This book review is based on an advanced reader copy provided by the author, Diana Morgan.
Black Dahlia, Red Rose is published by Coronet (Hodder & Stoughton) and is currently available to buy from Waterstones, Amazon, and all good bookshops. The novel takes place in the Victorian era and follows a group of women who work in the pharmaceutical industry.
Death with a Dark Red Rose by Eileen Chang
Death with a Dark Red Rose is a new novel by Chinese author Eileen Chang. The book was published in China by Guangming Daily Publishing and Shangdong Picture News. It was later republished by Fudan University Press, Shanghai Literature Publishers, and Shaanxi People's Publishers.
Chang's writing style is evocative. She swoons over colors, sounds, and smells, and her sentences are cinematically crisp and phantasmagorical. Her opening scene is a brilliant example, as she describes the colors of the morning and dawn.
Chang died in the year 2000, but she was not forgotten. Her legacy lives on in the writers and filmmakers who take her stories for inspiration. Her personal archives are still housed in Hong Kong. Her second husband, scriptwriter Ferdinand Reyher, died in 1967, and she left her personal papers to her lifelong friends. Her lifelong friends, like Roland Soong, have been working to preserve her papers and her literary work.
Black Dahlia, Red Rose by Piu Eatwell
Piu Eatwell's Black Dahlia, Red Rose is a chilling and complex crime novel that delves into one of the most inscrutable murder cases in history. The 1947 death of aspiring starlet Elizabeth Short remains a puzzle, even 70 years after it was first reported. In her gripping noir-tinged account, Eatwell draws on exclusive interviews and recently declassified FBI files to unravel the mystery.
Piu Eatwell's Black Dahlia, Red Rose is part detective story and part history. It traces the final days of aspiring actress Elizabeth Short, as well as the circuitous investigation that was conducted by the police. In the process, Eatwell gets to know the man's daughter and finds out more about the murderer.
Victoria Langfeld's first published novel
Victoria Langfeld is a twenty-year-old author who lives in Ontario, Canada. She began working on her fantasy romance novel, The Red Rose, at age twelve, and has since gone through numerous drafts and character changes. Since she was a child, Langfeld has enjoyed writing fairy tale-style pieces, and her passion for writing has never wavered. Teachers and friends encouraged her to submit her novel to publishing houses. She tried the self-publishing route first, but in the end, she decided to work with an online company, iUniverse.
Comparisons to Sarah Winchester's "Mystery House"
While there are several similarities between the "Mystery House" and "Two Houses," they are distinctly different. Sarah Winchester's house was a haphazard construct, largely based on her warnings from a medium. The medium told her to err on the side of confusion by confusing the dead victims of Winchester rifle gunshot wounds. While this theory seemed unlikely to hold up, it did not deter Sarah, who lived in the house for 38 years.
The Winchester house had strange details like a carriage room covered with a roof. It also had a staircase with unusual doors. The staircase contained 44 steps and seven turns, which some people claim confuse ghosts. Others say Winchester's staircase was designed to be easier to climb for people with arthritis.
Flaws in the ending
Despite the fact that the ending is a tad ambiguous, the Red Rose episode does provide some interesting insights. The story revolves around the cult of the Red Rose and the Dark Web. The identity of the Gardener is never explained, though we are left to assume he is the real Gardener. However, the Gardener is not the only person behind the Red Rose.
While Stephen King is a great writer, he often struggles to come up with original ideas. His previous novel, The Haunting, followed a similar template, and Rose Red follows a similar path. Both movies feature similar characters and storylines. While Rose Red has similarities to other haunted house movies, it still succeeds in making its own mark in the horror genre.
