book? A now-former friend (for reasons unrelated to her book recommendations) told me she thought I would absolutely love this book because she knows I'm a fan of gothic horror and characters who survive horrific abuses. That was back in February 2014. I bought the ebook on Amazon and started reading...

...and then got dreadfully bored and gave up around the 36% mark. Where was the taboo relationship? Where was the survival? Where were justice or cleverness? Why was the mom such a heartless piece of garbage suddenly? Why were the twins so obnoxious? I had so many questions and no time or energy in trudging through to find the answers. Something about the writing style made even the most dramatic of events feel dull and lifeless. And the way the characters spoke! Good golly lolly, it was unbelievably wordy and pretentious and obnoxious! (If I never see the word ‘golly' again, it'll still be too soon.)

Fast forward to 2019, and I found myself sorting through Kindle books on my new phone while I had an active reading goal. I was vaguely curious about Flowers in the Attic again and decided that it couldn't be too bad. Onto the Currently Reading list it went, and with that decision came my slow descent into madness.

Okay, okay, not madness. But I did end up bored and grumpy many times while forcing myself to continue this book - to the point I picked it back up in July 2019, put it back down with barely 15% more read in September 2019, and picked it up again recently for my 2020 book goal. Yeah, it's that frustrating to read. If I hadn't spent actual money on this several years ago - thus leaving me no hope of returning it now - I would have tossed this book into the Did Not Finish pile and never looked back in 2014.

In a way, I'm glad I didn't give up on it entirely, but I also still feel as if my time were wasted. While the first half of this book is dreadfully boring and slow, the second half is actually rather fast-paced and entertaining. Annoying and disturbing, with many things to prove that all of the characters are terrible people - yes, even the protagonists - but entertaining all the same. Just not quite enough to make the ride to the top of the rollercoaster worth the thrilling plummet to the bottom.

I mean, it's not as if I went into “that one book about abuse and incestuous relationships” expecting sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns. I did expect the children to be much less insufferable (the older brother is a sexist creep, the older sister has a slight martyr complex and super annoying speech patterns, and the younger siblings take turns being horrible brats), but I assume it's meant to be a product of the time and their upbringing. And it's not as if I didn't expect the grossness of them being emotionally manipulated, but I hoped for some consistency.

At times, their monster of a mother gaslighted them and at others they broke away from her manipulation, in a never-ending and ridiculous cycle which soon lost all believability with how frequently the little “dolls” teetered and tottered between anger and stupidly blind trust. Was Chris the trusting one or was Cathy? The roles flip-flopped so often, I found myself getting confused every time the mother interacted with them. The children abused each other yet got angry when their family members abused them. They kept ignoring obvious opportunities to escape because blah, blah, boohoo their evil mother who left them locked in an attic for two or three years might return. Just... pick a side and stick to it, please!

Additionally, the siblings often failed to defend themselves and each other against a frail old woman who could easily have been overpowered and decided not to run away far too many times. If the thought processes had been more realistically portrayed, maybe I'd have believed the presented excuse about fear and weakness but it just isn't done well. The thought patterns don't fit people victimized into subservience; they fit characters who want to escape and fight back but don't because then the book would be much shorter and the plot ruined. One of my pet peeves is inconsistent characterization used to advance plot, and this book has it in spades. I never felt confident in guessing how the characters would respond to situations, because there was no solid grasp on which sibling felt which way - except Carrie, who was a horrible brat and could be relied upon to hit, kick, bite, and scream at anyone who dared offend her.

Well, and Chris could be counted upon to be a sexist, condescending jerk. Run away and save his siblings? Never! He must wait for Momma's money so his selfish arse can become a doctor someday! Steal some jewelry from the mother who's keeping them imprisoned so they can use that for money and flee? No! Never! Evil Momma is the most perfectest person alive and he loves her so much! Stop staring at his sister's body like a creep? No! Blame her for being attractive and enticing him! Go to the bathroom and jerk it? No! Time to rape his sister instead then cry like a little baby begging forgiveness for doing it, as if he couldn't have stopped himself! Just stop eating the donuts he thinks are covered in arsenic? Why do that when he can feed it to their pet and see if the poor thing dies instead?! Seriously, I hope he burns in fictional people hell.

That probably sounds like I hate this book, and to be completely honest I'm not sure why I don't. I guess the last quarter-to-half just got so intense and engrossing that it convinced me there's something of value to the story. I do, after all, enjoy gothic horror and stories of surviving abuse and psychological horror. Once the boring lead-up was out of the way, it wasn't terrible. Wasn't great, either, but it has plenty of potential in the story and that's enough to earn it a couple of stars. (If not for the inconsistent personalities and atrocious dialogue, I'd probably give this three stars for being average and coming together into an entertaining read at the end.)

Now, to convince myself that I'm not curious enough to read the second book in the series. But I must admit, I am a little bit interested in seeing what happens next even though I hate the main characters.

This actually wasn't all that bad. I really liked the children characters and it's an interesting take on what happens when children are just locked away and abused.

Sometimes I read books and I'm glad that my schooling was through the French (québecois) system and that I was therefore not exposed to them until much later in life, this one was such an instance.