Books like 'If There Be Thorns'
Readers who enjoyed If There Be Thorns by V.C. Andrews & Michael Görden also liked the following books featuring the same tropes, story themes, relationship dynamics and character types.
contemporary romance horror mystery 20th century gothic drama suspense classics family
-
Replay by Ken Grimwood
Rated: 4.15 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsAt forty-three Jeff Winston is tired of his low-paid, unrewarding job, tired of the long silences at the breakfast table with his wife, saddened by the thought of no children to comfort his old age. But he hopes for better things, for happiness, maybe tomorrow ...But a sudden, fatal heart attack puts paid to that...Categorized as:
classics drama suspense 20th-century action-adventure alternate-history audiobook book -
The Changeover by Margaret Mahy
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsCarnegie medal-winning supernatural romance from Margaret Mahy.The face in the mirror. From the moment she saw it, Laura Chant knew that something dreadful was going to happen. It wasn’t the first time she’d been forewarned. But never before had anything so terrible happened... -
The China Garden by Liz Berry
Rated: 4.06 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsWhen Clare moves with her mother from London to Ravensmere, an historic English estate, she can't shake the feeling that the residents already know her, especially Mark, a maddeningly attractive biker. Clare also feels compelled to take midnight walks in Ravensmere's abandoned China Garden. Then her mother reveals that their own past is tragically linked to the estate... -
Heaven by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 4.04 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsOf all the folks in the mountain shacks, the Casteels were the lowest the scum of the hills.Heaven Leigh Casteel was the prettiest, smartest girl in the backwoods, despite her ragged clothes and dirty face...despite a father meaner than ten vipers...despite her weary stepmother, who worked her like a mule. For her brother Tom and the little ones, Heaven clung to her pride and her hopes... -
-
Dark Angel by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 4.00 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsSecond in the Casteel family saga series set in Virginia and Boston. As Heaven moves away from home she is determined to leave her traumatic past behind... -
Drawing Blood by Poppy Z. Brite
Rated: 4.02 of 5 stars · 32 ratingsEscaping from his North Carolina home after his father murders their family and commits suicide, Trevor McGee returns to confront the past, and finds himself haunted by the same demons that drove his father to insanity... -
Shattered Souls by Mary Lindsey
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsA thrilling debut story of death, love, destiny, and dangerLenzi hears voices and has visions - gravestones, floods, a boy with steel gray eyes. Her boyfriend, Zak, can't help, and everything keeps getting louder and more intense... -
Tarnished Gold by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.94 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHer high school graduation just days away, Gabriel Landry is blissfully happy - until rich cannery owner Octavious Tate waylays her near a secluded pond and shatters her innocence, forever.Pregnant and desolate, Gabriel agrees to a shocking plan that will allow Octavious' frigid wife, Gladys, to claim the baby as her own... -
Tea with the Black Dragon by R.A. MacAvoy
Rated: 3.99 of 5 stars · 30 ratingsMartha Macnamara knows that her daughter Elizabeth is in trouble, she just doesn't know what kind. Mysterious phone calls from San Francisco at odd hours of the night are the only contact she has had with Elizabeth for years. Now, Elizabeth has sent her a plane ticket and reserved a room for her at San Francisco's most luxurious hotel... -
Garden of Shadows by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.93 of 5 stars · 28 ratingsOlivia dreamed of a sun-filled love, a happy life. Then she entered Foxworth Hall...V.C. Andrews' thrilling new novel spins a tale of dreadful secrets and dark, forbidden passions--of the time before Flowers in the Attic began. Long before terror flowered in the attic, thin, spinsterish Olivia came to Virginia as Malcolm Foxworth's bride... -
Bloodsucking Fiends by Christopher Moore
Rated: 3.96 of 5 stars · 54 ratingsThere is an alternate cover edition here.Jody never asked to become a vampire. But when she wakes up under an alley dumpster with a badly burned arm, an aching neck, superhuman strength, and a distinctly Nosferatuan thirst, she realizes the decision has been made for her... -
