Rose Madder (novel)
First edition cover
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| Author | Stephen King |
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| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Fantasy novel |
| Publisher | Viking |
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Publication date
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June 1995 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) |
| Pages | 420 |
| ISBN | |
Rose Madder is a 1995 novel by Stephen King. It deals with the effects of domestic violence (which King had touched upon before in the novels It, Insomnia, Dolores Claiborne, Needful Things, and many others) and, unusually for a King novel, relies for its fantastic element on Greek mythology. In his memoir, On Writing, King states that Rose Madder and Insomnia are "stiff, trying-too-hard novels."
In the prologue, which takes place in 1985, Rose Daniels' husband, Norman, beats her while she is four months pregnant, causing her to suffer a miscarriage. Rose briefly considers leaving Norman but dismisses the idea: Norman is a policeman, and is excellent at finding people. Norman also has a violent temper and was recently accused of assaulting a black woman named Wendy Yarrow. The subsequent lawsuit and Internal Affairs investigation has made him even more volatile.
Nine years later, when Rose is making the bed, she notices a drop of blood on the sheet from her nose the night before; Norman had punched her in the face for spilling iced tea on him. Rose realizes that she has passively suffered through Norman's abuse for 14 years and that if she continues to put up with it, he may well eventually kill her. Rose decides to leave Norman, departing from her unidentified city on a bus, with their bank card. Once Norman realizes that Rose is gone, he resolves to hunt her down and kill her.
Rose arrives in a Midwestern city, disoriented and afraid. When she arrives at the bus station, she meets a man named Peter Slowik, who guides her to a women's shelter. There, she quickly makes several friends and, with the help of the shelter's director, Anna Stevenson, gets an apartment and a job as a hotel housekeeper, with her new friend Pam.
Rose decides to pawn her engagement ring, only to learn that it is absolutely worthless. However, she notices a painting of a woman in a rose madder gown and immediately falls in love with it. She trades her ring for the painting, which has no artist's signature. Outside, a patron of the pawnshop, who witnessed Rose's ordeal with her wedding ring, asks her to read a passage from a novel, and is so impressed that he offers her a job recording audio books. Bill Steiner, the nice gentleman who owns the pawnshop, asks her for a date; Rose soon falls in love with him, although she is afraid to begin a new relationship.
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