Scarlet Rose by Julia Madeline

Scarlet Rose is a jaded, washed up stripper with a violent past. As a middle aged divorcee and mother she is forcing her oldest daughter Fiona to hit the stage night after night now that her own broken body is unable dance as it used to. Fiona, though honest and loyal to her family, is only sixteen.

One night during a show she is recognized by an older gentleman named Charlie who meets her afterwards and reveals that he is her father. Mortified by what she is being put through he tries to help her out but all of his generous acts backfire. His ex-wife, still enraged by his past alcoholism and infidelity, infuriates the situation. She pushes him away and forbids Fiona ever to see him again. That demand was quickly dismissed.

A couple years later Charlie is found dead in a hotel room lying next to a gay prostitute. He had been tortured in particularly gruesome ways and then covered with a sprinkling of rose petals. No one knows who the killer is but with Charlie’s checkered past and a fortune without a will, everyone has a motive.

A vortex of shady individuals are dredged up by the police investigation. Drug dealers, the cabaret manager and the detectives all confront little Fiona for information, scaring her half to death. In addition she discovers that a second long lost brother was living with Charlie before he died. All of the possible suspects are protecting their precious secrets, all of them suspecting that Fiona already knows too much.

Scarlet Rose is the tale of a family torn apart by vanity, desperation, poverty, incest and eventually murder. Never before have the dark corner’s of Canada’s night life and welfare underbelly been spelled out with such enticing sensitivity. The addition of a character based on real life murderer Dennis Howe deepens the intrigue to a frightening level. Comparable to the Oprah book club novel White Oleander by Janet Fitch this twisted tale of familial deceit it doesn’t get any better. As a debut novel one has to marvel at the author’s attention to detail and ability to write in such a personal manner. Scarlet Rose is both a tantalizing tale and a dramatic heartbreaker.

Scarlet Rose: Julia Madeline, Publisher: Black Heart Books. May 2008, ISBN: 978-0-9808874-0-2, 368pgs, $21.00 - Scarlet Rose will be available May 2008