Ruby by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsThe New York Times best-selling novels of V.C. Andrews have captivated millions of readers worldwide. Now comes a thrilling new series about the dark, forbidden secrets that change the lives of the Landry family. Ruby Landry is a 15-year -old Cajun girl who lives on the Louisiana bayou. An illegitimate child whose young mother died at her birth, Ruby lives with her Grandmere Catherine... -
The House of Sleep by Jonathan Coe
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsLike a surreal and highly caffeinated version of The Big Chill, Jonathan Coe's new novel follows four students who knew each other in college in the eighties. Sarah is a narcoleptic who has dreams so vivid she mistakes them for real events. Robert has his life changed forever by the misunderstandings that arise from her condition. Terry spends his wakeful nights fueling his obsession with movies... -
Pearl in the Mist by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 24 ratingsFate whisked Ruby from a simple life in the Louisiana Bayou. But her new riches bring more treachery than happiness... Even after a year as a Dumas, Ruby still wonders at the splendor of the family's New Orleans mansion, and rejoices in the love of the father she had never known. But true happiness in her new home is as elusive as the swamp mist... -
-
Devil May Care by Elizabeth Peters
Rated: 3.88 of 5 stars · 16 ratingsEllie is young, rich, engaged and in love. These are the carefree days before marriage and new responsibility, and anything goes -- including house-sitting at eccentric Aunt Kate's palatial estate in Burton, Virginia... -
The Woman in the Wall by Patrice Kindl
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsAnd hide is what Anna does throughout the course of this amazing book. She retreats into the fabric of a big old house, building a series of passageways and secondary walls that allow her to share the life of the house unseen by her mother and sisters. As Anna says, her family is not observant. But Anna herself is a quirky and perceptive witness to the life she has chosen to escape... -
The Loop by Nicholas Evans
Rated: 3.92 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsHelen Ross is a 29-year-old biologist, sent into a hostile place to protect the wolves from those who seek to destroy them. She struggles for survival and for self-esteem, embarking on a love affair with the 18-year-old son of her most powerful opponent, brutal and charismatic rancher, Buck Calder... -
All That Glitters by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.85 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsDriven from the Dumas Mansion back to her beloved bayou, Ruby's only hope is that fate will let her begin anew...Living again in a humble shack, Ruby is determined to make a secure and happy home for her precious infant daughter, Pearl. Paul Tate-- her first love, whom she was forced to abandon-- is at her side once more, now a man of dazzling wealth... -
Melody by V.C. Andrews, Laurel Lefkow
Rated: 3.85 of 5 stars · 20 ratingsMelody Logan knew her beautiful mother, Haille, was unhappy in their hardscrabble mining town....But with her wonderful father's unwavering love, Melody always felt safe until a dreadful mine accident ripped her from her family's moorings.She was still devastated by her father's death when she left West Virginia with Haille to follow her mother's dream of becoming a model or actress... -
Lost Souls by Poppy Z. Brite
Rated: 3.90 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsAt a club in Missing Mile, N.C., the children of the night gather, dressed in black, looking for acceptance. Among them are Ghost, who sees what others do not. Ann, longing for love, and Jason, whose real name is Nothing, newly awakened to an ancient, deathless truth about his father, and himself.Others are coming to Missing Mile tonight... -
Hidden Jewel by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsHidden Jewel is the fourth thrilling novel in the V.C. Andrews Landry series. Following All That Glitters, the spellbinding story of Ruby Landry's daring struggle to find a happy life with Beau Andreas and to protect their precious daughter. Sheltered from sorrow, innocent young Pearl thrives in the sunshine of a loving home.. -
Heart Song by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsMelody Logan was as alone as a solitary gull, with only the wild Atlantic wind to lift her spirits.... When Melody Logan's mother died in a car accident, Melody lost the last shred of family she had ever known. She was practically a stranger to the Logans, her wealthy relatives on Cape Cod, where she now drifted on a sea of dark secrets... -
