The Gossiping Flowers. Jitter Jumpers, #37

Twelve-year-old Dexter is a boy "abruptly transplanted, " his roots ripped from the comforting scent of his mother's cinnamon baking and thrust into a house that smells of "lemon polish and the dust of ages." His father, a man who views emotional distress as a "potent substance" to be distilled, has cultivated a greenhouse of "Whispering Blooms." These sensitive carnations do more than grow; they amplify and "whisper" back the very feelings Dexter is desperate to hide.
To survive his father's "warped understanding" of the human soul, Dexter must find the courage to face the "Symbiotic Despair" rooted in his own backyard.