The first chapter sums up what's been going on recently and introduces both Vega and Piper. Their roommate conflict is covered a bit.
Then we've got band practice, during which Leona's incessant bitching pisses off Clover and she leaves. Libby uses her Libran diplomatic skills to help and they decide to meet again when Leona's more up to it. The girls go their separate ways and Vega heads to the hedge maze, which is her favorite place. She decides to text Cassie, who's struck up an "unlikely" friendship with Leona. I'm glad that gets a comment, because I sure commented on it during Leona's book. Vega thinks about her mother while she's waiting for Cassie. Cassie, by the way, has returned to wearing silver and white, like she originally did. It's noted in both Leona and Vega's books, contradicting her switch to pinkish-white in Sage's book. Cassie has also gone through a slight change in personality. She's far more mouthy than she was originally. She's not too thrilled with having to go through the maze and then she snaps at Vega when Vega's looking at her "like some precious little doll." Good girl, Cassie. You stick up for yourself. After a brief discussion about Scarlet and then Leona, Cassie decides to talk to Leona after dinner and asks Vega to accompany her.
At dinner, Leona's quiet and only speaking to her new roommate Ophelia, whose color is now orange. It was yellow in Leona's book. Astra asks why she's so quiet, but this just causes problems. After dinner, Vega and Cassie finagle their way to Leona's room, but when Cassie asks questions about Ophelia, Leona becomes angrily defensive and basically throws the pair out. She also can't resist throwing in another nasty comment or two about Scarlet. Seriously, Leona's just a fucking bitch. Yeah, you bombed your mission, but don't take your failure out on your teammates when they've done nothing wrong. Only being nice to the one girl that's a weaker SD than you isn't the answer. I understand her attitude a little more here, except the comment about Scarlet's "weird" stuff which is her old brand of bitch, but there had better be a goddamn apology scene in a future book. If the writers let her get away with acting like this, this will be one of the few times in all the modern kids' books I read that I've seen such behavior go unpunished.
Whatever. I'm sick of Leona and her piss poor personality. Moving on.
The one good thing is that Leona let it slip that she's seen Scarlet recently. Not that she'd actually consider being fucking helpful for one "starmin," but info is info. Vega comments that at least Leona gets along with Ophelia, then adds that she and Piper still have problems. She asks how Cassie and Sage are doing and Cassie suddenly realizes they've been getting along fine ever since she threw out the flowers every SD room got. Cassie got a weird feeling about them and threw them out and ever since, she and Sage have been fine. But Vega, showing one of her rarer moments of obnoxiousness, pooh-poohs Cassie's theory, just because she's been wrong about a couple other things before. Cassie continues to stick up for her idea, especially after reviewing the holo-video Vega took of Leona's room, which reveals no flowers in sight. Vega thinks to herself that Cassie has a temper, and yeah, most people would after you've consistently shut down her perfectly logical theory and evidence. The girls make a bet (Vega loves games of any kind) about the flowers and plan to take them to the botany lab.
The next morning, the girls drop off the flowers with one of the botany lab assistants, Gladiolus Rose, who says they're not like anything she's seen before. She comments that they smell like her favorite flower, reiterating the fact from Libby's book that they smell different to each person. Cassie and Vega stop for breakfast, then chase down Scarlet, but it turns out not to be her. Then Vega daydreams in Professor Delphinus's class and gets embarrassed, only to continue to feel so when that prof turns up in their SD class at the end of the day. But Vega is forgiven and shines in class. Ophelia continues to not get simple SD things and Cassie's convinced she shouldn't be one of them.
The next day, the girls go to check on the flowers, but the assistant hasn't shown them to the person she planned on, because that professor's been in a bad mood. Cassie's convinced that's more evidence that she's right, but Vega, of course, is not sold. The girls go to breakfast and then are summoned to a Wish Orb presentation. Vega is chosen and the next day, she's off on her Wishworld mission.
I'm not going to go into huge detail about Vega's mission. She's in a bigger city and spends the night with a very wealthy classmate after identifying her wisher, who's a different girl. I love her wisher, because she's clearly a bit of a goth girl (without using the word) and yet she's very popular and all her classmates copy certain elements of her style. Vega experiments with her special talent and discovers that it's mind control. This moment reminded me that Leona didn't use a talent at all. And I honestly have totally forgotten what Libby and Sage's were. Anyway, Vega stumbles across Ella, her wisher, in the library and Ella gets mad at her for "spying" on her. But Vega overhears Ella wishing that her lie would go away. Vega ends up paired with Ella for an interview project, thanks to her mind control talent. The two girls get to know each other during this and Vega guesses her wish incorrectly, which makes Ella angry again. Clover appears and it's clear Vega's on the wrong track, which is pretty obvious. During Bring Your Parent to School Day, which Ella is absent from, Vega finally realizes that Ella is not the rich girl with a fashion designer mother that everyone thinks she is. She uses her talent to find out Ella's address and rushes over there with Clover. Ella tells them that her mother is a housekeeper for a famous fashion designer, which Katie misheard and that started the lie. Ella actually makes her clothes herself from thrift store finds and castaways from her mom's employer. Vega convinces Ella to admit it to the school, and she does over the PA system, saying she's starting a club called Designing with Ella. Naturally, the club is packed with girls and Ella's problems are solved. Vega collects her wish energy and she and Clover return to Starland.
Vega has her Wish Blossom ceremony and then tries to call her mother, something she's been avoiding. When she gets back to her room, she finds her mom waiting. Piper called her and told her Vega could use a visit from her, so it seems the flowers' powers have worn off. As she's falling asleep, her StarZap goes off with a text from Scarlet, saying to meet her in the hedge maze the next day.
And that's it! The mystery of the flowers is not solved, but it's on the way there. I really like Vega's character, because she's kind of a perfectionist, but she also seems capable of learning her lessons. Like I'm hoping she won't pick on Cassie for incorrect hunches anymore, because she sure had some of those on Wishworld. I loved the bits with her and her mother, because they rounded out her character a lot. That's one issue I had with Leona's book, now that I've read Vega's. Sage, Libby and Vega all came out more well-rounded during their books and we learned more about their families and such. We learned a little about Leona's, but only very shallow details. Cassie is shaping up to be an excellent character. Clover's appearances made me both like and dislike her a tad. I liked that she didn't suffer through Leona's shit, but for someone who hasn't been on a Wishworld mission, she was way too smirky and smug about Vega having problems. None of the missions have gone perfectly so far, so why act all smug? It's not helping anything. And I still adore Piper and can't wait for her book.
I skimmed my Libby summary, checking for a reference while writing this, and I'd written that Leona laughed at Lady Cordial in Libby's book. Lady Cordial also said something at the end of Leona's book about inexperienced Starlings that was quite unlike how she usually speaks. I wonder if she's behind some of these odd occurrences. Maybe her bumbling, stuttering, awkward self is just a facade and she's hiding something. Hmm!
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