My Sweet Audrina by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.87 of 5 stars · 38 ratingsA haunting story of love and deceit, innocence and betrayal, and the suffocating power of parental love from V.C. Andrews.The idea of her sister hovered above them all. Audrina fiercely desired to be as good as her sister. She knew her father could not love her as he loved that other girl, for her sister was so special, so perfect—and dead... -
The Captive by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.86 of 5 stars · 36 ratingsCan The Secret Circle Survive...Lured into the most popular in-crowd imaginable, Cassie is intoxicated by her newfound strength, a power as addictive as it is perilous.Caught between two members' consuming desires to use the coven's mysterious force, Cassie turns to one of their boyfriends, Adam--and falls captive to her own dangerous love... -
-
Companions of the Night by Vivian Vande Velde
Rated: 3.79 of 5 stars · 19 ratingsWhen Kerry's little brother forgets his stuffed bear at the laundry, Kerry ventures out at 11th p.m. to retrieve it for him. The laundry is deserted and kind of spooky, and while she's there three men burst in, dragging a bound and bloodied young man they insist is a vampire. Kerry helps him escape, only to be caught up in a desperate game between vampire hunters and their prey... -
Heartlight by Marion Zimmer Bradley
Rated: 3.70 of 5 stars · 10 ratingsHeartlight is the story of Bradley’s greatest champion of good, Colin MacLaren, as he carries the banner of Light through the second half of the twentieth century. Ghostbuster, exorcist, student and teacher of the mystic arts, Colin meets Claire Moffat, who becomes his dearest friend, when he rescues her from a cult bent on human sacrifice... -
Runaways by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.78 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsThe spellbinding Orphans series concludes in this thrilling new novel from V.C. Andrews(R)... "All for one and one for all" was the girls' motto. In the grim foster home for orphans run by Louise and Gordon Tooey, at least Brooke, Crystal, Raven, and Butterfly had each other. Calling themselves "sisters," together they could forget the past and dream of a new chance...a real home... -
Unfinished Symphony by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.78 of 5 stars · 18 ratingsMelody Logan had only just found a safe harbor when a new storm set her adrift all over again.... Melody had always believed her mother, Haille, and dear stepdaddy had died in tragic accidents — that's why she'd come to stay with her secretive Logan relatives on Cape Cod. But then a friend recognized Haille's picture in a catalog and kindled Melody's hopes... -
Blood Pact by Tanya Huff
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 29 ratingsIt began with the call no daughter ever wants to get, the call that told private investigator Vicki Nelson her mother had died. Mrs. Nelson's coworker at the Queen's University Life Science Department told Vicki that the cause of death was a heart attack, and that they'd be waiting for her to arrive in Kingston to make the funeral arrangements... -
Seeds of Yesterday by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.83 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsThe final, haunting novel, in the extraordinary story that has enthralled millions!The horror began with Flowers in the Attic, the terrifying tale of four innocent children locked away from the world by a cruel mother.The shocking fury continued with Petals on the Wind and If There be Thorns. Now V.C. Andrews has created the last dark chapter in the strange, chilling tale of passion and peril... -
Petals on the Wind by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.80 of 5 stars · 54 ratingsThey were such brave children to withstand such suffering. Such clever children to escape such terror!For Carrie, Chris and Cathy, the attic was a dark horror that would not leave their minds, even while they built bright, promising new lives. Of course mother had to pretend they didn't exist.And Grandmother was convinced they had the devil in them.But that wasn't their fault... -
The Initiation by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.77 of 5 stars · 37 ratingsCassie is initiated into her hometown's coven of witches but her love for the coven leader's boyfriend could prove deadly... -
What Was She Thinking? [Notes on a Scandal] by Zoë Heller
