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Copy/paste the text below into your blog. <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/225473.Scarlett_The_Sequel_to_Margaret_Mitchell_s_Gone_With_the_Wind?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Scarlett: The Sequel to Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1172865400m/225473.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/225473.Scarlett_The_Sequel_to_Margaret_Mitchell_s_Gone_With_the_Wind?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">Scarlett: The Sequel to Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/66622.Alexandra_Ripley">Alexandra Ripley</a><br/><br/> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/26298711?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a> rating: 2 of 5 stars<br/>If GWTW had been written like this, this book would never have been written. There would have been no movie and no one would ever have heard of Vivien Leigh. <br/> <br/>I started off with low expectations, and found that "Scarlett" was easy to read and reasonably entertaining. I knew from the start that it deserved no more than 2 1/2 stars but was planning to give it 3, because I was enjoying it. Like many, I really wanted to find out about "Act 2" of Scarlett and Rhett. When I first read GWTW, as a teenager, I just knew that they would overcome all and get back together. The more I read it, though, the less likely that seemed. Still, I hoped. <br/> <br/>I remember hearing bad reviews when "Scarlett" came out, so I put off reading it. The reason I finally decided to read it was that my book group is reading GWTW, and some had expressed interest in this as well. Someone had even read it and recommended it (the guilty shall remain nameless). <br/> <br/>"Scarlett" starts out at Melanie's funeral, and we see glimpses of familiar faces. They make their obligatory appearences and then they are forgotten and rarely or never mentioned again. We meet new characters, in Charleston, Savannah, and Ireland. Scarlett is on a New Age journey of self-discovery! These characters also appear briefly and disappear. When Scarlett visited her Grandfather Robillard, I thought perhaps V C Andrews had taken over the writing chore (fortunately, no attics were involved). Events are foreshadowed, then never come to pass. (Events that do occur are *heavily* foreshadowed.) Scarlett meets trial after trial, struggles and wrestles mightily with each, finds each too difficult to overcome, thinks "I'll think about that tomorrow" and--snap! all turns out well for no apparent reason. Events from GWTW are recycled with little change in description. <br/> <br/>The character of Scarlett bothered me very much. She was not the same Scarlett we hated and loved. No, Scarlett was not nice. But she was interesting and had gumption. The new Scarlett had no edge. I thought the fact that Vivien Leigh played her in the original movie and Joanne Whalley in the TV show was appropriate. I tried to tell myself that we all change as we age and mature. But the truth is, unfortunately, the author did not understand the character as Margaret Mitchell did. <br/> <br/>One other particular problem I had was when Scarlett "realizes" that her mother didn't love her. How could she, when she didn't allow Scarlett to express herself freely? Erm, well, perhaps Scarlett's mother understood the society that Scarlett would be moving in and gave her the tools to gain the best possible position in that society. How's that for love? <br/> <br/>Oh, and perhaps the author should have read the first line of GWTW: "Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful...." <br/> <br/>Finally, I just got tired of the book. I got tired of insipid Scarlett. I'm so glad I got it from the library. I didn't have to pay for it and it won't waste room on my bookshelf. <br/><br/><a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/851556?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>