I was twelve years old and three books into the Dollanganger quartet when I discovered that the author—who was still “writing” new books, as she continues doing to this day—had died four years earlier. Already a committed V.C. Andrews fan for life, I took this as such a personal tragedy that when our Hebrew school class was encouraged to donate a tree in Israel in memory of someone we’d loved and lost, I proudly inscribed…
In the spring of 1978, I landed a job as a senior editor at Pocket Books, though I was hardly qualified for the position. The publisher at the time, Peter Mayer, was committed to hiring bright young people on the cheap. Though I’d never before acquired a book, I was now able to acquire not only hardcover reprints but also paperback originals. Flowers in the Attic was my first.
As Mallory announced on Thursday, today will be devoted to the study and discussion of V.C. Andrews, the author of Flowers in the Attic. For those of you who aren't terrifyingly and intimately familiar with her work, Andrews was, for a time, the Stephen King of incest. You can't begin to imagine the level of success she reached in her lifetime. Whatever number of books you think are required to move in order to…
