Gates of Paradise

Informationen zum Autor One of the most popular authors of all time! V.C. Andrews has been a bestselling phenomenon since the publication of Flowers in the Attic ! first in the renowned Dollanganger family series! which includes Petals on the Wind ! If There Be Thorns ! Seeds of Yesterday ! and Garden of Shadows . The family saga continues with Christopher’s Diary: Secrets of Foxworth ! Christopher’s Diary: Echoes of Dollanganger ! and Secret Brother ! as well as Beneath the Attic ! Out of the Attic ! and Shadows of Foxworth as part of the fortieth anniversary celebration. There are more than eighty V.C. Andrews novels! which have sold over 107 million copies worldwide and have been translated into twenty-five foreign languages. Join the conversation about the world of V.C. Andrews at Facebook.com/OfficialVCAndrews. Prologue For as long as I could remember, the only person I could share my deepest secrets with was Luke Casteel, Jr. It was as if I were truly alive only when he was with me, and in my secret putaway heart, I knew he felt the same way, even though he had never dared say anything about it. I wanted to look at him, look into his soft dark sapphire eyes forever and ever and tell him what I really felt, but the words were forbidden. He was my half brother. But there was one way I could look continually at him and he at me without either of us being self-conscious about it or feeling someone would discover our secret, and that was whenever I painted him. He was always a willing subject: With the easel between us and my world of art serving as a window, I could stare closely at his perfectly shaped, high-cheeked, bronze face and I could capture the way those unruly, jet-black strands of hair always fell over his forehead. Luke had my aunt Fanny´s hair, but my father´s deep blue eyes and perfect nose. There was strength in the lines of his mouth and in his sharp, smooth jawline. I couldn´t help seeing the clear resemblances to my father, and even to myself. He had the same tall, lean build Daddy had and kept his shoulders back the same way. The resemblances always saddened me because they reminded me that Luke wasn´t simply my half brother, he was my illegitimate half brother, born out of a passionate indiscretion between Daddy and my aunt Fanny, my mother´s sister, something we all understood was best kept unmentioned. We tried to leave it behind us, stuffed away in the shadows, even though we both knew people whispered and gossiped about us in Winnerrow. Although my family was the most prominent in Winnerrow, we were a very odd family indeed. Luke, Jr. lived with his mother, who had been married twice: once to a man much older who had died, and once to a man much younger, who had divorced her. Everyone in Winnerrow remembered the court hearing over who would win custody of Mommy´s and Aunt Fanny´s half brother Drake, after their father Luke and his new wife Stacie were killed in a car accident. Drake was only about five at the time. The argument was settled out of court, with Mommy getting custody and Aunt Fanny getting a lot of money. Drake hated to hear about it, and more than once got into a fight at school when some boy teased him about "being bought and paid for." Mother said Drake had her father´s temper anyway. He was handsome, muscular, and very athletic, as well as very bright and determined. Now he was a student getting his M.B.A. at Harvard Business College. Even though he was really my uncle, I always thought of him as a big brother. Mommy and Daddy raised him as they would raise a son. Most everyone in Winnerrow knew about Mommy, how she was born and raised in the Willies, how her mother had died giving birth to her, how she had lived in a shack most of her young life, and then gone off to live with her mother´s rich family, the Tattertons. She lived at Farthinggale...

Dettagli sul prodotto

• Autori: V. C. Andrews, V.C. Andrews
• Editore: Pocket Books USA
• Lingue: Inglese
• Formato: Tascabile
• Pubblicazione: 08.11.2010, ritardato
• EAN: 9781451628104
• ISBN: 978-1-4516-2810-4
• Pagine: 488
• Serie: Casteel; Casteel
• Categoria: Narrativa > Romanzi