Rated: 3.73 of 5 stars · 26 ratingsSchoolteacher Barbara Covett has led a solitary life until Sheba Hart, the new art teacher at St. George's, befriends her. But even as their relationship develops, so too does another: Sheba has begun an illicit affair with an underage male student... -
Flowers in the Attic by V.C. Andrews
Rated: 3.78 of 5 stars · 69 ratingsWay upstairs there are four secrets hidden.Blond, beautiful, innocent little secrets, struggling to stay alive. Flowers In the AtticThe four Dollanganger children had such perfect lives -- a beautiful mother, a doting father, a lovely home. Then Daddy was killed in a car accident, and Momma could no longer support the family... -
-
Blood and Chocolate by Annette Curtis Klause
Rated: 3.75 of 5 stars · 48 ratingsVivian Gandillon relishes the change, the sweet, fierce ache that carries her from girl to wolf. At sixteen, she is beautiful and strong, and all the young wolves are on her tail. But Vivian still grieves for her dead father; her pack remains leaderless and in disarray, and she feels lost in the suburbs of Maryland. She longs for a normal life... -
The Silver Kiss by Annette Curtis Klause
Rated: 3.70 of 5 stars · 37 ratingsZoe is wary when, in the dead of night, the beautiful yet frightening Simon comes to her house. Simon seems to understand the pain of loneliness and death and Zoe's brooding thoughts of her dying mother.Simon is one of the undead, a vampire, seeking revenge for the gruesome death of his mother three hundred years before... -
The Girl in a Swing by Richard Adams
Rated: 3.52 of 5 stars · 23 ratingsA shy young man meets a beautiful woman in the company of a young girl. He finds himself swept off of his feet and married to her, bringing her with him to live in his family home. She is his erotic dream come true; she does everything she can to bind him to her and join him in his comfortable life.Soon, however, odd things begin to happen... -
Exit to Eden by Anne Rampling, Anne Rice
Rated: 3.60 of 5 stars · 37 ratingsWelcome to the club to satisfy all your desires. In the Caribbean sun, the champagne flows and the games of pain and pleasure never stop. Lisa is the perfectionist. Elliot, the client. In their meeting, they discover that Eden is a state of heart and mind where innocence and love can be recaptured... -
The Enchantment of Lily Dahl by Siri Hustvedt
Rated: 3.43 of 5 stars · 14 ratingsThe protagonist of Siri Hustvedt's astonishing second novel is a heroine of the old style: tough, beautiful, and brave. Standing at the threshold of adulthood, she enters a new world of erotic adventure, profound but unexpected friendship, and inexplicable, frightening acts of madness...Categorized as:
coming-of-age family 20th-century book contemporary female-author female-mc feminism -
Dark Reunion by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.50 of 5 stars · 39 ratingsElena rises from the dead to recreate the powerful vampire trio. Summoned by Elena, Stefan keeps a promise to her and fights the most terrifying evil he's ever faced. Joining the brother he once called enemy, Damon battles this new horror with strength, cunning, and deadly charm...Categorized as:
drama high-school 20th-century action-adventure audiobook book contemporary female-author -
The Fury by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.51 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsA Love Triangle of Unspeakable Horror... Stefan Tormented after losing Elena, he's determined to end the feud with his brother, Damon--whatever the cost.Damon Mocking Stefan and Elena, he laughs in the face of doom.Elena Wild with her craving for blood, she confronts the ultimate evil.The terrifying story of two vampire brothers and the beautiful girl torn between them... -
The Struggle by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.47 of 5 stars · 42 ratingsThis is the terrifying story of two vampire brothers and the beautiful girl torn between them: Damon: determined to make Elena his queen of darkness, he'd kill his own brother to possess her.Stefan: desperate for the power to destroy Damon, he succumbs to his thirst for human blood.Elena: irresistibly drawn to both brothers, her choice will decide their fate... -
The Awakening by L.J. Smith
Rated: 3.37 of 5 stars · 58 ratingsA Love Triangle of Unspeakable Horror...ElenaSearching for the ultimate thrill, she vowed to have Stefan.StefanHaunted by his tragic past, he struggled to resist her passion.DamonDriven by revenge, he hunted the brother who betrayed him.The terrifying story of two vampire brothers and the beautiful girl torn between them...
Or - use our amazing romance book finder to get recommendations based on your favorite content tropes and themes. Mix and match at will.