Seeds of Yesterday - V.C. Andrews

Reading Challenge Category: A Re-read

Official Blurb:

They escaped their mother’s hellish trap years ago, but a cruel history of lies and deceit has come full circle…
The forbidden love that blossomed when Cathy and Christopher were held captive in Foxworth Hall is one the Dollanganger family’s darkest secrets. Now, with three grown children and even a new last name, the pair seem to have outlived a twisted legacy. But on their son Bart’s twenty-fifth birthday, when the spiteful and disturbed young man claims his rightful inheritance, the full, shattering truth of their tainted past will be revealed at Foxworth Hall—the place where the nightmare began, and where Christopher and Cathy were once just innocent flowers in the attic…

My Thoughts:

We are back with Cathy’s point of view in this fourth book in the Dollanganger series. This was very welcomed after having lived in her children’s minds in the last one, and it hadn’t made for overly pleasant reading. Although, she did appear changed from the feisty Cathy that we had gotten to know. She was much more passive and weak-willed, which changed the dynamic of the story and was very frustrating at times.
For some strange reason, Cathy and Chris uproot their lives and move back to Foxworth Hall for a few months to celebrate Bart’s 25th birthday. However, due to many reasons, they end up spending years and years there and not being able to escape (though this was more their choice than what had happened to them when they were children). It isn’t clear how many years pass by in this book as there are considerable time jumps where spring, summer, autumn and winter just fly by, and we come full circle to the next set of seasons. We did seem to be on a cycle of stories and behaviour repeating themselves with this circle, mostly from Bart and Cindy. This made the book drag somewhat.
I remembered a little more about what happened during this book, and I had an awful sense of dread through the first half. The end of the book appeared rushed, especially with the Joel side of things. Also, we don’t really get answers for a lot of what happened, and this was disappointing, It was almost as if the author just wanted to finish the story and wrapped it up. The few final things that did happen were very sad, and I was choked up and had to hold back the tears. There was no major blubbing like I do at the end of the Heaven series, though. I think this was due to the hurried feel the end had.
So, even though this was better than book three, it was probably on par with book two so receives four stars. It could have been so much better if Cathy’s personality had remained intact and the ending had had a little more thought put into it. This is the last we hear from these characters as the final book in the series is a prologue following Cathy and Chris’ grandmother, Olivia. So, even though it was sad to say goodby to the characters until I reread the books again in a few years time, I do think the books should have ended after book two. Still a good series though and I do recommend reading them all.

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