title: Rose (A New Tale) (Volume 1)
author: Madeline Simpkins
description: Madeline Simpkins was born and raised in the great city of Austin, Texas. She read an alarming number of books growing up, and still does to this day. This is her first book, which she completed at the age of 16 as a junior in High School. In her mind, the best day in the world would include a good book, a blanket, and a hot cup of tea.
zlib_text:   
  
  Rose Madder  
  
    
  
  
  
  
  
  Stephen King
  
  
  
  
  
    
  
  This book is for Joan Marks
  
  I'm really Rosie,
  
  And I'm Rosie Real,
  
  You better believe me,
  
  I'm a great big deal
  
  Maurice Sendak
  
  A bloody
  
  egg yolk. A burnt hole
  
  spreading in a sheet. An en-
  
  raged rose threatening to bloom.
  
  May Swenson
  
  
  
  
  
  Prologue
  
  Sinister Kisses
  
  She sits in the corner, trying to draw air out of a room which seemed to have
  plenty just a few minutes ago and now seems to have none. From what sounds
  like a great distance she can hear a thin whoop-whoop sound, and she knows
  this is air going down her throat and then sliding back out again in a series
  of feverish little gasps, but that doesn't change the feeling that she's
  drowning here in the corner of her living room, looking at the shredded
  remains of the paperback novel she was reading when her husband came home.
  
  Not that she cares much. The pain is too great for her to worry about such
  minor matters as respiration, or how there seems to be no air in the air she