V.C. Andrews

Author profile

born

June 06, 1923 in Portsmouth, Virginia, The United States

died

December 19, 1986

gender

female

website

http://www.completevca.com/index.shtml

genre

Horror, Romance

About this author

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Virginia Cleo Andrews (born Cleo Virginia Andrews) was born June 6, 1923 in Portsmouth, Virginia. The youngest child and the only daughter of William Henry Andrews, a career navy man who opened a tool-and-die business after retirement, and Lillian Lilnora Parker Andrews, a telephone operator. She spent her happy childhood years in Portsmouth, Virginia, living briefly in Rochester, New York. The Andrews family returned to Portsmouth while Virginia was in high school.

While a teenager, Virginia suffered a tragic accident, falling down the stairs at her school and incurred severe back injuries. Arthritis and a failed spinal surgical procedure forced her to spend most of her life on crutches or in a wheelchair.

Virginia excelled in school and, at...more Virginia Cleo Andrews (born Cleo Virginia Andrews) was born June 6, 1923 in Portsmouth, Virginia. The youngest child and the only daughter of William Henry Andrews, a career navy man who opened a tool-and-die business after retirement, and Lillian Lilnora Parker Andrews, a telephone operator. She spent her happy childhood years in Portsmouth, Virginia, living briefly in Rochester, New York. The Andrews family returned to Portsmouth while Virginia was in high school.

While a teenager, Virginia suffered a tragic accident, falling down the stairs at her school and incurred severe back injuries. Arthritis and a failed spinal surgical procedure forced her to spend most of her life on crutches or in a wheelchair.

Virginia excelled in school and, at fifteen, won a scholarship for writing a parody of Tennyson's Idylls of the King. She proudly earned her diploma from Woodrow Wilson High School in Portsmouth. After graduation, she nurtured her artistic talent by completing a four-year correspondence art course while living at home with her family.

After William Andrews died in the late 1960's, Virginia helped to support herself and her mother through her extremely successful career as a commercial artist, portrait painter, and fashion illustrator.

Frustrated with the lack of creative satisfaction that her work provided, Virginia sought creative release through writing, which she did in secret. In 1972, she completed her first novel, The Gods of the Green Mountain [sic], a science-fantasy story. It was never published. Between 1972 and 1979, she wrote nine novels and twenty short stories, of which only one was published. "I Slept with My Uncle on My Wedding Night", a short fiction piece, was published in a pulp confession magazine.

Promise gleamed over the horizon for Virginia when she submitted a 290,000-word novel, The Obsessed, to a publishing company. She was told that the story had potential, but needed to be trimmed and spiced up a bit. She drafted a new outline in a single night and added "unspeakable things my mother didn't want me to write about." The ninety-eight-page revision was re-titled Flowers in the Attic and she was paid a $7,500 advance. Her new-generation Gothic novel reached the best-seller lists a mere two weeks after its 1979 paperback publication by Pocket Books.

Petals on the Wind, her sequel to Flowers, was published the next year, earning Virginia a $35,000 advance. The second book remained on the New York Times best-seller list for an unbelievable nineteen weeks (Flowers also returned to the list). These first two novels alone sold over seven million copies in only two years. The third novel of the Dollanganger series, If There Be Thorns, was released in 1981, bringing Virginia a $75,000 advance. It reached No. 2 on many best-seller lists within its first two weeks.

Taking a break from the chronicles of Chris and Cathy Dollanganger, Virginia published her one, and only, stand-alone novel, My Sweet Audrina, in 1982. The book welcomed an immediate success, topping the sales figures of her previous novels. Two years later, a fourth Dollanganger novel was released, Seeds of Yesterday. According to the New York Times, Seeds was the best-selling fiction paperback novel of 1984. Also in 1984, V.C. Andrews was named "Professional Woman of the Year" by the city of Norfolk, Virginia.

Upon Andrews's death in 1986, two final novels--Garden of Shadows and Fallen Hearts--were published. These two novels are considered the last to bear the "V.C. Andrews" name and to be almost completely written by Andrews herself.

Her novels were so successful that after her death her estate hired a ghost writer Andrew Neiderman, to write more stories to be published under her name.(less)

combine editions
Books by V.C. Andrews

Average rating: 3.69 · 216,550 ratings · 5,565 reviews · 137 distinct works

	Flowers in the Attic (Dollanganger, #1) 3.62 avg rating — 35,865 ratings — published 1979 — 67 editions	My rating:
	Petals on the Wind (Dollanganger, #2) 3.68 avg rating — 13,454 ratings — published 1980 — 42 editions	My rating:
	If There Be Thorns (Dollanganger, #3) 3.61 avg rating — 11,962 ratings — published 1981 — 38 editions	My rating:
	Seeds of Yesterday (Dollanganger, #4) 3.65 avg rating — 10,018 ratings — published 1984 — 30 editions	My rating:
	Garden of Shadows (Dollanganger, #5) 3.70 avg rating — 8,554 ratings — published 1987 — 26 editions	My rating:
	My Sweet Audrina 3.78 avg rating — 7,435 ratings — published 1982 — 24 editions	My rating:
	Heaven (Casteel, #1) 3.84 avg rating — 7,039 ratings — 35 editions	My rating:
	Dark Angel (Casteel, #2) 3.78 avg rating — 5,979 ratings — 24 editions	My rating:
	Dawn (Cutler, #1) 3.67 avg rating — 5,973 ratings — published 1990 — 23 editions	My rating:
	Fallen Hearts (Casteel, #3) 3.73 avg rating — 5,163 ratings — published 1984 — 22 editions	My rating:

More books by V.C. Andrews…

Series by V.C. Andrews

Dollanganger (5 books)
by V.C. Andrews

3.64 avg rating — 79,839 ratings

Casteel (5 books)
by V.C. Andrews, Andrew Neiderman

3.76 avg rating — 26,876 ratings

Cutler (5 books)
by V.C. Andrews

3.69 avg rating — 19,439 ratings

Landry (5 books)
by V.C. Andrews

3.74 avg rating — 17,637 ratings

Logan (5 books)
by V.C. Andrews

3.69 avg rating — 12,879 ratings

More series by V.C. Andrews…

Quotes by V.C. Andrews

“You are the most dangerous kind of female the world can ever know. You carry the seeds for your own destruction and the destruction of everyone who loves you. And a great many will love you for your beautiful face for your seductive body; but you will fail them all because you will believe they all fail you first. You are an idealist of the worst kind - the romantic idealist. Born to destroy and self destruct.”
― V.C. Andrews, Fallen Hearts

tags: dark-angel

145 people liked it

“What is normal? Normal is only ordinary; mediocre. Life belongs to the rare, exceptional individual who dares to be different.”
― V.C. Andrews, My Sweet Audrina

tags: my-sweet-audrina

116 people liked it

“Life is like that - twenty minutes of misery for every two seconds of joy.”
― V.C. Andrews, If There Be Thorns

tags: if-there-be-thorns

114 people liked it

See all V.C. Andrews's quotes »

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